Back Up

How to Back Up a Hard Drive

from :EHow

Needed:

• CD-R Discs/CD-RW Discs/Blank DVD Discs and CD-RW Burners , or
• Mass storage device
  
• Hard Disks
• Microsoft Windows XP

1. Step 1

   Insert your Windows XP CD into the drive and double click it when it pops up on your desktop.

2. Step 2

   In Windows Explorer, double-click the ValueAdd folder, then Msft, and then Ntbackup.

3. Step 3

   Double-click Ntbackup.msi to install the Backup utility.

4. Step 4

   Click Backup to run Microsoft's Backup program.

How to Run the Backup Utility

5. Step 1

   Click Start, point to All Programs, point to Accessories, point to System Tools, and then click Backup to start the wizard.

6. Step 2

   Click “Next” to skip past the opening page, choose Back up files and settings from the second page, and then click Next.

7. Step 3

   Decide whether you want to back up everything or just certain things.

8. Step 4

   Decide where you want the backups saved to.

9. Step 5

   Set a schedule for regular backups.

Sometimes, when many programs are installed and and it is requires a lot of time and energy to reinstall each single program, backing up the whole computer is a better option.

How to Backup a Whole Computer

Needed:

• File backup software like Norton Ghost or Macrium Reflect
• Storage Medium like a USB Hard Drive

Instructions

1. Step 1

   The first step is to figure out where you will be backing up the computer to. You need an external hard drive with enough space to store a full backup. To determine how much space you need on a Windows PC, go to My Computer, right-click the drive, and click on "Properties". From there, click on the "General" tab, and look at the size of the drive. If there are multiple drives on the computer, figure out the total size of all the hard drives. Buy an external (USB) hard drive that's at least twice the size of your computer's hard drives.

2. Step 2

   Once you have the hard drive, you must acquire backup software. There are several options available, like Norton Ghost and Macrium Reflect. Each piece of software is similar, but Macrium Reflect has a free edition, which will be used for this article. A download link is in the "Resources" section, located near the bottom of the page. Follow the instructions on screen to install the software.

3. Step 3

   Plug in the USB drive, following the manufacturer's instructions, and then load the backup software. Once you have the software loaded, you must create a new backup. In Macrium Reflect Free Edition, click on the "Create a backup image of an entire disk or selected partition(s)" button. Read the instructions on screen and select the disks to backup. You will need to select the backup location as well; make sure you select the USB hard drive!

4. Step 4

   Run the backup. The backup will take a long time, depending on the size of the hard drive. Once the whole backup has been completed, exit the backup program.

5. Step 5

   You can also backup to an online server. There are many online services that will do this for you; a great one is Mozy, which is linked in the "Resources" section of this article.