I recently bought a "Netgear ReadyNAS Duo" server. It comes with a 1TB drive, and has a hot-swap cage for a 2nd 1TB drive that -when installed- will automatically become a RAID mirror backup of the primary drive.The "manual" really sucks though, as it really doesn't explain much of anything. It took me several days to discover how to make it appear as "just another drive" on all of the computers on my LAN.It connects via my router, and I've now got it configured it to allow a selected folder-share to be accessed via an ftp connection. Pretty slick!I even found a "free" site that provides me a "domain name" that is aliased to my IP address, along with a tiny TSR utility, which will automatically update my "domain name" whenever the "lease expires" on my current IP, and Comcast forces a new IP on my account. This service is found here: http://dyndns.comI'm wanting to find free or pay software that will allow me to do complete image backups of both my Development computer and my Flightsim computer. Does anyone have any suggestions on what might best suit my purpose?

Bill: Windows will do that for you... look in the help under "system image". If something goes wrong you'll be able to restore to the state saved on the image.

I use Acronis True Image 2010

Bill: Windows will do that for you... look in the help under "system image". If something goes wrong you'll be able to restore to the state saved on the image.

Unfortunately, my development machine runs on Vista x32, and three of the other systems are WinXP/SP3. I need something that can be set up for any OS, and run automatically on a schedule......preferably with incremental backups.I'll look into Acronis True Image 2011 (current version).Thanks for the replies!

Using Acronis True Image very successfully. Btw. got my NAS configured the same way, and have been wondering if there is a way to access it on network basis over internet... currently looking into it!Would be kinda useful if I could for instance stream music over to my iPhone from the NAS over the internet. Or at least be at work or some holiday, and just open my network folder over internet in windows explorer.I think I gotta look into VPN...

Using Acronis True Image very successfully. Btw. got my NAS configured the same way, and have been wondering if there is a way to access it on network basis over internet... currently looking into it!Would be kinda useful if I could for instance stream music over to my iPhone from the NAS over the internet. Or at least be at work or some holiday, and just open my network folder over internet in windows explorer.I think I gotta look into VPN...

For FTP access, all I had to do was open up Port 21 on my router using "FTP" template. I have a Belkin G Wireless router. I did find though that if I power down the NAS for any reason, I may have to reconfigure the DCHP address for the NAS in the router... :)I can also open up a Port for HTTP access, or any other services I want.I obtained a "free" static domain address that provides a fixed URL I can use, and a tiny TSR utility that will automatically update the dyndns.com server with my dynamic IP address. Comcast has a fairly long "lease time" for dynamic IP's, but now I don't have to worry 'bout it! :)

I bought and installed Acronis True Image for my Development machine, and a second license (1/2 price!) for my Flightsim machine.I created and tested the recovery CD and it works just fine, accessing my NAS with no problems! Yeah! Now I feel a lot safer with my precious data as well as my OS System image.

Using Acronis True Image very successfully. Btw. got my NAS configured the same way, and have been wondering if there is a way to access it on network basis over internet... currently looking into it!Would be kinda useful if I could for instance stream music over to my iPhone from the NAS over the internet. Or at least be at work or some holiday, and just open my network folder over internet in windows explorer.I think I gotta look into VPN...

Something like Radmin?

Except Radim is remote desktop, file transfer at al, and I use it internally for the laptop, but that doesn't help me with my iphone and streaming.I gave up on VPN, as apparently whatever I set on my Linksys in VPN, Iphone can't access it. The idea would be to be able to shut down the main machine as it literally eats power and still be able to access stuff on the NAS, and also be able to wake the computer if needed. But WOL is apparently also not working...