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Last updated on 3/16/22

Explore Backup Concepts With EaseUS

 

For this section, you will install a third-party application on your computer; you may need to check with your IT support team if computer and business policies restrict such actions.

You’ll once again use your USB memory stick as the target for backups. You might want to erase any previous backups so that it doesn’t run out of room.

Discover Backup Software to Help You Automate Your Backups

Knowing how to create PowerShell scripts and automate them is really great for simple tasks, and we saw that Robocopy is easy to use. However, it has no built-in concept of keeping a GFS of incremental or differential backups, so we’ll have to consider using something else if we need to do this.

For more complex backups, it is simpler to use a purpose-built application with a graphical user interface (GUI); many options on the market cater tor all needs, from home users to global corporations; some of the more common applications are listed here: 

Backup Application

Needs

Commvault

Corporate backup solution

Veeam

Corporate backup solution

Druva

Data cloud backup system

Backblaze

Cloud storage

Bacula

Enterprise class open source backup solution

Veritas

Enterprise local storage and cloud system

EaseUS Todo Backup

Home and enterprise backup software

All of these applications support basic full, differential, and incremental backup operations and manage actions such as GFS scheme, audit trails, and backup validation.

Introducing EaseUs

To get the flavor of using a GUI-based backup tool, we’re going to take a look at the free version of EaseUS Todo Backup and try a few things.

To prepare for the exercises, visit EaseUS Todo Backup, download and install the Free User version of the software; you will have to supply an email address for this bit. 

Start the installer and confirm you want to use the free version. Additional code will be downloaded as the process continues. Eventually, you can click Start Now, close the purchase me nag screen, and click Create Backup

For our purposes, we’ll create a backup again using the Windows Fonts folder, so click Create Backup. For a real-world case, like PiraSTEM, you’d perhaps select My Documents and other folders containing important configuration and intellectual property files. 

The screenshot shows the Welcome to EaseUS Todo Backup window. At the bottom, create backup is selected.
Start your backup with EaseUS

Click Select Backup Contents. Then navigate to File.  

The screenshot shows how to select your backup contents with EaseUS. First, select backup contents, illustrated by a question mark icon, is selected. Then File, illustrated by a folder icon, is selected.
Select your backup contents

Here, use the EaseUs explorer to find and tick Fonts (it’s under Computer…C:...Windows), then click OK.

Next, click the right icon to select the destination for your backups. In our case, it will local drive, since we are using an USB-stick.

Different destinations for the backups are shown. From left to right: a desktop icon illustrates local drive; a cloud icon illustrate EaseUS Cloud; a server icon illustrate NAS.
Select the backup destination type

Select your USB memory stick as per previous exercises (here, it’s drive E :). Then click OK to save your settings, and you can now run a backup by clicking Backup Now

A list from the local drive is shown. USB STICK (E:) is selected. The button OK in the bottom right end corner is selected.
Select the backup destination with EaseUS

Automate Backup Frequency

Once the backup has completed, a pop-up window will allow you to set up a backup schedule. You can also do this from the main screen by selecting Options. On the options page, check out the Backup Scheme tab and see how you can create a range of backups, from one-time operations to repeated events.

Pop-up window once the backup is completed. Different tabs at the top; the backup scheme tab is open. On the left, daily is selected from the list. On the right, time and full backup method are set.
Set up a backup schedule with EaseUS

Also, note that the Backup method can be incremental, differential, or full. Just below, there is a really useful tick option to “Create a full backup every ‘n’ Backups.” This could be used instead of creating two backup tasks for a full backup and daily incrementals/differentials. 

Try setting up a daily full backup that runs at 17:30, as per the image above, then click OK to save your settings.

Perform Audits

EaseUS keeps a log of its activities, and this can be seen by clicking on Tools from the main screen then selecting Logs

The list appearing from clicking on Tools on the top right hand corner is shown. Logs, the second last item on the list, is selected.
View logs with EaseUS

 Try selecting the log for your Fonts backup and viewing its Details:

A log summary report window is shows. At the top, there are four categories, from left to right: all, successful, warning, failed. All is selected, and a list of logs is shown. At the bottom, the search can be refined by choosing a date range from the box
Log summary report

The EaseUS log is a summary report of the backup as a whole and does not list the actual files backed up.

Alternatively, you can check the backup image directly with EaseUS through the Tools menu, as shown below:

The list appearing from clicking on Tools on the top right end corner is shown. Check image, fourth from the top, is selected.
Check the integrity of a backup image with EaseUS

If everything worked well, you should get an output saying “Image check completed, no errors found,” and “Image check completed, no files lost”, as shown below:

The successful output of a check image is shown.
Backup image integrity check output

Retrieve Backups Regularly

As mentioned before, backups should be tested regularly to make sure they are working properly.

In EaseUs, you can also perform test restores of your backups through the Browse to Recover menu. Let’s take a look at how this is done. 

After clicking on Browse to Recover on the top right of your screen, you can see how to select the backup image (.pbd file) on your USB stick that you wish to restore.  

First, Browse to Recover on the top right end corner is clicked on, opening a Browse to Recover pop-up window in the middle. In the pop-up window a list of files is shown. From the Fonts folder, the file Fonts_20220101_Full_v1.pbd is selected.
Choose the backup to restore through Browse to Recover

Once the file has been identified and selected, click on Recover to, then use the Browse button to select the destination of your restore.

The pop-up window from clicking on Browse is shown. In the pop-up window a list of destination folders is shown. The folder restore, fourth from the bottom, is selected.
Select the destination of the backup restore

When selecting the Recover to field, remember it’s wiser to try to restore your backup to a test location. You can create a new folder as you choose your location in EaseUS.  

Once restored, you could use the fc.exe file compare utility as you saw in the chapter “Test That Your Backup Works.”  

Let’s Recap!

  • There are many GUI-based backup tools available for small businesses and corporations. 

  • Most GUI-based backup tools are based on the concepts of full/differential/incremental backups, GFS, and HSM and have logging and restore functionality.

  • EaseUS Todo Backup provides a free version of their backup tool.

  • EaseUS allows you to set up robust backups and backup management schemes.

  • EaseUS can support backup/restore testing.  

We’ve now had a look at the basic concepts of managing backups with Windows command line scripting and job scheduling. We’ve also seen how a commercial, GUI based tool applies the basic principles in a point and click way. 

Before we move on to the Linux world, let’s see whether you’ve soaked up any of this knowledge with a quiz. 

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