All sections of this FAQ page apply to v7.0 or higher of Backup Plus only.

Yes. Writing to CDR & CDRW disks is supported as long as the disks have been pre formatted to accept direct file writes. You will need to have some type of CD software installed on your system that makes your CDR drive act as a standard drive. We suggest Adaptec/Roxio DirectCD. Most CD writable devices come packaged with software of this type. Spanning of CDR & CDRW disks is also supported and has been successfully tested with v2.5d+ of Adaptec/Roxio DirectCD.

Error #503 means that Backup Plus ® is not able to write to the destination. This almost always means that the CD you are trying to use has not been pre formatted with DirectCD or other packet writing software. Ensure the CD has been pre formatted.

Error #507 when performing a multiple disk style backup usually means that Backup Plus ® cannot write the requested amount of data to the CD. Ensure when you select the multiple CD style backup, that you set the drop down listing for the data amount to be written to each CD to no larger than the formatted CD can hold. In most cases, a CDRW disk formatted using DirectCD will only allow for 530 MB to 550 MB of data to be written to the disk. You can check how much space is available on an inserted disk using Windows Explorer.

If you are planning to write the backup more than once, you should always use CDRW disks, as the data can be deleted from these disks and the disk space recovered after doing so. CDR disks should always be used fresh and then put away once you have written to them once using Backup Plus ®.

There are some other common reasons for either of these errors to be reported:

(1) If you have anti virus software running on your system that performs auto checks of data as it is being written or downloaded for example, you should disable the auto protect before backing up your backup set.

(2) Ensure your system is not running many other applications that take up a considerable amount of system resources. We suggest disabling ALL applications including those in your system tray.

This means that Backup Plus ® is having problems writing the backup archive to the CDRW disk. This can happen with some CDR devices if system resources are low or a particular file is rather large. A suggestion to avoid this problem would be to write the backup archive to your hard drive first and then simply drag the backup archive in 'Windows Explorer' to your CDR device for storage. You can also get answers to error codes under the Errors & Warnings section of Backup Plus ® help.

The Backup Set (BPS) file is a configuration file which tells Backup Plus ® what you want to backup and saves any settings defined for that Backup Set. The Backup Archive (BAC) file is your actual backup file, which contains the backed up files and folders.

Yes, very easily. Simply choose the Restore toolbar button in Backup Plus ® to view the contents of a created backup archive. You do not have to restore anything if you do not wish to.

If you wish to use another program to perform a scheduled backup, we suggest using Windows Scheduler. When adding a new task using Windows Scheduler, do not select the actual program, but use the browse button on the Scheduler Wizard dialog and browse to the backup sets sub folder and select the backup set you wish to perform. This will perform the backup much in the same way that a desktop shortcut to a backup set does.

Backup Plus ® is not a disaster recovery utility. While some users do indeed backup their entire system, counting on Backup Plus ® to restore your system back to it's original state is not an option. Backup Plus ® requires a basic install on Windows in order to run, thus restores cannot be performed from a DOS prompt. It's true purpose is to ensure your important documents and files are backed up and safe for retrieval.

Backup set formatting has changed between v6 and v7 of Backup Plus ®. You will need to recreate your previous backup sets using v7 of Backup Plus ® now.

You can consult a full listing of error codes and warnings by choosing the Help/Contents option and checking the Error Codes & Warnings section.

Yes. Backup Plus ® can perform incremental backup operations. This simply means that only the files that have changed since your last backup will be updated in your backup archive and any new found files will also be included. On the Actions Menu, with the backup set open, choose the Default Location & Settings option. The update option will be available to your there.

Keep in mind that when a large backup is being updated, the folders and files to be backed up need to be preprocessed, then the existing archive needs to be read in order to compare the old files with the new ones. This can take some time on large backups when performing an incremental backup operation.

When Backup Plus ® is first installed, there is a shortcut created to start the Timed Backups Manager in the Windows StartUp folder. You can simply delete this shortcut to stop the Timed Backups Manager from loading. Below you can find instructions for doing this:

This will stop the Timed Backups Manager from loading in your system tray the next time you start your system.

Miscellaneous

Currently Backup Plus ® does NOT support Tape Drives although most other devices are supported.

Backup Plus ® can handle up to 4 GB of data at a time. Higher end systems can handle this size, while lower end systems with limited amounts of RAM may not handle these archives. Also, if a created archive is this large and the archive is being incrementally updated, you will need to have at least that amount of hard drive space available for BP to create a backup copy of the archive while updating it.

Also, a single file included in a backup archive cannot exceed 2 GB in size. The amount of files that can be included in a backup archive cannot exceed 65,535.