Backing up Outlook automatically

We all know we should back up our data regularly.  Sometimes its tough to get to, or remember to and that’s why I look for the most idiot proof  method available.  James Kendrink pointed me to Jake Ludington’s blog with a simple, and better yet, free method for backing up my Outlook data daily.  He uses a simple text file to create a batch file that is then run by Window’s Scheduled Tasks.

The upside is that this method is completely free and that it can be set up in about two minutes.  I have a 2 GB SD card that sits in my laptop all the time and which I use for backups.  I’ve followed Jakes simple steps to backup all of my Outlook data daily.

The downside is that Outlook has to be closed to do this.  That’s not Jake’s fault, that is a limitation with almost every file; they’re locked while in use.  Since I rarely ever close Outlook, and neither does Jake, he includes a command that closes Outlook before running the ‘copy’ command.  This isn’t exactly rocket-science, but if you’re looking for an easy way to backup Outlook, or any other folder for that matter, check out Jake’s simple method.  James points out that OutbackPlus does the same thing, and also backs up your IE and Firefox settings and other docs as well.  The only catch is that it is $39.95