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    I'm trying to backup a folder on my E drive (LHS of sync) to external drive F (RHS of sync),  my problem is that the RHS F drive is actually 2 drives which are swapped round every week.

    When I use Synctoy 2.0 only those files which it thinks have changed (ie date greater than at last sync) get echoed over to the RHS folder.

    On the old version 1.4 Synctoy would copy all changes and also older files if they were missing from the right hand side as it would compare LHS folder to RHS folder. Version 2 seems to miss these files after the 1st time the program is run.

     

    Can Synctoy 2.0 do this?

    Tuesday, September 16, 2008 10:49 AM

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    I agree - if what you have already works, then keep it as-is.  However, if you decide to upgrade, I don't think that you will experience major problems with multiple hdds in SyncToy 2 as long as you create duplicate folder pairs.  I assume that you have a scheduled task that runs on a set schedule to back up your items.  To get around the problem where SyncToy requires a unique folder pair for each unique hdd, you can set up two scheduled tasks.  So, let's say that your task runs on a weekly basis.  Then, you can create ScheduledTask1 to run on all odd weeks and ScheduledTask2 to run on all even weeks. 

    One of nice things about SyncToy v2 is that it now offers a command line utility.  With previous versions, when we ran a scheduled task, the GUI version appeared and did its thing.  Now, we can run a command line tool called SyncToyCmd.exe and if needed, have its output redirected to a text file for further analysis (for instance, you may want to verify that all of the jobs completed successfully instead of just a message in the scheduled tasks window that says result code 0x0 or something like that).
    Monday, October 27, 2008 9:08 PM

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    I am having the EXACT same issue! Using Synctoy v2 on Windows Vista, using echo mode.

    It works great on the original destination drive, but when I swap the external destination drive it only syncs over the newly changed files. Is there a way to have it compare LHS with what's already on RHS, or any other solution?

    Please I am desperate!

    Thank You.
    Saturday, October 25, 2008 3:03 AM
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    It looks like we are out of luck with SyncToy v2.  I was in your situation too and I had to end up replicating about all 15 folder pairs (backup jobs) so that I can successfully sync with a second hdd because I had the same problem as you did.  I am almost certain SyncToy v1.4 didn't have this problem.
    Saturday, October 25, 2008 3:16 AM
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     Aakash Shah wrote:
    It looks like we are out of luck with SyncToy v2.  I was in your situation too and I had to end up replicating about all 15 folder pairs (backup jobs) so that I can successfully sync with a second hdd because I had the same problem as you did.  I am almost certain SyncToy v1.4 didn't have this problem.


    Dear Aakash,

    So basically you have TWO SETS of identical folder pairs for each unique external hard drive, all using the same drive letter for destination?

    Thanks for the quick response!
    Saturday, October 25, 2008 3:31 AM
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    Yup - I have two identical folder pairs for each unique external hdd. It uses the same drive letter because I only ever have one hdd connected to the computer at any given time, so there is no problem with this.
    Saturday, October 25, 2008 8:01 AM
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    Thank you Aakash, you have been VERY helpful! I will give it a shot later tonight.
    Saturday, October 25, 2008 10:10 PM
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    Thanks for the suggestion, I'm not sure if it'll work for me though as mine is a totally automated process on a machine I don't normally log into other than to check now and again. If the  change over of external drives gets out of kilter (ie Christmas holidays), it may leave me with a bigger problem.

     

    I have gone back to v1.4 until i can see a better way.

     

    Thanks for your replies.

    Monday, October 27, 2008 11:13 AM
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    I agree - if what you have already works, then keep it as-is.  However, if you decide to upgrade, I don't think that you will experience major problems with multiple hdds in SyncToy 2 as long as you create duplicate folder pairs.  I assume that you have a scheduled task that runs on a set schedule to back up your items.  To get around the problem where SyncToy requires a unique folder pair for each unique hdd, you can set up two scheduled tasks.  So, let's say that your task runs on a weekly basis.  Then, you can create ScheduledTask1 to run on all odd weeks and ScheduledTask2 to run on all even weeks. 

    One of nice things about SyncToy v2 is that it now offers a command line utility.  With previous versions, when we ran a scheduled task, the GUI version appeared and did its thing.  Now, we can run a command line tool called SyncToyCmd.exe and if needed, have its output redirected to a text file for further analysis (for instance, you may want to verify that all of the jobs completed successfully instead of just a message in the scheduled tasks window that says result code 0x0 or something like that).
    Monday, October 27, 2008 9:08 PM
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    Just wanted to confirm that it is working perfectly now. Thanks again Aakash!
    Wednesday, October 29, 2008 10:39 PM
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    Has anyone tried just copyingTarget Drive #1's .dat file to target drive #2?  There's a hidden/system .dat file created by SyncToy in the root of the sync folders in both the source and target drives.  Can the .dat file from target drive #1 be copied to #2, such that a single SyncToy sync can be done with swapped target drives?
    Friday, March 5, 2010 7:03 PM