I agree 100% with everything our host said. There are a couple of more items to consider. 1) Backup programs offer encryption (probably all of them). If you use it, you will need to provide a password to have access to the data that you backed up. Should the time come where you need to restore those data, then you will need your password. If you forget your password, then forget your data. No password = no data. If you do not use encryption, then if someone gets a copy of your backup (for example, they have access to your external drive that has the backup), then they will have complete access to everything that was backed up. 2) On-line backup services. Know that when you use one of those services that they have 100% unfettered access to all of the data that you store on their servers. Not every employee. But the ones that control the environment will have access. That does not mean that someone is looking at your data. But the company can have programs that examine your data and builds a profile on you. If you are a celebrity or a high ranking government official, the service could make copies of your data for the company's executives to peruse. If you were the CEO of Google, would you be able to resist seeing what Hillary Clinton is backing up, or what LeBron James is backing up, or what (pick your celebrity) is backing up? Are you planning to one-day run for public office? Do you know if your backup service keeps yet another copy of your personal data, that they can use to influence you if you become successful? How about your company's trade secrets? Are you going to let complete strangers have copies of that? When you upload your files to the "cloud", those computers are owned by other people that you do not know. They are strangers. If a government official wants to see what you have on your computer, they will need a search warrant. If a government official asks a "cloud" service to keep unencrypted copies of your uploads, will the service do so and hand over "the" data (note that I used the determiner "the", rather than the pronoun "your", because whatever you upload to the cloud service is no longer owned by you). The most secure way to protect your data is to do a local backup that is encrypted. As a safety net, you can upload that encrypted backup to the "cloud" service. They will not be able to profile you on its contents, because it is encrypted and they cannot access its contents. Cheers!
If a cloud back up service offeres an encryption key I would recommend using it. Create a password that is a sentence long. Remember it but don't save it on your computer. If you lose a hard drive where the password is stored you're out of luck. I'm sure you can search TH-cam for a video on where to hide a password. Save in two locations.
I have been using Macrium Reflect to make image copies for years and I can say that it's the perfect software. Saved my buns a few times. The restore works great booting up with the Macrium rescue USB media. Takes less than 3 minutes to back up my entire Drive C (Image sizes approx. 25 Gb). Great video BTW.
Macrium does a good job for sure to backup the whole image of the disk or partitions but to backup data or files like pictures, videos and documents, I think Cobian backup is the best alternative. It can create incremental or diferential backups of the files with timestamp optionally. One other good thing is that it is all free with no paid version.
Great Advice, I simply keep all of my files on my desktop, except for the download folder. I then drag and drop into my external hard drive and internal hard drive, and spend way to much time letting 1tb of data run through a usb cable. So now I am going to try out those programs you mentioned
Hi Leo Thanks a lot for informative video. One comment: I think you should mention that you need to verify that your image backup can actually be restored and boot from restored image. I have seen some cases with my customers where restored image backup can not boot. Also easeus support is not good, they crashed my backup disk during dial in! Hence I am using macrium only now. Peter L
So true. At least do something for pete's sake! People has came to me after their computer hard drive crashed and they didn't have a backup. Years of ancestory work was gone. It was so heart breaking to tell them that I couldn't help. Yes, they could spend thousands of dollars on hard drive recovery but they were older folks on a limited income and could never have afforded it. Be wise, buy a hard drive at least 4x the total amount in your computer and back up. Remember, back up, back up, back up.
I take two approaches to this, I have a network storage drive I used an Atomic Pi for that running Open Media Vault, and I create a system image of windows every month or if I do some big updates
Great video. I would not trust any cloud storage though. Cloud storage is just someone else's computer even if it is a huge cloud drive service by a huge corporation. The recent fiasco with Google Drive losing data is part of the reason not to trust clouds with anything important.
The real lesson from the Google fiasco is to BACK UP. The cloud can be safe and very useful, but it's still only one place, and if your data is in only one place, it's not backed up.
I was moving my SSD in my system and for some reason the drive when corrupt, I had to format the drive to use it again so i lost all the recent project files that I spent MONTHS on. Definitely getting a backup :(
Suppose you keep all your files in the one-drive folder, and set the automatic backup to daily, and some virus or hacker corrupts your files in the onedrive folder. In that case, I assume you will automatically have the corrupted files sent to the back up onedrive cloud storage, so you lose everything. Is that right?
The video's "Resources" section is helpful. My main trouble in current times is that no longer do I know what to do with something like Macrium Reflect for use on Windows 10; I had been learning to use it when on Windows Vista, but some technologies have changed and am therefore lost.
