Fab's AutoBackup 7 Pro - a must have tool for techs

[DavidH]

i am with Barcelona on this one - I do ask customers about whats important on their drive - pictures, documents etc and if they know roughly what there is and when they put it there. For the 1% of customers that do put stuff outside the standard file tree ( tend to be either kids or professional people like creatives) its always worthwhile to ask and gives you a heads up whether you should do some spelunking before you run fabs. Its worth the few minutes - both from a customer satisfaction perspectives but also minimises the overall amount of time you might spend by avoiding the arguments in the first place.

 

[Porthos]

when I know a client can be problematic, I'll image their drive just in case.

Wise words, I always trust my gut on this.

 

[fincoder]

They don't/won't care when you tell them "hey, you shouldn't store your stuff in <insert location> anyway!"
They'll just spread the word that YOU lost all their treasured memories.

I understand this is the mindset of some customers, but the bottom line is it's not my fault and most people understand that. I ask the customer the locations of files they need to recover and I get all that they requested. I also recover any other data I can find using Fabs, and if the system is still running I have a quick look at recently opened apps and file locations.

My judgement is that I do a good job at recovering files. Loss of data is incredibly rare, maybe a similar number of occurrences that everyone else here has had. I believe I put all reasonable effort into recovering user data. My business survives only because of smart compromises to keep my rates affordable in this economically depressed area.

i am with Barcelona on this one - I do ask customers about whats important on their drive

So do I. This puts some responsibility back onto the customer, but I still make all reasonable efforts to find other data. Opening all folders in non-data locations is not reasonable in my opinion.

 

[ChrisTech]

i am with Barcelona on this one - I do ask customers about whats important on their drive - pictures, documents etc and if they know roughly what there is and when they put it there. For the 1% of customers that do put stuff outside the standard file tree ( tend to be either kids or professional people like creatives) its always worthwhile to ask and gives you a heads up whether you should do some spelunking before you run fabs. Its worth the few minutes - both from a customer satisfaction perspectives but also minimises the overall amount of time you might spend by avoiding the arguments in the first place.

I 'Fab' every machine but do not image every one.

I have tweaked one of the Technibble Business Pack forms because I ask all customers where they save their Photos and Documents - and if they use any specialist programs such as Sage. They initial that part of the form that I have asked them and that I have noted what they say.

I'll check for "strange" folders up to a point but there has to be a limit.

 

[GTP]

I'll check for "strange" folders up to a point but there has to be a limit.

Yes there definitely has to be limits.
But working within the parameters I mentioned above, my limit is about 15 minutes. After that if I miss it they lose it.

 

[Diggs]

Can drive mappings be included in FABs?

 

[fabs]

Can drive mappings be included in FABs?

Do you mean backup and restore the user's mapped drives? If so, this is already the case. The option is called "network drives connections" in the user items tab.

 

[Diggs]

Oops - I see it now. Thx!

Is it checked by default? I see it didn't pick up the mapped drives on the backup I just did.

 

[fabs]

Oops - I see it now. Thx!

Is it checked by default? I see it didn't pick up the mapped drives on the backup I just did.

Yes it is. You should had a folder like this in your backup: "E:\test\2018-06-22\HOME\FAB\archive\NetworkDrives" and a network.reg file in it.
You have to log out and log back on to see the network drives connections in the explorer

 

[Diggs]

Hmm... I see what happened. It is a multi-profile computer and I only moved one profile to a new machine. It's an admin profile but the NetworkDrives folder is with the profile I didn't copy to the new machine hence no network drives.

@edit - I see I can move that folder into the other profile and all is good. Thx again!

 

[fabs]

Fab's AutoBackup 7 Pro V7.0.4.32732 has just been released.

Change log:
Added:
- 3D Objects Windows 10 user folder.
- Ability to transfer Windows 7 sticky notes to Windows 10 sticky notes app. Caution: all the existing sticky notes are lost in the process on the Windows 10 app if there are, so be careful!

