Backup and Restore
Your computer cost from hundreds to thousands of dollars, but the computer itself is not necessarily the most valuable part. Often, the data on the hard disk is the most valuable part. How many hours of work did you put into creating that data? One little event, like a power line spike from a lightning strike, and all that work could be lost. It’s a good idea to copy your data files to removable media, such as an external hard drive, DVD, or flash drive, at least once a week.
To perform a backup, select “Start| Control Panel” from the “Start” button in the Windows taskbar. In the “Control Panel” window, click the “Back up your computer” hyperlink. To start a backup for the first time, click the “Set up backup” hyperlink to start the “Windows Backup” program.
In the “Select where you want to save your backup” window, choose the removable media to which you wish to backup your data. You can save to a network location by selecting the “Save on a network…” button, and then entering the network pathway where you would like to save the backed up files. If you choose to do this, then click the “OK” button when finished. If you simply selected a removable media in the initial window, click the “Next” button to continue.
In the next window, check the types of files that you want to back up. You can select to “Let Windows choose (recommended)” or “Let me choose.” If you select the latter option, you will then need to specify which files to backup and also whether you wish to save a system image that can be used to restore your system. It is recommended that you select the “Let Windows choose” option, which also creates a regular backup schedule for the files. When you have made your selection, click the “Next” button to continue.
The next screen then allows you to view your backup setting, and also set when you want to create a backup file for your system. If you wish to set a different schedule, you can click the “Change schedule” hyperlink to set when the backup should be performed.
When you are ready, click the “Save settings and run backup” button to save your backup settings and begin the backup procedure. Note, that this whole process may take several minutes to hours depending on how much information you have selected to backup.
To restore files that you have saved to a backup file, first open the “Backup or restore your files” window again. Then either click the “Restore my files” choice or the “Restore all users’ files” choice. If you’re prompted for an administrator password or confirmation, type the password or provide confirmation.
Next, you select how to look for the files you wish to restore by clicking either “Browse for files” or “Browse for folders.” When you’re browsing for folders, you won’t be able to see the individual files in a folder. To view individual files, use the “Browse for files option,” instead. You can then select the files or folders to restore and then click the “Add files…” button to add the saved copy of the folder or file from the backup that you created to the list of items to be restored. Then click the “Next” button to continue. The next screen asks where you want to restore your files. You can select either “In the original location” or “In the following location.” If you choose the latter option, then you can click the “Browse…” button to select a new location. Then click the “OK” button after choosing the new location. When you have made your choice, click the “Restore” button to restore the item or items that you selected back to the chosen location.
