Software Syncing Conclusions

By Sean Kerner, published on February 13, 2008
Source: Tom's Guide US | Keywords: , , | Themes: Software

9. Software Syncing Conclusions

Conclusions

When choosing a syncing solution, it’s probably a good idea to first figure out your own usage scenario. Do you need to do local backups to a local network storage or USB thumb drive or do you need an always-on PC-to-PC backup? Or is it something in between?

It terms of an all around solution that can do both local and remote, GoodSync is a solid choice. That said, GoodSync’s local syncing features are not as robust compared to what Allway Sync offers and its remote PC syncing isn’t as feature rich as either BeInSync or FolderShare’s offerings. But you can do both local and remote, so if that’s what you need, give GoodSync a try.

If you’re just looking for a powerful local synchronization solution, Allway Sync with its multi-way synchronization options and really complete options for handing file deletions is a very good choice.

For remote PC-to-PC synchronization, both BeInSync and FolderShare are impressive easy-to-use solutions. At this point the edge goes to BeInSync as it offers more features for controlling transfers and because it makes it easy to identify on your desktop what is synced and what is shared. However, BeInSync is a significantly more expensive product compared to FolderShare, which currently is free (although that is likely to change once Microsoft moves it out of beta).

The bottom line as always is that synchronization solutions are all about choice. All of the solutions in this review have free trial versions available to try out and “synchronize” for yourself. So go and figure out what your needs are and get synced.

See our earlier article on Syncing Software.

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Comments

Anonymous 02/14/2008 12:55 PM
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Dsynchronize by domio is free and can handle all sorts of syncing scenarios without the fruity looking interfaces.

Anonymous 02/14/2008 12:55 PM
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Dsynchronize by domio is free and can handle all sorts of syncing scenarios without the fruity looking interfaces.

peppe 02/14/2008 12:55 PM
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Dsynchronize by domio is free and can handle all sorts of syncing scenarios without the fruity looking interfaces.

Anonymous 02/14/2008 1:12 AM
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www.powerfolder.com
you forget to mention that one

Anonymous 02/14/2008 2:46 AM
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No SuperFlexible File Synchronizer? Too complicated for you?

Anonymous 02/14/2008 3:56 AM
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Foldershare has been in beta for years - I think it's abandonware (though I use it and love it)

Anonymous 02/14/2008 6:20 AM
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You seem to have forgotten the tried and proven robocopy from the Windows Server 2003 resource kit. It runs in a simple batch file, which can be generated by robocopygui. It's ugly but works extremely well, can be scheduled using Task Scheduler, can sync changes in both directions, and is a favorite business solution that works just as well for me at home, even in Vista x64.

Anonymous 02/14/2008 7:35 AM
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i like unison
http://www.cis.upenn.edu/~bcpierce/unison/
freeware, open source, and works cross platform and remotely.
allows remote SSH sync, too. pretty simple, no automated options, though. pick one dir, then another (local or remote) to sync it to...and it does the hard part. asks about files it is not sure about.

peace.

Anonymous 02/14/2008 7:39 AM
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maybe not open source. there is a link to the source code...but it is broken. well, free, anyway. ;-p

Anonymous 02/14/2008 8:15 AM
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Hey ! Where is MirrorFolder? you missed the best !

tot 02/14/2008 8:45 AM
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You definitively forgot PowerFolder!!! (http://www.powerfolder.com)

tot 02/14/2008 8:46 AM
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You definitively forgot PowerFolder !!!

tot 02/14/2008 8:47 AM
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Anonymous 02/14/2008 9:32 AM
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mmhh nice list a little bit late for me:D. i finally came to PowerFolder. I think its better and i can run my smaller clients

Anonymous 02/14/2008 11:48 AM
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What about Windows Offline Folders and My Briefcase?

Anonymous 02/14/2008 1:34 PM
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I was surprised you left out Microsoft Groove. In addition to being an amazingly easy to use sync program, it also has wonderful team collaboration features built in. I can drag a file in to groove and auto-sync with an unlimited number of computers across the interet, lan, or even wireless ad-hoc.

When I worked overseas, we used Groove to handle a 4 man project team's collaboration efforts. Whenever one of us updated a directory on our computer that was setup as a shared directory, the other users were updated automatically. Wonderfully easy to use.

Anonymous 02/14/2008 4:31 PM
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Allway Sync is rather buggy and has several times during sync deleted all files on both shares.

Anonymous 02/14/2008 6:53 PM
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Capivara works very well for me!

www.capivara.org

Anonymous 02/14/2008 7:21 PM
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Vice Versa is hands down the best tool. Archiving function is awesome
http://www.tgrmn.com/

Anonymous 02/14/2008 10:57 PM
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imho, by far the best sync software is vice versa 2 pro (not tested here)


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