Fixed:
- The order information was shown in clear on the main app when clicking the "key" icon on the upper right corner.
- Sometimes, cloud files could not be copied when dealing with another user profile due to missing required NTFS permissions.
- There was a glitch with network places item that was checked by default but the tile remained disabled (greyed out).
- The scheduled tasks could not be created using the command line builder tool on workstations not using 24 hours time format.

Grab it from your orders history's details on the shop's website at https://store.fpnet.fr/account.php?language=en or using the bundled updater tool (click the "Download Fab's AutoBackup 7.X" link within the program and get the updated files).


Note : there is still no default settings or any odd folders support in this update.

 

[Diggs]

Something happened and I haven't used this revision enough to figure out what the problem is. Several times I've tried to restore a profile on to a fresh N & P machine and after starting the restore I see the Public profile flash by and instantly done (because there was nothing in Public). The user profile failed to restore. I went back and tried to restore the user profile again and got pages of errors. Happened twice now. Each time I did another N&P and then just the user profile only and had no problem. Hmm..... Anybody else?

 

[fabs]

After some restore tests, it appears there is an issue when selecting the public backup and one or several users backups : all the users items remain in the "user data" tab remain grayed out.
This definitely needs to be fixed but looks a bit tricky at first sight. To workaround this until I release a fix, just do not select the public profile when you have to restore a user profile backup. The public profile will be implicitly selected: you will see a "public data" tab allowing you to restore or not the public stuff too.
If that can help...

 

[Diggs]

Yep - Explains what I am seeing. The workaround is fine.

Thanks!

 

[fabs]

The workaround is fine.

Thanks!

I have digged a bit around that issue and it looks like I have found something suitable. At least, the odd behavior is gone in my test version.
Thanks for the input!

 

[fabs]

Fab's AutoBackup 7 Pro V7.0.4.32750 has just been released.

Change log:
Fixed:
When running in command line mode and there was a windows.old folder on the source drive, the Windows.old folder was processed instead of the current Windows folder.
- Restoring user's data was not possible when public profile was selected too.

Grab it from your orders history's details on the shop's website at https://store.fpnet.fr/account.php?language=en or using the bundled updater tool (click the "Download Fab's AutoBackup 7.X" link within the program and get the updated files).


Note : there is still no default settings or any odd folders support in this update.

 

[GTP]

This ----V V V V

Note : there is still no default settings or any odd folders support in this update.

So if YOU don't bother to image before that N & P or take the time to look at the filesystem for odd folders your clients may have hidden then YOU are the problem NOT Fabs Autobackup!
Fabs Autobackup is a lifesaver but it still requires some physical effort on the tech's part!

 

[Slaters Kustum Machines]

This ----V V V V

So if YOU don't bother to image before that N & P or take the time to look at the filesystem for odd folders your clients may have hidden then YOU are problem NOT Fabs Autobackup!
Fabs Autobackup is a lifesaver but it still requires some physical effort on the tech's part!

End thread. This is the answer.

 

[fabs]

Fab's AutoBackup 7 Pro V7.0.4.32753 has just been released.

Change log:

Fixed:
- A fix in the previous release broke the direct transfer feature

Grab it from your orders history's details on the shop's website at https://store.fpnet.fr/account.php?language=en or using the bundled updater tool (click the "Download Fab's AutoBackup 7.X" link within the program and get the updated files).


Note : there is still no default settings or any odd folders support in this update.

 

[glennd]

Fab's AutoBackup 7 Pro V7.0.4.32753 has just been released.

Change log:

Fixed:
- A fix in the previous release broke the direct transfer feature

Grab it from your orders history's details on the shop's website at https://store.fpnet.fr/account.php?language=en or using the bundled updater tool (click the "Download Fab's AutoBackup 7.X" link within the program and get the updated files).


Note : there is still no default settings or any odd folders support in this update.

Hey Fab, regarding libraries, does AutoBackup grab all libraries or only the 'known' libraries, Documents, Music, Pictures, Videos? That is, if I was to create my own library within the Windows libraries system would it get backed up? And if a library has several folders configured on different drives will they all be included?