Vista backup utility & backing up on to a network drive
By sedel1027
@sedel1027 (17846)
Cupertino, California
December 23, 2009 10:22am CST
I had to purchase a new computer recently and am now stuck with Vista for a few months. My old computer had XP Professional on it and I had no issues at all using the back up utility to back up my files to an external hard drive on our network. Now when I try to set up the backup utility on Vista, the program is asking for a password. I am logged into the computer as the Admin, there is no password on the external hard drive, I can access the hard drive and view all the files on the drive without entering any type of password.
Any ideas?
2 responses
@jazelann (112)
• Philippines
23 Dec 09
Whew! I have never experienced anything like that!. I think the back-up utility on Vista is different from that of XP. But, it should have run you know. When you've set up the back-up utility using xp, does it require you any password?
Or when you were using xp, did you have password on your account?
@sedel1027 (17846)
• Cupertino, California
23 Dec 09
Nope, there was no password required when I set up the backup utility when I had XP.
@sedel1027 (17846)
• Cupertino, California
31 Dec 09
Nope, not a virus. We figured out what we need to do but its going ot be a huge pain in the butt. I hate Vista.
@livewyre (2450)
•
23 Dec 09
I use SyncBack from 2BrightSparks - they have a free version which I find pretty easy to use, their site is here:
http://www.2brightsparks.com/
I don't know if they have any problems with VISTA, but because the program works even when you are logged off, they also require a password.
One of the things that is a real No-No from a security point of view is to be looged on as admin and have no password!! that gives hackers complete control over your machine as Administrator... the only thing worse than that is to them go on a public forum and tell everyone... oooh hang on... you just did that too!!
First things first, add a password to any account on your PC that has admin rights...! then you can try the backup thing again...
First things first, add a password to any account on your PC that has admin rights...! then you can try the backup thing again...@sedel1027 (17846)
• Cupertino, California
23 Dec 09
No, my admin account on my pc has a password. That is not what the backup utility is asking for. its asking for a password to access the external hard drive, which doesn't have a password.
@livewyre (2450)
•
23 Dec 09
Sound very odd, my SyncBack software asks for a password, but that is so that it can schedule a task whether you are logged in or not.
The fact remains that you should not really be logged on as Admin with no password if you have internet access - I would change that right now, and worry about the backup later. If you do set a password, try that as the backup password and see if that actually does the trick. If not download syncback...
@sedel1027 (17846)
• Cupertino, California
31 Dec 09
As I said, my Admin account does have a password, the backup drive itself doesn't.