Very helpful video, but please make a video on the difference between Incremental backup and Differential backup (with special reference to macrium) These two concepts really confuse me as to what they really do
Search is your friend. Here's my video: th-cam.com/video/N1FJS-JEL9I/w-d-xo.html and my (better) article on the topic: askleo.com/full-incremental-differential/
My desktop has in total 2 TB (500GB SSD and 2 HDDs 500GB + 1TB) and I copy all my data to my laptop with its 2 TB HDD. The advantage is, that on the road and at home I have exactly the same data. I have a lot of old hardware lying around, so since June 2019 I use an ancient Pentium 4 PC as 2nd backup and I added 4 leftover HDDs in total 1.21 TB (250GB + 3 x 320GB). This gratis second backup only stores the more important data. To be more safe for hackers both laptop and Pentium are powered off, except during backup or restores. In both cases you need a working network.
I use Acronis 2013. I take care to insure that there is NO user data on system drive. Do weekly full image for C:, keep 3 copies. Problem? No need to bother fixing it. Blow system drive away with an image restore. Use usb hard drive.
If someone asks me, then they are the exact people that setting them up with a reliable external device and application to keep a full backup image on a regular basis will never happen. I just recommend Backblaze for a cloud backup service because the data is actually the most important part and Backblaze is silent, always updating, and keeps versioning.
If my OS becomes unstable, I normally just format and start from scratch but it's a pain though and I normally loose my email inbox and address book with my favourites and the forever ending Windows Updates. Thunderbird is good, it let's me put my inbox off my OS drive. I guess it doesn't hurt to backup the entire system now and then.
Remember that if you use a backup program, if your comfuser goes belly-up you will probably lose that program: getting everything back on a new machine can be complicated. After using several bought and free backup programs I just sit down on a regular schedule and copy my data, Firefox and Thunderbird profiles and the like to a hard disk. Using a pro forma set of empty folders it only takes a couple of minutes to start going and the data is immediately available - which wasn’t the case in several of the programs I bought.
I only make a simple copy of all my data in an external hard drive. No need to use a backup software. Anyway, nobody will get access to my external drive and steal it. For me the problem with backup is that you will always need that particular software that you used to backup your data to make a retrieval. While with a simple copy, I don't need any software. Plus I make images of my operating system and programs installed, so in case the SSD were my OS and programs are installed fails, I will just use the image to reboot my pc as nothing happened.
Low key approach. I have top level folders that contain all the material I want backed up, and have a script to run Robocopy on those folders. Anything new or changed gets copied. I run the batch program every couple of days on two different USB external drives (one is stored in my house, the other in my garage in case of a fire). I do not want to use proprietary backup software/encryption, because I want full access to the contents if I need to connect to a borrowed or replacement computer without a lot of configuration. I connect the drives when I am ready to run (takes about 3 minutes) than disconnect them immediately. This greatly reduces the opportunity for malware crypto locks to get at them. If my computer gets crypto-locked I will obviously not plug in the remote drives. If there is any suspicious behavior on my computer, I do not connect the drive. Since the copies are simply mirrors of my existing structure, I can restore them to any machine (new machine or even a Mac) without any special software
So my Western Digital Hardrive, I see it offers a piece of software called ACRONIS. It's only free for 5 years. How good is Acronis? Also, I use dropbox since I don't have an external drive and money is tight, I am wondering if ACROIS or that MACRUM software would allow me to back up my PC, and put the file on my C: and then I can just drop the ACRONIS or MACUM file onto dropox? Or have it automatically put it there for me, so I know its automatically being backed up?
I see you did your last backup program update some two years ago. Well I’ve decided to follow your advice having had a big scarecwithbth3cladtvquality update of Win 10. I tried exert recovery program imaginable including recovering my disk image. Eventually I was able to recover my files and programs. Anyway, having watched your and researched on line the best backup programs, I decided Macrium Reflect free is for me especially for simplicity and since I can simply clone my Windows drive. But the company are dropping the free version on Jan 1st 2024 so what would you advise? Thank you.
The title suggests that there would be a list of software you can use and after seeing the video it wull give a suggestion what kind of software I have to look in to more but nothing at all. After seeing this video I still not know in which direction I should look as a back-up software program. Pity. So for me this is nog a good video. 😠
Well I tried 5 different BACKUP / Clone software Including Macrium Reflect 8 and every one caused my computer to crash 37% to ^5% of the clone to a Brand New Samsung M.2 980 SSD in a Saberrent Enclosure case commented to a 3.1 Type C 10GB/Sec port. Finally after buying a second SSD I decided to Connect the Enclosure to a Slower 5GB/Sec 3.1 USB ant it took 0ver 3 Hours to Clone a 512gb M.2 WD SSD. Maybe it was the SSD& enclosure was getting too hot because at the slowed speed and a bottle of frozen water sitting on the Enclosure it worked. IF you can't run at 10GB/SEC what's the use of having a 10 GB USB Port.
