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Backing up files to external hard drive. Need advice.

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I have many 1000s of folders and files on my PC that I want to save to an external hard drive as a precaution in case my PC dies. I am using Windows 10 OS. For as long as I can remember, I have used “GFI backup freeware” (originally recommended by my computer tech) which has worked well for me especially because most of my data has file names or folder path names that exceed the 256 character limit, and GIF backup freeware was able to work around this obstacle.

In fact, before realizing there was a file/path character limit, I joined Carbonite as a cloud storage service but soon had to cancel my membership since it would not accommodate my long file/path names. Similarly, when I tried “copying and pasting” my files from my PC to an external hard drive, it also gave me the same error message.

In the last few weeks, my GFI freeware has not been working. I have tried to download a newer version, but I cant find any on the web, leading me to believe GFI is not offering it’s back-up freeware anymore. Is anyone aware of the status of GFI backup freeware?

My current situation is that I need to back up my PC’s hard drive within a few days, since my new PC will be arriving then, so I want to have my files securely backed up before the new installation. The dilemma is that without GFI backup freeware, I will need another transfer app/program that will allow me to transfer these long file names from my PC to an external hard drive and I don’t know of any. I could go in and shorten the file/folder names to within 256 characters, but that would take me longer than a few days.

I would appreciate any suggestions on what I can do.

Thank you.
 
have you tried using \\?\ for long name support?

for example I use ViceVersa as my paid-for backup software and to get around the 256 character limit, the software allows the folder name path to be prefixed as such - \\?\shared folder\local folder\etc....
 
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