Someone reviewed v on Jul 5, 2022

Pros: 555

Cons: 555

Bottom Line: 555

KatieKate reviewed v2.1 on Feb 8, 2011

It's pretty good software all around. I found it does a semi-flawless job in keeping my stuff synced.

No complaints here!

driver8 reviewed v2.1 on Nov 12, 2009

wow ! some great updates in this one, considering it's only a '.1' update ! Looking forward to seeing the speed updates, and the auto drive-letter fix. Good for Win7 and 64-bit.

* Better Performance: The speed of file copy operations is significantly increased across the board.
* Improved Robustness: Much more resilient to transient network and file system errors and better error reporting which pin-points which file the sync failed on in case there’s a fatal error that stops the sync.
* Folder pair configuration backup: Folder pair configuration is automatically backed up under %localappdata%\microsoft\synctoy\2.0. User can replace SyncToyDirPairs.bin with the backup copy to resolve last saved configuration.
o Fixed the data corruption issue when using SyncToy with NAS drives.
o Fixed the issue that prevented uploading files to SharePoint when using SyncToy 2.0.
o Fixed the issue that prevented delete changes from being synchronized when the sync option is set to “Echo”.
o Fixed the UI issue where reported file time were off by the difference between local time and UTC when destination is a FAT volume.
* Dynamic Drive Letter Assignment: Drive letter reassignment will now be detected and updated in the folder pair definition.
* True Folder Sync: Folder creates, renames and deletes are now synchronized for all SyncToy actions.
* Exclusion Filtering Based on Name: File exclusion based on name with exact or fuzzy matching.
* Filtering Based on File Attributes: The ability to exclude files based on one or more file attributes (Read-Only, System, Hidden).
* Unattended Folder Pair Execution: Addressed issues related to running scheduled folder pairs while logged off.
* Folder Pairs With Shared Endpoints: Ability for folder pairs associated with the same or different instances of SyncToy to share end-points.
* Command line enhancements: Added the ability to manage folder pairs via the command line interface.
* Re-Architect Sync Engine: The SyncToy engine has been rearchitected to provide scalability and the ability to add significant enhancements in future releases.
* Sync engine is also more robust insomuch that many single, file level errors are skipped without affecting the entire sync operation.
* Sync Encrypted Files: Sync of Encrypted files works when local folder and files are encrypted, which addresses the common scenario involving sync between local, encrypted laptop PC folder and remote, unencrypted desktop PC folder.
* 64-Bit Support: SyncToy now has a native 64-bit build (x64 only) for 64-bit versions of Windows.
* Folder pair rename
* Sub-folder Exclusion Enhancements: Descendents created under excluded sub-folders are automatically excluded. Usability improvements for the sub-folder exclusion dialog.
* Folder Pair Metadata Moved: Folder pair metadata removed from MyDocuments to resolve any issues with server-based folder pair re-direction setup.
* Setup Improvements: Integrated setup with single self-extracting archive file and no extra downloads if you already have .NET Framework 2.0 installed. Enabled silent install for the SyncToy Installer file

tangentlin reviewed v2.1 on Nov 12, 2009

Sync Toy is simple and easy to use, it saves me a lot of hassle cross syncing both my home computer and work computer. SyncToy was noticibly missing and missed when I migrated to Windows 7, I am happy that Microsoft finally has released this powertoy for free again.

mharvey reviewed v2.1 on Nov 11, 2009

I have not tried SyncToy 2.1 yet but I did evaluate version 2.0. It looked promising but it has several shortcomings.

The show stopper for me was that it caused corrupted files when copying to a NAS. After finding that this was a known problem what had not been fixed in a long time I moved on SyncBack Freeware. It does everything that I wanted from SyncToy and more. I may investigate to see if the file corruption when copying to NAS has been fixed in SyncToy but I am not sure that I will move back in any case.

anomoly reviewed v2.1 on Nov 11, 2009

Synctoy is OK. I just don't like the junk it leaves in the folders you are trying to backup as well as the backups themselves. Try synkron. It's portable and has a very powerful gui which is also a one-click or scheduled option. It was on fileforum but was removed.