13TB four times large.. uff.. unpayable. :D What if i would like to use another HDD (sometimes) for 1:1 backup the daily used, but didn't want to copy all exist files, only the newer, and if i decide to delete something on the daily drive, and didn't want it to be on the backup drive? Is there a program for it to do it automatically when i want to backup?
Thanks for the video. What about the Windows 10 backup program that comes with the OS? Is that a good solution? Would Macrium Reflect or EaseUS be preferable? Which of those two do you recommend? I consider myself an experienced Windows user.
Windows 10 backup: askleo.com/dont-use-windows-built-in-image-backup/ and th-cam.com/video/oK8nevrmfhM/w-d-xo.html . Yes, either of Macrium Reflect or EaseUS Todo would be preferable.
@@askleonotenboom Thanks, appreciate the quick respones. I found an older video of yours re Windows Backup, but hadn't seen this really recent one. Relevant because I'm looking at creating an image backup (sending my laptop for repair, want to be prepared just in case something goes wrong). The WD software that came with my Passport drive never really worked well, so I have been looking at alternatives. I was able to find a free version of Macrium Reflect 8, using it right now :) .. watching some of your other videos too. Also subscribed.
Well, you don't seem to answer comments so I don't know why I'm bothering typing here, but here goes: you mentioned that onedrive/Google drive backups are ok, but if I get a ransomware, will my online data be protected or not? How can I protect myself against that?
Apparently you're not reading all comments, since I reply often, just not to every single comment. There is no "yes/no" to is my data protected, because it depends on many things. But it is best to assume it is NOT. That means a) you should regularly backup the contents of your OneDrive/GoogleDrive/Dropbox/whatever yourself, ideally to an external hard disk or other system in your control. Now, that being said, many of the providers will notice if a lot of files change all at once -- a hallmark or ransomware. OneDrive, for example, will notice, and ask if you'd like to revert ALL of your OneDrive back to before the massive change happened.
I am going to buy a Seagate Backup external drive for Back up . My question is I don't want to keep backing up the same stuff over and over . Is the a way to backup only where it left off the last back up ? Hope you can understand my question . Iam not very PC savvy . Please let me know if I need to try and explain myself better .Thanks in advance
That's called an "incremental" backup, and indeed, most backup programs support it. Macrium Reflect and EaseUS Todo are the two I generally recommend, but there are others.
Oh wow thanks , that was fast. I just got a new HP pavilion all in one pc. Had the Geeks come out to set it up along with a new printer. Want to do things more responsibly this time around .Love the all in one but HATE !!!!! Windows 11 ‘s Explorer File 🤯.. Been watching some TH-camrs changing the explorer file back to windows 10 … having the Best Buy Geeks come out again to see if they can do that . At 71 yrs young don’t like those drastic changes . My Opinion is Microsoft really screwed up this time … so off to buy a hard drive and have the Geek set that up for me too … thanks again have a great day ☺️
Is there a way or a software that just copies the folder and files in the original source structure so when i connect the "destination" hard disk to another pc i can read those folder and files normally, without me needing the backup software to read or restore those files? I can not find one. I tried many and they all, after the backup, create ONE SINGLE FILE that can only be read from the software that created it. And if i connect that external HD to another pc, I can not read those copied files coz the backup software is not installed in that second pc.
I believe Karen's Replication may work - www.karenware.com/powertools/karens-replicator-backup-utility - Also, if you're up for command line tools, this is exactly what tools like XCOPY and ROBOCOPY can do.
@@askleonotenboom WOW, Karen's replicator actually works so well. It has been months that i keep searching for a solution and i could find nothing up until now. Thank you so much!
On Windows 10 I could ADD "other" FOLDERS FROM C DRIVE (say) and backup up any and all locations to the FileHistory Drive. It seems I cannot do this in Windows 11. Did Microsoft screw its users again?
Hey, I dropped by this video looking for the answer to "What backup program should I use?" Looks like you talked about backups in general... but hey... what programs are available and why should we use them? In my case, I'm looking for what's available for home-PC's/laptops. My family members will never remember to backup, and will not plug in external drives. I have massive NAS devices, and linux servers, as well as cloud-based equipment at my disposal. What I would like is a set-it-and-forget-it backup app that will backup my wife & daughter's Windows laptops on a schedule so that I don't worry about them losing their school/work. My preference is daily backups to a NAS device with incremental backups so PST files and updates to school work / Word docs etc. get backed up. What I don't know... is what is available these days for the consumer-grade, Windows world. Opensource is best, proprietary formats are not preferred. Free is best, but a small price isn't a bad thing. Any suggestions on what is the best backup software on the market in 2022?
