Nero BackItUp & Burn

Priced at $40, BackItUp & Burn isn't best of breed at any particular backup task, but it's good at all of them and it performed nearly perfectly in my tests. The only bump in the road was a warning that the Windows OS partition I was attempting to create an image of wasn't locked. Regardless, the imaging process proceeded without incident, though I wish that the program had given me the option to consolidate the backup into one file instead of splitting it into 2GB parts. On the other hand, 2GB files are perfect for DVD, and the program takes advantage of Nero's optical expertise with support for DVD-R/RW as well as CD-R/RW and BD-R/RE.

My only gripe about BackItUp & Burn involves its hefty 304MB footprint, which is due in large part to the included CD recovery image (and the included Nero Express, Nero BurnRights, and Nero RescueAgent), but also in part to its requiring--and installing--Microsoft Installer 4.5, .Net 3.5, Microsoft Visual Studio redistributable, and Microsoft Primary Interoperability Assemblies 2005 (if you don't have them installed already). Caveat: Don't blindly click through unless you really want the Ask toolbar and a new home page (Ask.com).