Raysy reviewed v2.0 on Aug 23, 2009

Easy to use, free, reliable - it does all you want from a home user sync tool.

xwris onoma reviewed v2.0 on Mar 25, 2009

I have not used SyncToy enough, not to the point of being able to write a review. Actually, I am not sure it can do what I want. So, here's a question for anyone interested to help me out:

Say I have two folders with many files, subfolders and sub-subfolders, etc. in it. Also, assume that INITIALLY these two folders were identical but after some time, different changes have been done in both of them. So folders (say) A and B were exactly the same, but now they are not. So, I want to "merge" them, to a new folder which will be the product of "adding" folder A+B, keeping the most recent version of all common elements, without deleting anything AT ALL.

What function of SyncToy will do this?

Thank you in advance!

wetbook71 reviewed v2.0 on Feb 5, 2009

I'm not sure i trust SyncToy. First, i copied all my files (drag-n-drop) from my harddrive to my fash drive/memory stick. Then, i created a folder pair across the two (C:\work paired with G:\work), and used SyncToy to preview them for any file changes.

Two problems
1) In a lot of the operations it identified, the "last modified" time shown in the SyncToy preview list did NOT match the "date modified" time shown for the file in Windows Explorer.

2) Despite having just dragged-n-dropped all the files from G:\work to C:\work, it still identified 'overwrites' as being necessary (when the files should've been identical across the pair). Moreover, it wanted to overwrite the side of the pair having the newer "last modified" time (target path) with the side having the older "last modified" time (source path). In other words, it wanted to overwrite a more recent version with an older version, according to "last modified" times (never mind that the times didn't match what was shown for the files in Windows Explorer, as noted in point #1, above).

If anyone understands what's going on here, and can convince me that my mistrust is unnecessary, that would be cool! thanks.

trevithick reviewed v2.0 on Aug 18, 2008

I have used SyncToy since version 1 and on through 1.4 and the beta of 2. SyncToy works well, has an understandable interface, and provides intelligent feedback on errors that occur in a job. It is quick, flexible, and easy to use.

It is not flawless, as once in a great while you will have to re-create a sync pair for some reason. However, I personally have not found a better synchronizing software.

belthurgp reviewed v2.0 on Aug 18, 2008

Well written tool and works as advertised. Use it to sync both of my computers weekly once. Syncing / Backup is not a easy task and you should spend some time in setting up your synchronization folders. Once you setup, it's just a one click operation.

@Busthead..learn how to use SyncToy first

Busthead reviewed v1.4 on Sep 29, 2007

Ignores some files creating directories but leaving them empty without reporting errors. Completely unreliable. Another piece of crap from MS.

xee reviewed v1.4 on Sep 24, 2007

It does what it says on the tin, however, Unison is a better, more powerful, cross-platform alternative and it's very customizable.

hypotheticalBeta reviewed v1.4 on May 29, 2007

it worked as advertised for the most part, except that it reported a few files as "not found". The files do very much exist and perhaps the only thing i could find was that SyncToy was perhaps running into some sort of path length limit. the 8 files reported as "not found" are all in 8.3 "dos name format" in a path that is 116 characters long. seems like 128 chars is the underlying limit (116 + 11 + 1(period)) .

Anyone know of this being a known bug?? anyone know where i could submit a bug report for this? Google doesn't seem to show any mention of this yet???

coolticker reviewed v1.4 on Nov 2, 2006

Using .NET for such small tool is a pain, eating 20MB RAM is too much, many other free tools exists that are written in a real optimized language.

anonymouscowturd reviewed v1.4 on Oct 31, 2006

Works perfectly for me.
trevithick, the reason it won't install is because the thing is written in .net 1.1. The versions of the .net are not compatible (in the sense that dll and exe's written for one won't run on another (even newer) version)). This is by design to avoid DLL and versioning hell. So yes, you would have to re-install 1.1. That's not a bad thing as a lot of .net stuff is still 1.1 only. Hope that helps

goldenscreen reviewed v1.2 on May 5, 2006

Good freeware but too limited IMO. Pales in comparison to Syncback Free. Get that instead, I guarantee you won't regret it

trevithick reviewed v1.2 on Mar 29, 2006

I'm going to give this a 4 instead of a 5 because versions 1.1 and 1.2 will not install if you have updated to .NET Framework 2.0. The install will stop and tell you it needs the older .NET 1.1 Framework.