Does anyone know whether Robocopy will do the job? Can it back up folders with restricted access to user accounts, such as the one containing the Registry?
Okay, now here's a problem. I've backed up my hard drive onto an external drive, mirrored the whole thing. So, malware or some other emergency comes up and I have to restore my backup onto a reformatted, or new hard drive. What's the procedure for that?
@@alainarchambault2331 The bootable rescue disk is the best option. Plan "B", if necessary, is If you have a Windows installation disk (or on a flash drive, etc), you can re-install Windows, re-install your backup software, and then use that software to restore your computer from the backup that resides on your external drive. This is not ideal, because some files will be in use. But it should work.
There are cases of ransomware eating the entire network let alone all connected storage devices on an affected machine. It is definitely better than nothing.
@@verahunt2993 Indeed, there is risk. But at some point you discovered that the malware existed. You would start with a backup prior to that. And to be clear, that this might be a possibility is NOT an excuse to not backup at all. Even if the backup is infected, you can restore it somewhere safe, run anti-malware tools against it, and always exact non-infected files.
@@askleonotenboom Oh, no. I would never stop backing up. I just wanted to confirm that a backup might include some malware and then figure out what to do if it does.
sooo a recommendation for difference case scenarios? because there was ZERO answer in this video. just want an automated thing to update specific folders to an secondary internal drive.
The typical backup and restore process may work well if the original hardware is working. But the most common threat I find today is Ransomware, which encrypts your disk and makes normal operation impossible. To restore, You have to start with a clean hard drive or SSD, and reinstall all your software and backup data. If you have all the sources you can reinstall, I suppose, but I don't. Instead, after restore I make a full backup image copy of my entire new system drive immediately to removable media and remove it from my system, so future ransomware can't infect my backup. I don't mind doing incremental backups of data to another drive, but I need complete isolation from ransomware. It's the threat I find today, and I find it evolves to get around the so called anti malware software rapidly. I assume that ransomware attacks will continue to happen.
How much does EaseUS pay you? It is a horrible backup solution. I just paid for the Home version that also backs up to the cloud. It did a backup to an external drive and that was all. EaseUS now claims I don't have an account and I can't access any settings for incremental backups or backing up to the cloud. EaseUS won't recognize my email address even. I can't do anything other then wait for a reply from their "support team." So I paid $59.95 and I am very disappointed. I feel ripped off. Teir web pages have spelling mistakes. Beware!
They don't pay me anything. I'm sorry you had a bad experience, but the majority of people I'm in contact with that use it - including myself - have no problems. DO ask for a refund.
Why is everyone's answer it depends for everything pc related? The is like saying well we can't cause of covid. That answer is getting super old and and unacceptable. Now moving on. It is funny cause I had a backup solution and now the backup doesn't work because of software issues. So here is my answer to everyone. Expect to just lose your data is is going to happen and you will be screwed unless you are willing to pay stupid money for backups of backups of backups.
Thanks, good tips. Plus your jargon-free style is so much more approachable than all the other techies who spout online.
I agree 100% with everything our host said. There are a couple of more items to consider.
1) Backup programs offer encryption (probably all of them). If you use it, you will need to provide a password to have access to the data that you backed up. Should the time come where you need to restore those data, then you will need your password. If you forget your password, then forget your data. No password = no data.
If you do not use encryption, then if someone gets a copy of your backup (for example, they have access to your external drive that has the backup), then they will have complete access to everything that was backed up.
2) On-line backup services.
Know that when you use one of those services that they have 100% unfettered access to all of the data that you store on their servers. Not every employee. But the ones that control the environment will have access.
That does not mean that someone is looking at your data. But the company can have programs that examine your data and builds a profile on you.
If you are a celebrity or a high ranking government official, the service could make copies of your data for the company's executives to peruse.
If you were the CEO of Google, would you be able to resist seeing what Hillary Clinton is backing up, or what LeBron James is backing up, or what (pick your celebrity) is backing up?
Are you planning to one-day run for public office? Do you know if your backup service keeps yet another copy of your personal data, that they can use to influence you if you become successful?
How about your company's trade secrets?
Are you going to let complete strangers have copies of that? When you upload your files to the "cloud", those computers are owned by other people that you do not know. They are strangers.
If a government official wants to see what you have on your computer, they will need a search warrant.
If a government official asks a "cloud" service to keep unencrypted copies of your uploads, will the service do so and hand over "the" data (note that I used the determiner "the", rather than the pronoun "your", because whatever you upload to the cloud service is no longer owned by you).
