NVBackup Version 1.16 Released

The latest version of NVBackup was released this morning (2007-02-11 09:29). NVBackup is part of Alexander Pruss's HandyPalmStuff project on SourceForge. All products in the project are freeware. Since NVBackup uses undocumented methods to provide backups on NVFS (new) devices, so USE AT YOUR OWN RISK.

I use NVBackup all the time on my Palm T|X and it is a lifesaver (truth be told, ANY backup program, used regularily, is a lifesaver [GRIN] ). I have NVBackup scheduled to perform a backup every morning at 0300, reset the T|X and set the time from the internet. For anyone with an NVFS Palm, who doesn't already have a backup program they run on a regular basis... I highly recommend you give NVBackup a try! You can download NVBackup directly here.

NVBackup is currently the most popular HandyPalmStuff project. It is a backup utility for NVFS-based PDAs: Palm T5, LifeDrive, TX, TE2, Treo 650, Treo 700P. Unlike commercial backup utilities that access data via the database cache, this reads data direct out of the flash disk where it is store. This seems to be the best backup utility in terms of restoring the exact state of the system before the backup, without a need to reenter registration codes for other software (there may be one or two exceptions) or anything else.

Features include:

• scheduled daily backups (including on locked devices)
• ftp server support--automatically or manually export your backup to an ftp server
• compression and checksum1
• AES 128-bit encryption
• selective restore
• fast update of existing backup
• connect to atomic clocks on the Internet to set the time, either manually or after a scheduled backup
• BSD licensed so you can make a closed-source commercial backup program on the basis of this

Pros over some commercial solutions:

• exact state restoration, usually with no need for warm or hard reset before restoring
• should work better on unstable systems (e.g., due to unstable third-party utilities) than other utilities
• may be faster for very large backup sets (say, 50mb)
• does not affect cache memory significantly

Cons:

• backup cannot be restored on another model PDA or maybe even on the same model PDA after a ROM upgrade
• uses undocumented APIs
• slower for smaller backup sets than some commercial solutions

Recent Updates:
1.16: Help prevent freeze after backup.
1.15: Fix potential crash problem!
1.14: Alert after a bad scheduled (or crashed manual) backup.