Backing Up your Operating System and Programs with Disk Imaging

[ctal]

Do you regularly back up your operating system, programs, and settings?

Ok, so you know about the dangers of not backing up your valuable data; losing all those photos of family and friends or your special documents, movies, emails or even music library.... But what about all the programs and settings you have installed on the computer? Imagine the time that you will have to spend, if you don’t have those backed up, reinstalling and setting up your operating system, your programs, driver software, updates and patches, options, settings, preferences. Not to mention re-activating any of your software that requires it, which may involve frustrating, time-consuming phone calls if you exceed the allowable number of on-line re-activations.

I have about 60 programs, plug-ins, etc. on my machines, probably above average but not an uncommon number. It takes me about 30 hours of painstaking work to reinstall from scratch and do all of those things, which usually means close to an entire week. That’s despite knowing exactly what I am doing and how I want everything set up, and despite having an already set up laptop alongside, that I can copy settings from without having to think too much.

Sounds like a nightmare... well in the event of catastrophic data loss or failure of your machine this is exactly what you would need to do...

However there IS a way to avoid all of that ... which is to backup all your programs and settings via a Disk Imaging program.

Essentially this type of program will take a snapshot "image" of the entire system disk (or those parts you choose) and back them up bit for bit. This means that you can restore the image at any time and it will be exactly as you backed it up, programs and all. Imaging programs usually offer a compression option, which typically reduces the size of the image files to around half the size of the occupied space on the partition or drive which is imaged.

I can restore a replacement hard-drive from a saved image in less than a half an hour, and the machine does nearly all of the work!

My practice is to create a new image about once a month, and back up data files daily. If I have to do a complete restoration, I first restore the image, then perform any updates to Windows or other things that may have occurred during that month, and then I over-write the restored data files with the previous day’s backups.

And do I ever breathe more easily if I’m installing new or updated software or hardware that may have problems or mess up my machine. Instead of having to spend hours and hours troubleshooting problems, I just restore the image.

And, similarly, infections by viruses or nasty adware are no problem either, if I have an image to fall back on that was created prior to when the problem arose.

I usually save the three or so most recently created images, going back a few months. On my desktop systems, I save them to both a second internal hard drive, and to an external firewire or usb drive. My laptops can’t accommodate a second internal hard drive, so I either place the images on two external drives, or on one external drive and another computer.

Some imaging programs can do incremental backups, just saving what has changed since the last complete image was created, which makes it quick and easy to do the process frequently. Some programs allow you to image to a network drive, and some allow you to schedule the process to happen automatically at a pre-determined time.

An advantage of using an imaging program is that you can also image all your data at the same time you image your programs. This means that you may not need a separate backup program. The only drawback to this approach is that if you need to restore then you have to restore everything at once.

Some imaging programs provide a feature where you can explore the images you create as if they were folders and even selectively choose individual files to restore. Different imaging programs have different features and capabilities so you need to check what comes with a product at the time you purchase it.

There are some excellent threads which have appeared at ABXZone discussing the pros and cons of the various programs that are available. Here are some of them:

http://www.abxzone.com/forums/f49/th...am-114759.html

http://www.abxzone.com/forums/f49/lo...am-112229.html

http://www.abxzone.com/forums/f49/ac...rt-114470.html

If you have Windows Vista then you are in luck as it includes a disk imaging program of its own already called "Complete PC Backup". This program allows you to create images of your hard disks without the need to purchase any 3rd party software. The only limitation is that you cannot restore individual files, it can only be used to restore an entire disk.

I understand that the forthcoming Windows 7 will also include an imaging program of its own. I haven’t used the release candidate version of Windows 7, but based on reports by others its imaging feature sounds intriguing.

Happy imaging!

-- Al

[CrowdAds]

[PeterT]

Excellent post Al! Thanks for taking the time to write it. I can attest to the value of images. They have saved my a$$ many times. I use Acronis TI11 Home from a bootable CD for my OS partitions and Microsoft SyncToy for my data partitions. I create images and mirror backups, respectively, weekly, both to a 3rd physical drive. Not having a regular backup routine in place is like having unprotected sex with strangers. ;-)

[ctal]

Thanks very much, Peter! We're trying to come up with an original article (as opposed to a reference to a news item reported elsewhere) for posting on the front page each weekend. Not sure if that will be do-able without more volunteers!

I'd post a smiley in response to your closing comment, but those which seem most appropriate aren't available at present. :sad:

Best,
-- Al

[plainman007]

Yes ! I completely agree with what Ctal has told you here. I was one of those users who never cared about backing up for a few years of dabbling in some serious PC based work. And then one day just like that one of my drives crashed, taking with it all my projects, music, tons of digital work 3ds max files etc. All gone with the wind.

Its something that you never think would happen to you, until it does and then your stupefied. After that ive made backing up a regular practice and have benefitted from its multiple usages. Not only as a disaster recovery option, but also to use extensively if you dabble with testing different kinds of softwares, codecs, etc. You can rest assured that no matter what circus you try out on your system, you always have an insurance policy to jump back on. And within few minutes too.

Seriously heed Ctal's advice or prepare to be doomed one fine day. Its a real noteworthy topic for PC users who havent bothered to give it much thought.