The most secure way to protect your data is to do a local backup that is encrypted. As a safety net, you can upload that encrypted backup to the "cloud" service. They will not be able to profile you on its contents, because it is encrypted and they cannot access its contents.
Cheers!
If a cloud back up service offeres an encryption key I would recommend using it. Create a password that is a sentence long. Remember it but don't save it on your computer. If you lose a hard drive where the password is stored you're out of luck.
I'm sure you can search TH-cam for a video on where to hide a password. Save in two locations.
Great writeup
I have been using Macrium Reflect to make image copies for years and I can say that it's the perfect software. Saved my buns a few times. The restore works great booting up with the Macrium rescue USB media. Takes less than 3 minutes to back up my entire Drive C (Image sizes approx. 25 Gb). Great video BTW.
I won't pay 70 bucks for this crap.
It's a flawed program, and I know, because I've been using a backup program that is vastly superior, more reliable, and cheaper.
@@Jake-mn1qc Which program, Jake? Thanks...
Acronis allows you to mount backups as a read only drive. Good for retrieving files, even older versions.
Macrium Reflect also does..
Great and very good description on what to do for secure backup. You helped me really to perfect backup solution for me.
Macrium does a good job for sure to backup the whole image of the disk or partitions but to backup data or files like pictures, videos and documents, I think Cobian backup is the best alternative. It can create incremental or diferential backups of the files with timestamp optionally. One other good thing is that it is all free with no paid version.
Great Advice, I simply keep all of my files on my desktop, except for the download folder. I then drag and drop into my external hard drive and internal hard drive, and spend way to much time letting 1tb of data run through a usb cable. So now I am going to try out those programs you mentioned
Hi Leo
Thanks a lot for informative video.
One comment:
I think you should mention that you need to verify that your image backup can actually be restored and boot from restored image.
I have seen some cases with my customers where restored image backup can not boot.
Also easeus support is not good, they crashed my backup disk during dial in!
Hence I am using macrium only now.
Peter L
So true. At least do something for pete's sake! People has came to me after their computer hard drive crashed and they didn't have a backup. Years of ancestory work was gone. It was so heart breaking to tell them that I couldn't help. Yes, they could spend thousands of dollars on hard drive recovery but they were older folks on a limited income and could never have afforded it.
Be wise, buy a hard drive at least 4x the total amount in your computer and back up. Remember, back up, back up, back up.
Hi Leo, Is there a tutorial for configuring Easeus for monthly full & daily incremental backups & discard old backups?
I take two approaches to this, I have a network storage drive I used an Atomic Pi for that running Open Media Vault, and I create a system image of windows every month or if I do some big updates
Great video. I would not trust any cloud storage though. Cloud storage is just someone else's computer even if it is a huge cloud drive service by a huge corporation. The recent fiasco with Google Drive losing data is part of the reason not to trust clouds with anything important.
The real lesson from the Google fiasco is to BACK UP. The cloud can be safe and very useful, but it's still only one place, and if your data is in only one place, it's not backed up.
I was moving my SSD in my system and for some reason the drive when corrupt, I had to format the drive to use it again so i lost all the recent project files that I spent MONTHS on. Definitely getting a backup :(
Suppose you keep all your files in the one-drive folder, and set the automatic backup to daily, and some virus or hacker corrupts your files in the onedrive folder. In that case, I assume you will automatically have the corrupted files sent to the back up onedrive cloud storage, so you lose everything. Is that right?
Good analogy about the exercise program and thanks for this practical advice!
The video's "Resources" section is helpful. My main trouble in current times is that no longer do I know what to do with something like Macrium Reflect for use on Windows 10; I had been learning to use it when on Windows Vista, but some technologies have changed and am therefore lost.
Very helpful video, but please make a video on the difference between Incremental backup and Differential backup (with special reference to macrium) These two concepts really confuse me as to what they really do
Search is your friend. Here's my video: th-cam.com/video/N1FJS-JEL9I/w-d-xo.html and my (better) article on the topic: askleo.com/full-incremental-differential/
My desktop has in total 2 TB (500GB SSD and 2 HDDs 500GB + 1TB) and I copy all my data to my laptop with its 2 TB HDD. The advantage is, that on the road and at home I have exactly the same data. I have a lot of old hardware lying around, so since June 2019 I use an ancient Pentium 4 PC as 2nd backup and I added 4 leftover HDDs in total 1.21 TB (250GB + 3 x 320GB). This gratis second backup only stores the more important data. To be more safe for hackers both laptop and Pentium are powered off, except during backup or restores. In both cases you need a working network.
