Folder sychronisation

Big Chris · 7 Jul 2012 at 17:46

I have a laptop and a media PC, both running Windows 7 Ultimate. I have folders on both machines for Music, Films, Pictures etc.

I download music, video, pics etc to my laptop first, then copy it to the same named folder on the PC if/when required over my home network as the folders are all shared and open to read/edit.

I'm frequently buying music though and adding albums to artist folders and it's a pain to keep pushing it all manually to the media PC. Is there a way I can sync the folders, so anything I add the laptop Music folder will also magically appear in the PC music folder? I've had a Google around and confused myself more if anything...

lurkio · 7 Jul 2012 at 18:42

create a batch file using the robocopy command and you can sync from your laptop to what ever other devices you want

robocopy sourcefolder \\destfolder /MIR

open dos window and type
robocopy /?

for more info

my example

SET SOURCE=F:\store\music
SET DEST1=\\nas\music

robocopy %SOURCE% %DEST1% /MIR

Big Chris · 12 Jul 2012 at 19:42

Thanks Lurkio, I have next to no idea what any of that means though I'm afraid!

Is there not something built into Windows that makes it simpler? I know you could sync folders in XP and probably before, I've never played with it and don't want to go in blind.

Raumarik · 12 Jul 2012 at 19:55

Synctoy 2.1 is from MS, it'd do this but won't sync automatically without you making it a scheduled task etc. But has a reasonably good GUI and is easy to use.

I tend to use fastcopy to sync my folders but I don't mind doing so manually as I want that extra control over it (lost too much in the past). Right click - fastcopy, set details and off it goes.

bledd · 13 Jul 2012 at 13:32

If it's all going on the laptop first and then getting copied to the PC, let me know the EXACT folder names and I'll write a robocopy file for you. It will just be a case of double clicking the file and it will copy all new/updated files

IE..

C:\user\Chris\Photos
C:\user\ChrisPC2\Photos

Big Chris · 13 Jul 2012 at 13:35

I don't mind manually asking it to sync, I can just do so every week or something when I've made updates to the folder on my laptop.

I'll give Synctoy a go on a test folder and see how I get on.

Cheers fellas