This is a wonderful tool that I use all the time, but would sure like to be able to use the newer releases.

darthbeads reviewed v1.2 on Mar 29, 2006

For SyncToy v1.2, we have included:

• A fix for a problem introduced by Daylight Savings Time changes, which caused SyncToy to misunderstand which datetime stamps marked the most recent version of a file

• A few minor graphical user interface updates and some additional content in the Help file

• A minor fix for an exception caused by disabling performance counters

melowah reviewed v1.1 on Mar 16, 2006

I Like it too.

horsecharles reviewed v1.1 on Mar 15, 2006

Initial thoughts: on win9x there's startup error message(only for NT), just ignore it.
Previous version 1 too buggy(agree w/ SizzleMaster's take basically): app hung, had a lot of copy failures(not a single job had 100% file copy success), scattered quite a few "Copy of xx file"(& in unusable form too), left behind an incomplete log file on desktop, screen display(transparency) issues with lower resolutions...

Had such high hopes for it-- maybe this version(judging from mjm01010101's change log posting) is improved enough, but not willing to further flumox anything testing it: will wait to test it on the next new computer install.

mjm01010101 reviewed v1.1 on Mar 15, 2006

Changes:
The ability to type in a UNC path;

Support for longer folder pair names and ability to widen the left pane to see those longer names;

The ability to support the maximum length for folder paths, and documentation was added to the help file about how to set up a share to be able to sync deep folder pairs;

Better handling of the difference in precision between NTFS and FAT timestamps;

More discoverable link to the help file for information on how to schedule SyncToy using the Windows XP Task Scheduler;

Support for 800x600 screen resolution;

Added a warning for users if the selected action will take some time to complete;

Added brief explanations of the actions in the user interface;

Improved behavior when choosing folders to include or exclude when there are large numbers of folders involved;

Improved support for accessibility modes.

opticdmx reviewed v1.0 on Mar 15, 2006

SyncToy v1.1 Has been released.

I Like it. Does what is says and it is free.

SizzleMaster reviewed v1.0 on Sep 9, 2005

I've been working with this since the day it came out using all types of files on 7 different computers, running either XP-SP2, Win2003-SP1, or XP Media Edition 2005. I'm trying to get it to work with WebDAV either via a Windows Explorer mapped WebDAV connection or via a WebDrive mapped drive in Explorer. I've had the same experience on all three platforms, completely inconsistent synching ranging from working perfectly at times to doing nothing like it should, given changes in directories and in files, other times, to a mixture somewhere in between that makes no sense. It might be a cacheing issue but I clear cache out in WebDrive and it doesn't always help matters. This product probably is great for basic synching but even Allway Synch doesn't work in my scenario, a scenario that I believe a lot of people would like to get to work (synching drives over the Internet\WAN\LAN\Extranet, etc.).

Just some observations and food for thought perhaps.

horsecharles reviewed v1.0 on Sep 1, 2005

Very good & useful for a free toy. And btw it's been reported to work on all other win versions inc. win9x-- the guy that developed this site: www.mdgx.com pointed that out, but i can't find the reference or post on how to get that done.

EDIT: here's link-- http://www.mdgx.com/xptoy.htm#PT2

oufc_gav reviewed v1.0 on Sep 1, 2005

Easy simple app that does exactly what it says on the tin.
Anyone looking to do "professional" work using an 844kb freeware app that was in beta at the point they commented needs to take a reality check on their use of a computer.

mjm01010101 reviewed v1.0 on Aug 31, 2005

nifty. it's like a gui xcopy, perfect for end users.

rip_pit reviewed v1.0 on Aug 31, 2005

Just be aware that there is a 100% freeware edition of SyncBack(2BrightSparks) and that it is a great one. Give a try you won't regret it. SyncBack Freeware V3.2.8.500 http://www.2brightsparks.com/downloads.html

tmaioli reviewed v1 Beta on Aug 26, 2005

Works great to back up too my stripped Disks on my computer, simple and easy to use, therefore less chance for error. A good B/U solution, priced right, and seems to work well. No problems. Thanks Microsoft.

luvwknd reviewed v1 Beta on Aug 8, 2005

Simply put…more poor coding from the MS team!
SyncToy may be an adequate solution for an eight-year old whose file collection consists of a few paintbrush files and a couple Wordpad doc’s, but one thing is for sure – it is certainly NOT a graphics file management for professional photographers or digital imaging experts!
I first set it up to Sync my entire collection from my PC to my server, I am talking about 75GB of graphics over a 1gbps network, the PC is a 2.8ghz P4 and the servers are 2.4ghz Xeon, all with GB NIC’s and CAT6 cabling and a managed switch- after 36 hours it never finished. With this in mind I opted to try something smaller – much smaller and it seemed to work with minor file and hierarchy changes with an 80mb folder and using Echo instead of synchronize.
Second test, I tried a folder containing 32gb and about 250,000 files, I renamed some files, deleted some folders and files and added new files, then I ran the SyncToy preview and it did not indicate there was anything to delete, although I knew there was – anyway I went ahead and clicked the Run button and after lengthy amount of time (couple hours as I wasn’t waitin’ around) it said it was done, naturally I manually checked to see if the folder I deleted on the “Left” was still in the Echo folder on the “Right” and sure-shootin’ it was still there.

