ChronoSync to the Rescue
Posted by Dan Israel on Jan 24, 2014 in Video
For over a decade I used Retrospect to accomplish my back up tasks. However, Dantz/EMC just continue to abuse their user base. The two most annoying:
- A time out on the software. At the end of five years, the software license expired and you were force to buy a moder version in order to continue archiving.
- A lack of backward compatibility. It is complete absurd for software design to archive and restore to not be backward compatible with itself. How the brain trust at Dantz concluded that Restrospect V7 did not need to be able to read V6 archives is beyond me. Especially when you can not run the two version simultaneously.
So…I guess you would say we mutally parted ways. However coming to the Rescue at fraction of the cost is a great program I rely heavely on now called ChronoSync. This is utility that has more flexiblity that I’ve been able to surpase. And it has a user interface that is amazingly intuitive.
AVCHD ARCHIVE
Here is an example of one of my uses:I have a prosumer camcorder that has an internal hard drive in it. Every time I use it, I mount it to the mac via usb. I then run a ChronoSync script that syncroizes the camcorders internal drive to an external hard drive I have. This produces not only a perfect mirror of the camcorder, but you can set the script to archive the changes as well. They’ve even included the ability to “DIGEST PACKAGES” saving in extraordinary amount of time if you are running Mountain Lion (which now packages the AVCHD folder structure).I have ChronoSync mirror the camcorder to a folder on the drive. I have a folder for each year. Then at the end of the year, I change the folders permission on the mirror to READ ONLY. Make a new folder, re-point ChronoSync, and format the drive in the camcorder for a fresh start. By doing this, if anything every happened to the camcorder, I would only lose the footage I was in the process of shooting.It’s a great utility! Here is a
link to their site if you would like more information. It’s very reasonably priced. Has updates free for life. And great support. But most of all, it’s just good software that does what it supposed to do exceptionally well.
