What is a good backup strategy?

[MKairys]

In the past I have always separated system files from user data, in order to back up each appropriately. So I'd partition my hard drive and go through the exercises moving my user directories onto D: . Then I'd take a full image of my C partition once or twice a month and incremental images of D: daily. I'd save enough image files that I could roll the OS back a couple of months. And the incrementals of the user data served as version history.

Then I got my surface pro 3 and it all seemed like too much unpaid IT labor Besides I wanted to try the windows file history thing for versioning.

But I wanted to keep the imaging software I was using (Easeus) because it let me explore and copy files from the image file, whereas windows backup produced an opaque file. So I imaged the whole disk every couple of weeks and used FileHistory for versioning.

Then I contemplated rolling back windows, and realized I would also be rolling back my user files, and FileHistory wasn't going to work like a backup and let me restore all my files to their latest.

So my question is, how can I back up system and data appropriately without two partitions?

 

[MKairys]

Correction, the windows backup is not opaque, but it does include the entire disk so restoring it restores user files to whatever state they were. The author of how-make-full-backup-windows-pc says

The downside is that you cannot choose to restore individual files. It's meant to restore everything, bit-by-bit to the same (or replacement) hard drive. (Though, you can easily access the backup files and extract documents, photos, music, and other files, if you need to.)

In addition, if you don't backup regularly and a system failure occurs, you could lose valuable documents, settings and software because you can only restore the data since the last backup.

He or she refers to System Image Backup as an image that does not contain user data (?)
... and refers to File History but does not explain how it could be used, say in a bare-metal restore

 

[Axeelant]

I don't have an answer for you, but i'm also curious, why can't we just backup at least settings and personalisation stuff to onedrive, like in WP?

 

[TheCudder]

I don't have an answer for you, but i'm also curious, why can't we just backup at least settings and personalisation stuff to onedrive, like in WP?

This, basically. Allow Windows to back up your system settings & personalization data. Then insert microSD card for backing up files using file history.

 

[Jozef jurcisin]

Hi I just got WD Cloud Mirror 4t ( 2t and 2t) I am very happy.
I still make HD images.

see link
My Cloud Mirror - Personal Cloud Storage
WD Learning Center - WD?My?Cloud?Mirror - Welcome

 

[MKairys]

microSD card is a good idea, if I could afford one big enough. I'm using an external drive and my file history is up to 38 Gb. And settings + file history does not protect against O/S corruption or hardware failure.

Turns out
(1) system image backup does not include user folders not managed by Windows
(2) so-called Windows 7 backup allows you to include user folders but does not include them in the image, just makes a bunch of zip files

So I think the best solution (to answer my own question is to image the complete C drive every few weeks (I'm using Easeus) and depend on file history to update user files in the event of a restore, by going into the file history data directory and just copying it over the restored directories. This would give me the latest versions but would not account for files that had been moved or deleted, so there would be manual cleanup and this is not a perfect solution.

 

[was2wuz]

Yep, external hard drive image is probably the way to go

 

[MKairys]

Turns out micro cards are cheaper than I thought Got 64gb for $35 at Best Buy. Good idea!

 

[Trees]

So if I'm following correctly, can I use an external USB drive to capture a System Image Backup, and then with File History set it to backup to the same USB drive as used for System Image Backup?

 

[MKairys]

Yes. That was my set up until it was pointed out to me that using an SD card for file history is a better idea.

 

[anon(5327127)]

I've created Xcopy commands that copy the files, from various locations, onto an external drive. Complicated? A bit. This would be from a WHS v2.0.

 

[Trees]

If xcopy works for you then I think the key thing is that you are backing up data. I've used Robocopy in the past at work to keep stuff backed up from various sources to a central location. PowerShell probably has cmdlets that could also be used to formulate a backup script/method.

For home use, I'll see how System Image + File History work.