Awesome, I'm thinking to do the same with my 2tb HDD
I use Acronis 2013. I take care to insure that there is NO user data on system drive. Do weekly full image for C:, keep 3 copies. Problem? No need to bother fixing it. Blow system drive away with an image restore.
Use usb hard drive.
If someone asks me, then they are the exact people that setting them up with a reliable external device and application to keep a full backup image on a regular basis will never happen. I just recommend Backblaze for a cloud backup service because the data is actually the most important part and Backblaze is silent, always updating, and keeps versioning.
Totally agree. It's part of the "the best backup is whatever backup you'll actually DO" philosophy. 👍
If my OS becomes unstable, I normally just format and start from scratch but it's a pain though and I normally loose my email inbox and address book with my favourites and the forever ending Windows Updates.
Thunderbird is good, it let's me put my inbox off my OS drive.
I guess it doesn't hurt to backup the entire system now and then.
after setting a backup program, TEST IT OUT!
Remember that if you use a backup program, if your comfuser goes belly-up you will probably lose that program: getting everything back on a new machine can be complicated.
After using several bought and free backup programs I just sit down on a regular schedule and copy my data, Firefox and Thunderbird profiles and the like to a hard disk. Using a pro forma set of empty folders it only takes a couple of minutes to start going and the data is immediately available - which wasn’t the case in several of the programs I bought.
Most commercial programs have a disk image option with ability to create a boot drive. You shouldn't have any issues with a recovery if done properly.
thanks man! saludos desde Argentina!
Thanks for the indepth video!
I only make a simple copy of all my data in an external hard drive. No need to use a backup software. Anyway, nobody will get access to my external drive and steal it. For me the problem with backup is that you will always need that particular software that you used to backup your data to make a retrieval. While with a simple copy, I don't need any software. Plus I make images of my operating system and programs installed, so in case the SSD were my OS and programs are installed fails, I will just use the image to reboot my pc as nothing happened.
Thanks!, really clear explanations! 🙂
Thank you. Very clear.
Low key approach. I have top level folders that contain all the material I want backed up, and have a script to run Robocopy on those folders. Anything new or changed gets copied. I run the batch program every couple of days on two different USB external drives (one is stored in my house, the other in my garage in case of a fire). I do not want to use proprietary backup software/encryption, because I want full access to the contents if I need to connect to a borrowed or replacement computer without a lot of configuration.
I connect the drives when I am ready to run (takes about 3 minutes) than disconnect them immediately. This greatly reduces the opportunity for malware crypto locks to get at them. If my computer gets crypto-locked I will obviously not plug in the remote drives. If there is any suspicious behavior on my computer, I do not connect the drive.
Since the copies are simply mirrors of my existing structure, I can restore them to any machine (new machine or even a Mac) without any special software
So my Western Digital Hardrive, I see it offers a piece of software called ACRONIS. It's only free for 5 years. How good is Acronis?
Also, I use dropbox since I don't have an external drive and money is tight, I am wondering if ACROIS or that MACRUM software would allow me to back up my PC, and put the file on my C: and then I can just drop the ACRONIS or MACUM file onto dropox? Or have it automatically put it there for me, so I know its automatically being backed up?
You might want to put links for the software you were talking about .
Any reason why you choose incrementals over differentials? I always found that differentials make more sense to me anyway. Simpler with restore.
a) whatever works for you
b) incrementals are smaller
I see you did your last backup program update some two years ago. Well I’ve decided to follow your advice having had a big scarecwithbth3cladtvquality update of Win 10. I tried exert recovery program imaginable including recovering my disk image. Eventually I was able to recover my files and programs.
Anyway, having watched your and researched on line the best backup programs, I decided Macrium Reflect free is for me especially for simplicity and since I can simply clone my Windows drive. But the company are dropping the free version on Jan 1st 2024 so what would you advise? Thank you.
Here: askleo.com/macrium-reflect-free-is-going-away/ and here: th-cam.com/video/XugGQNeNAvU/w-d-xo.html :-)
Thank you so much for the prompt reply and for your links to your previous helpful answers.
The title suggests that there would be a list of software you can use and after seeing the video it wull give a suggestion what kind of software I have to look in to more but nothing at all. After seeing this video I still not know in which direction I should look as a back-up software program. Pity. So for me this is nog a good video. 😠
What were you doing at 1:50 when he said which software to use?
Well I tried 5 different BACKUP / Clone software Including Macrium Reflect 8 and every one caused my computer to crash 37% to ^5% of the clone to a Brand New Samsung M.2 980 SSD in a Saberrent Enclosure case commented to a 3.1 Type C 10GB/Sec port. Finally after buying a second SSD I decided to Connect the Enclosure to a Slower 5GB/Sec 3.1 USB ant it took 0ver 3 Hours to Clone a 512gb M.2 WD SSD. Maybe it was the SSD& enclosure was getting too hot because at the slowed speed and a bottle of frozen water sitting on the Enclosure it worked. IF you can't run at 10GB/SEC what's the use of having a 10 GB USB Port.
