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Best Folder Sync Program?

E

EttVenter

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jan 17, 2011
21
0
Hi guys,

Just bought my first MBP, and I really, really need an app that can do the following:

  • I need to be able to sync folders on the mac with folders on an external. I'm already doing this with Time machine, but I need to do it again with specific folders)
  • I need to be able to sync folders on one external with folders on another
  • I'd love for all of this to happen automatically

Every app I've found that does this costs almost $10. Any suggestions on free ones? The free ones are all lacking somewhere :(

Thanks!!
 
You make 10 bucks sound like a tremendous outlay. How does that compare to what you just spent on your MBP?

Would Dropbox be of any help?
 
Well yeah, I just spent a fortune on the machine, and another fortune on Photoshop and Lightroom. So I'm sure you can understand how a few thousand bucks out of my pocket could cause me to be a little stingy :p

Dropbox can only sync to dropbox. I want local folders to sync to each other.
 
I too was going to suggest rsync. It's free and it works amazingly well. But, you have to be technically minded and willing to use Terminal, read man pages (or similar doc), tinker a bit, and spend a bit of time.

I set up three little scripts that use rsync to back up three directories. One of them works across my local network to back up the user directories on an Windows XP (ntfs) machine to my iMac external disk. This took more time to set up than the simple iMac folder to folder synchronizing -- that was pretty easy.

I use OS X's launchd/launchctl services to run the scripts periodically instead of automator.
 
Check out the open source Unison app. It's cross platform, bi-directional, and free. It has every option you could imagine, but that means it also takes some work to configure, mostly with text files. There is a gui, but it's very limited.

It all depends on how much your time is worth (and data, if you configure something wrong).
 
Im sure Carbon Copy Cloner would do this, although it is no longer freeware and would cost about £20 (not sure of dollars) You can set up scheduled syncs or to sync when drives are connected. It also does disc cloning and can be used to create bootable backups on external drives. Its not free, but i'd recommend it anyway
 
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