Frequently Asked Questions
Is it required to reboot the computer after installation/upgrade?
No, a reboot is no longer required to complete installation or update of MirrorFolder v6.0.
Why RAID-1 type mirroring option is not supported in MirrorFolder v6.0?
We had to drop this feature as it uses a kernel mode file system filter driver, which requires an extended code signing certificate and attestation signing by Microsoft. This is somewhat difficult to obtain here for us.
Removing this driver component from our software also eliminated a rare possibility of undesirable system crash, which may occur due to conflict with some other filter driver present on the system, and not necessarily due to any bug in our driver. It is also almost impossible to diagnose any BSOD problem without obtaining the crash dump file. Removing this boot time driver also removed the requirement of system reboot during installation or update of our software.
It is now possible to setup mirroring for an entire drive efficiently using other options present in MirrorFolder v6.0. Please read the FAQ below to know how to do this.
So, considering all these, we decided to drop this feature.
How to setup mirror of an entire hard drive in MF v6.0?
You can set up a mirror of an entire drive to another local drive, a shared network drive, or a remote storage location using the following options. For this to work correctly, we need to create a volume snapshot to copy open and locked files and use the
Change Journal option to quickly find the list of files that have changed since the last synchronization. Both options require administrative privileges. So, for the '
Run as' option, you need to select
'System' when mirroring to another local or remote storage location, or a user name with administrative privileges when mirroring to a network shared drive. Note that booting from the mirror drive is not supported.
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Schedule: Synchronize periodically with a short time interval, say one hour.
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Schedule: Synchronize on startup or when the drive is connected.
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Schedule: Synchronize independently with task priority 'Background'.
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Schedule: Enable multi-threaded synchronization with a thread count of four or more.
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SyncOptions: Synchronize incrementally using Change Journal.
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SyncOptions: Replicate file delete operations.
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SyncOptions: Replace the mirror file, even if it has a newer time stamp.
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CopyOptions: Create a volume snapshot to copy open and locked files.
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CopyOptions: Copy file and folder permissions (ACLs), if required.
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CopyOptions: Delete files and folders that do not exist under the source path.
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Filter: Exclude subfolders that are temporary, or if you do not want to mirror them.
If you are mirroring to another local drive, you may remove the drive letter mapping for the mirror drive in Windows '
Disk Manager' software after setting up the mirror to make it normally inaccessible to other software running on your system. MirrorFolder will use the volume path name of the mirror drive to synchronize files.
How to setup mirror of a folder containing very large files that remain opened and locked for a long time?
For files that remain opened and locked for long time, a volume snapshot of the drive is required to be created to copy these files. You can use the following options when mirroring a folder containing large files that remain opened and locked.
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Schedule: Synchronize periodically with an interval that is not too small.
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CopyOptions: Create a volume snapshot to copy opened and locked files.
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CopyOptions: Copy files differentially with a suitable block size like 64KB. This option works only for mirror folders on local and network shared drives.
Select other options as default or as per your need.
Can I backup my smartphone with MirrorFolder v6.0?
Yes, the Cloud edition of MirrorFolder can backup any smart phone if you are running an FTP or WebDAV server software on it, and connecting through local WiFi network. You can then mirror folders from this FTP or WebDAV server to your local or network shared drive. Select a source path on the server and use the following options for its mirroring.
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Schedule: Synchronize periodically with a suitable time interval.
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Schedule: Synchronize on startup or when the drive is connected.
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Schedule: Disable multi-threaded synchronization.
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SyncOptions: Replace mirror file even if it has newer time stamp.
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History: Archive file before it is overwritten/deleted during synchronization.
We suggest to disable multi-threaded synchronization option as an FTP or WebDAV server running on a smart phone may face difficulty serving multiple file requests simultaneously at very high rate. Enabling archive option will also preserve older and deleted files in another location. Note that you may not want to run the server always on your phone to preserve battery power, but whenever you will start the server, MirrorFolder will also start synchronizing files from it within few minutes.