13TB four times large.. uff.. unpayable. :D What if i would like to use another HDD (sometimes) for 1:1 backup the daily used, but didn't want to copy all exist files, only the newer, and if i decide to delete something on the daily drive, and didn't want it to be on the backup drive? Is there a program for it to do it automatically when i want to backup?
Thanks for the video. What about the Windows 10 backup program that comes with the OS? Is that a good solution? Would Macrium Reflect or EaseUS be preferable? Which of those two do you recommend? I consider myself an experienced Windows user.
Windows 10 backup: askleo.com/dont-use-windows-built-in-image-backup/ and th-cam.com/video/oK8nevrmfhM/w-d-xo.html . Yes, either of Macrium Reflect or EaseUS Todo would be preferable.
@@askleonotenboom Thanks, appreciate the quick respones. I found an older video of yours re Windows Backup, but hadn't seen this really recent one. Relevant because I'm looking at creating an image backup (sending my laptop for repair, want to be prepared just in case something goes wrong). The WD software that came with my Passport drive never really worked well, so I have been looking at alternatives.
I was able to find a free version of Macrium Reflect 8, using it right now :) .. watching some of your other videos too. Also subscribed.
Well, you don't seem to answer comments so I don't know why I'm bothering typing here, but here goes: you mentioned that onedrive/Google drive backups are ok, but if I get a ransomware, will my online data be protected or not? How can I protect myself against that?
Apparently you're not reading all comments, since I reply often, just not to every single comment. There is no "yes/no" to is my data protected, because it depends on many things. But it is best to assume it is NOT. That means a) you should regularly backup the contents of your OneDrive/GoogleDrive/Dropbox/whatever yourself, ideally to an external hard disk or other system in your control. Now, that being said, many of the providers will notice if a lot of files change all at once -- a hallmark or ransomware. OneDrive, for example, will notice, and ask if you'd like to revert ALL of your OneDrive back to before the massive change happened.
Command prompt with admin
I am going to buy a Seagate Backup external drive for Back up . My question is I don't want to keep backing up the same stuff over and over . Is the a way to backup only where it left off the last back up ? Hope you can understand my question . Iam not very PC savvy . Please let me know if I need to try and explain myself better .Thanks in advance
That's called an "incremental" backup, and indeed, most backup programs support it. Macrium Reflect and EaseUS Todo are the two I generally recommend, but there are others.
Oh wow thanks , that was fast. I just got a new HP pavilion all in one pc. Had the Geeks come out to set it up along with a new printer. Want to do things more responsibly this time around .Love the all in one but HATE !!!!! Windows 11 ‘s Explorer File 🤯.. Been watching some TH-camrs changing the explorer file back to windows 10 … having the Best Buy Geeks come out again to see if they can do that . At 71 yrs young don’t like those drastic changes . My Opinion is Microsoft really screwed up this time … so off to buy a hard drive and have the Geek set that up for me too … thanks again have a great day ☺️
Would you use EaseUs imaging?
EaseUS Todo is one of my recommendations, yes.
What do you think of the Acronis True Image 2017 backup program? Thanks
I let Acronis years ago because of abysmal customer support. The product was always good, though, and I know there are lots of folks who recommend it.
I have used Acronis for many years. I can set it up and just leave it to get on with it. Great product
What do you think of AOMEI back up ?
I have no direct experience with it, but have heard good things.
Is there a way or a software that just copies the folder and files in the original source structure so when i connect the "destination" hard disk to another pc i can read those folder and files normally, without me needing the backup software to read or restore those files? I can not find one. I tried many and they all, after the backup, create ONE SINGLE FILE that can only be read from the software that created it. And if i connect that external HD to another pc, I can not read those copied files coz the backup software is not installed in that second pc.
I believe Karen's Replication may work - www.karenware.com/powertools/karens-replicator-backup-utility - Also, if you're up for command line tools, this is exactly what tools like XCOPY and ROBOCOPY can do.
@@askleonotenboom WOW, Karen's replicator actually works so well. It has been months that i keep searching for a solution and i could find nothing up until now. Thank you so much!
On Windows 10 I could ADD "other" FOLDERS FROM C DRIVE (say) and backup up any and all locations to the FileHistory Drive. It seems I cannot do this in Windows 11. Did Microsoft screw its users again?
Hey, I dropped by this video looking for the answer to "What backup program should I use?" Looks like you talked about backups in general... but hey... what programs are available and why should we use them?
