I use a removable USB hard drive to keep various files on so when I travel or go to a friends house I have all of the files I need. I also keep a copy of the file on the internal hard drive of my desktop. The external hard drive serves as a backup of sorts but I need to have access to the files immediately and the backup software I use (NovaBackup 7.x) saves backups in one large file that can be extracted in case of hard drive failure. Great for backing up an entire computer, a pain in the ass for a few files at at time.

I have been looking, for some time now, for a program that automatically synchronizes any two (or more) folders between two drives with as little input from me as possible. I only wanted to have to save it once. Call me lazy. Linux had a built in utility for this which was quite convenient but I could never find a proper replacement for my windows machines.

I found my answer in a sweet little application from Microsoft (surprise to me!). Best of all, it’s free! It’s called Sync Toy and it really doesn’t get any easier than this program. I installed it – the only requirement for installation is having .NET framework 2.0 – and had my folders from my desktop and external hard drive synchronized in a matter of minutes. A wizard takes you through all the necessary steps.

Now any changes I make to the folders I have set up in Sync Toy are automatically mirrored between the drives, regardless of which drive I save the file to. This is a god send seeing that I do a majority of my work on three different computers.

If you want to give this excellent tool a whirl you can download it here. Enjoy!

Filed under: F.Y.I., Tech, Tips