So, if you are looking for a high percentage reliable sync tool, Microsoft SyncToy is definitely not it! But don’t believe me, download it and perform your own testing and then report your findings back to this site; just remember…it is beta-ware!

minasinahanmetehe reviewed v1 Beta on Aug 6, 2005

Confusing single list selection using colors.
Only popping helpers were missing to finalize the mess.
Clear, best interfaces use two pane lists.
These are difficult to find. I have tried for years.
Vice Versa http://www.tgrmn.com/ is very good and some years ago they had free tool. I have been using it heavily (directory structure has about 10000 files) almost daily for over 4 years. No bugs.
If anyone knows another two pane tool, please let us know.

dim reviewed v1 Beta on Aug 5, 2005

Direct link: http://download.microsof...-23883f91c41c/Setup.msi

Neoprimal reviewed v1 Beta on Aug 4, 2005

Goodness....people rating software here have become dumber and dumber with each passing day.

First of all - you don't rate software based on download rate. That's an issue with your ISP/Router/Modem...etc. It's YOUR problem.
Second of all - if you don't USE it, you can't rate it you buffoon. What the hell is a paranoid character like yourself doing with beta software anyway? And the audacity to call it vaporware because YOU didn't download and use it?
I rate you a 1 - a 0 if I could, and thus "vapor"ous for being such a dumbnut.

Now on to the software review. I can't complain. It works as well as commercial solutions and is pretty neat. The program does take getting used to. I've been working with synching software for a while, mostly using it to check duplicates in picture folders and such - this is NOT that kind of software. This program is "Driven" - you don't get 2 sections with the ability to compare duplicates etc. You choose a folder and another and these options:
Synchronize: New and updated files are copied both ways. Renames and deletes on either side are repeated on the other.
Echo: New and updated files are copied left to right. Renames and deletes on the left are repeated on the right.
Subscribe: Updated files on the right are copied to the left if the file name already exists on the left.
Contribute: New and updated files are copied left to right. Renames on the left are repeated on the right. No deletions.
Combine: New and updated files are copied both ways. Nothing happens to renamed and deleted files.
You choose one of them and then get to preview what happens. It runs as fast as your hard drive no matter what the task....for me I did a simple echo procedure (backup) and copied over 161 megs in seconds. Some synchronizers run slowly, this one doesn't. Technically you could use the preview for comparison operations, but it's not like you get to pick and choose files to copy...so in the end - look to it as more of a backup and file duplication tool than a check for duplicates/analysis tool. It does what it says and says what it does. Finally, it has a juicy footprint, as it runs off .Net. 23-30 megs. I have a gig of mem so that is but a teardrop for such a funtional tool.

coover reviewed v1 Beta on Aug 4, 2005

I could have rated it a five, but I haven't tested it fully. It seems like a good application and it's very easy to use. 4 is a legitimate score for this beta.

Some of the folks who previously rated this application seem confused! CapZap rated it a 3 because it downloaded slowly. I thought we were rating the application, not the download speed. Actually, my 819KB download took only 4 seconds. This was better than 204 KB/Sec. Since DSL Reports rates my download speed at 1362 kb/sec (KB/Sec = kilobytes per second and kb/sec =kilobits/sec, and 1 byte is about 8 or 9 bits), this download was very fast. But the really ridiculous rating was a 1 by randal2k who didn't even bother to download the application. He gave it a 1 because MS asked to check to see if he was actually running a legitimate version of XP. By the way, what MS does is to run a "Check-Sum" test on one or more files on the computer. They take no actual information and have no idea whose computer they are testing.

forgie reviewed v1 Beta on Aug 3, 2005

not bad at all MS. Great little tool that is simple and fast. My only dislike is the chosen wording to describe different types of syncing. 6 different options and I'd give you 20$ if you understood what each did without having to look at the help file. keep it free MS you sobs!