In my case, I'm looking for what's available for home-PC's/laptops. My family members will never remember to backup, and will not plug in external drives. I have massive NAS devices, and linux servers, as well as cloud-based equipment at my disposal. What I would like is a set-it-and-forget-it backup app that will backup my wife & daughter's Windows laptops on a schedule so that I don't worry about them losing their school/work. My preference is daily backups to a NAS device with incremental backups so PST files and updates to school work / Word docs etc. get backed up.
What I don't know... is what is available these days for the consumer-grade, Windows world. Opensource is best, proprietary formats are not preferred. Free is best, but a small price isn't a bad thing. Any suggestions on what is the best backup software on the market in 2022?
This might be a good start: askleo.com/how-to-back-up-windows-10/
Does anyone know whether Robocopy will do the job? Can it back up folders with restricted access to user accounts, such as the one containing the Registry?
Okay, now here's a problem. I've backed up my hard drive onto an external drive, mirrored the whole thing. So, malware or some other emergency comes up and I have to restore my backup onto a reformatted, or new hard drive. What's the procedure for that?
Depends on the backup program you use. Most have you create and boot from a rescue disk, which can then be used to perform the restore.
@@askleonotenboom Ah, I used the EaseUs Todo you suggested, didn't see a boot disk option but then again I didn't look too deeply.
@@alainarchambault2331 The bootable rescue disk is the best option.
Plan "B", if necessary, is If you have a Windows installation disk (or on a flash drive, etc), you can re-install Windows, re-install your backup software, and then use that software to restore your computer from the backup that resides on your external drive.
This is not ideal, because some files will be in use. But it should work.
There are cases of ransomware eating the entire network let alone all connected storage devices on an affected machine. It is definitely better than nothing.
That's why you need both a local backup and an off-site backup. I use an online backup solution along with a standard external backup.
How do you know that a backup doesn't include a virus, a trojan horse, or some other form of malware? Could you end up restoring an infected file?
Of course it's possible. It depends on what backup you choose to restore, and how completely you choose to restore it.
@@askleonotenboom Well, I can't imagine how you would know which backup is corrupted to know which one to delete or avoid.
@@verahunt2993 Indeed, there is risk. But at some point you discovered that the malware existed. You would start with a backup prior to that. And to be clear, that this might be a possibility is NOT an excuse to not backup at all. Even if the backup is infected, you can restore it somewhere safe, run anti-malware tools against it, and always exact non-infected files.
@@askleonotenboom Oh, no. I would never stop backing up. I just wanted to confirm that a backup might include some malware and then figure out what to do if it does.
sooo a recommendation for difference case scenarios? because there was ZERO answer in this video.
just want an automated thing to update specific folders to an secondary internal drive.
The video (and article) do make a recommendation. It should work for a files and folders backup as you're asking for.
He literally named 2 different backup applications that suit your exact needs in his video. Try watching it before commenting next time.
@@PaperBagMan884 time stamps plz.
The typical backup and restore process may work well if the original hardware is working. But the most common threat I find today is Ransomware, which encrypts your disk and makes normal operation impossible. To restore, You have to start with a clean hard drive or SSD, and reinstall all your software and backup data. If you have all the sources you can reinstall, I suppose, but I don't. Instead, after restore I make a full backup image copy of my entire new system drive immediately to removable media and remove it from my system, so future ransomware can't infect my backup. I don't mind doing incremental backups of data to another drive, but I need complete isolation from ransomware. It's the threat I find today, and I find it evolves to get around the so called anti malware software rapidly. I assume that ransomware attacks will continue to happen.
How much does EaseUS pay you? It is a horrible backup solution. I just paid for the Home version that also backs up to the cloud. It did a backup to an external drive and that was all. EaseUS now claims I don't have an account and I can't access any settings for incremental backups or backing up to the cloud. EaseUS won't recognize my email address even. I can't do anything other then wait for a reply from their "support team." So I paid $59.95 and I am very disappointed. I feel ripped off. Teir web pages have spelling mistakes. Beware!
They don't pay me anything. I'm sorry you had a bad experience, but the majority of people I'm in contact with that use it - including myself - have no problems. DO ask for a refund.
Why is everyone's answer it depends for everything pc related? The is like saying well we can't cause of covid. That answer is getting super old and and unacceptable. Now moving on. It is funny cause I had a backup solution and now the backup doesn't work because of software issues. So here is my answer to everyone. Expect to just lose your data is is going to happen and you will be screwed unless you are willing to pay stupid money for backups of backups of backups.
Bad advice, there are far better solutions which usage is much easier to understand for people who aren't very technical, and for less money.
Care to share what those solutions are?
Well name one