If a bad update killed your desktop interface, don't panic. You can still trigger a Timeshift restoration from the TTY ...
Say I've got a Windows server whose files I want to have backup automatically to a remote linux server weekly. I see on the cygwin site that it comes w/ rysnc (at least I think that's what I'm seeing) ...
It's boring but it works.
I'm running Suse 9.3 at home, and I've got one hard drive with one of the partitions full of my "important stuff" -- docs, mp3s, movies, etc -- and in the same machine, I've got a separate hard drive ...