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I'm making a small network in our company that will comprise of 4 machines:

1 Windows 95 PC
1 Windows NT 4.0 PC
1 Windows XP PC
1 Windows XP Server

I want to be able to run one solution that supports XP, NT 4.0, and 95. I was thinking that an application that ran on the server and did image-based backups would be the way to go, but I want to know what are some specific applications that can definitely do this. I also want to make sure it can back up open files as well, as the machines tend to be in use to some degree 24/7.

What are some good applications for this?

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    OK, I HAVE to ask: What cause do you have for running Windows 95? While awesome for bringing back memories, that doesn't seem necessary or safe for normal business uses.
    – Luke has no name
    Jul 23, 2010 at 13:51
  • We run some specialized machinery that interfaces with a PC and only support Windows 95. It would cost tens of thousands of dollars to upgrade them, so we keep them chugging for as long as possible. (:
    – WDot
    Jul 23, 2010 at 13:55
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    @Luke We still have one Win3.11 box because it's attached to a half-million dollar scientific instrument and the only drivers for it are for a 20 year old OS. This is a familiar pain.
    – sysadmin1138 ♦
    Jul 23, 2010 at 14:05
  • @Luke, the manufacturing world is full of crap like this. We know it's a pile of crap; but like WDot and Sys said, upgrading costs amazing mounts of money.
    – Chris S
    Jul 23, 2010 at 14:30
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    No such thing as XP Server.
    – John Gardeniers
    Jul 27, 2010 at 2:03

4 Answers 4

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I doubt many modern good backup solutions support software that old. You might be better off with something like Clonezilla and storing as many important files as possible on the network (preferably on a more modern OS/Server).

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Synback SE might be a solution 

http://www.2brightsparks.com/syncback/sbse.html
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Legacy applications often use file-based databases involving many files, and they have no mechanisms for ensuring data is flushed to a correct state before backup. So be careful with imaging and replication solutions if they are used when people are working on the systems in question - can you guarantee that you can restore to a stable position ?

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Since they are all Windows machines, they (hopefully) all have Windows File Sharing. If you can share the directories that need to be backed up, you can then use smbmount on a Linux/BSD/(whatever OS's Samba is available for) server to mount the shared folders, copy the files off and put them under a decent backup solution.

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