Windows 7 how to backup the best way!

If you’ve come across this page, now is the time you really need to get your computer backed up!

There are a lot of options out there for computer backup and in my post I will cover our two recommended techniques.

Hard Drive Cloning

When cloning a hard drive you will be backing up all programs and data. This means you have an exact copy of your machine so if your hard drive stopped working you could insert the cloned drive in your laptop or desktop and boot up as normal.

A USB, SATA or IDE external hard drive caddy (this will enable you to remove the drive and install in your computer if the worst were to happen.)

What type of hard drive do I have?

If your machine was bought in 2009 its very likely to be SATA but always check your manual or look at your computer manufacturers website.

2.5 (laptop) / 3.5 SATA (Desktop) Hard Disk

2.5 (laptop) / 3.5 IDE (Desktop) Hard Drive

Seagate Discwizard free disk cloning software http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/support/downloads/discwizard

1. Plug in your new external hard drive
2. Download, install & then run Discwizard
3. At the main menu select Disk Utilities
4. Select Clone Disk
5. Press next and then select automatic
6. Press next then proceed and reboot

Now you have a full clone of your pc 🙂 !

Automatic backup

For regular backups of documents, photos, videos and music we use the inbuilt windows backup.

1. Attach a USB hard disk
2. Open Backup and Restore by clicking the Start button at the bottom left of your screen, clicking Control Panel, clicking System and Maintenance, and then clicking Backup and Restore.
3. If you’ve never used Windows Backup before, click Set up backup, and then follow the steps in the wizard. If you’re prompted for an administrator password or confirmation, type the password or provide confirmation.

There are many other products around and we’ve tried a fair few but for windows 7 this has to be the easiest and best way to backup at home!