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How To Back Up And Stay Safe By Coning Your Hard Drive
In this article I want to explain one general method for how to back up your computer. I'm not going to go into the multitude reasons why it is absolutely essential that you back up on a frequent and regular basis, but I'll give you some suggestions on ways you can protect your data, with details for both MS Windows and also Apple Mac computers.
To begin with we're going to define “cloning” backups.
Cloning is making an exact 100% copy of your computer's hard drive, typically to a different internal hard disc, or ideally, an external hard drive which is stored switched off except when the backup process. This is done to minimize wear and tear and keep it more reliable.
When you the right way, when you clone your computer’s drive, the clone will be one you can "boot" from. In other words, you can start the computer from that drive in exactly the same way you normally boot with your normal hard drive.
You can save money as well as downtime when you have a bootable backup drive. In many cases, you can start your computer up from the external drive and you'll be back using your computer again in a minute or two.
Running your computer off the backup drive like this isn't only temporary. But if you’re waiting for a replacement drive or you're trying to get an appointment with a computer shop to replace the main drive once it fails you can at least get work done in the mean time and everything will be exactly the way it was when you last cloned the drive.
Cloning your drive in this way can also save you money by minimizing the time spent by a technician repairing your Mac or PC. In many cases the tech can simply take the external hard drive out of the case and put it into the computer in place of a bad hard drive, then put the new replacement drive into the external case.
This can take just ten to twenty minutes to get you back up and running again, as opposed to easily hours of time.
Sadly, there aren't a lot of options to create a hard drive clone like this for Windows. While Mac users tend to have more options, it's still something you can do on just about any computer.
We've discovered a couple of programs that will clone your hard drive like this for Windows, both of them are free (I have to mention there are a couple of caveats on that which we will explain in a moment).
The first option, which makes these 100% "cloned" copies is a program called XXClone. This is a completely free program which does a good job and which I use myself}. The only problem with this program is that it only works right on Windows XP, and is unfortunately not compatible with Windows Vista or Windows 7. Googling XXClone will give you a download link.
A second option for Windows users that does seem to work with all versions of Windows is Seagate DiscWizard (what used to be called Maxtor MaxBlast).You can get Discwizard for free! Just Google it.
The one minor hitch to this is that for you to use it, it does require at least one of your drives to be either a Seagate or Maxtor brand drive.
There're a few options on the Mac side, the main two being "SuperDuper!" (yes, with the exclamation point)" as well as one named Carbon Copy Cloner. SuperDuper is inexpensive, CCC is free (but appreciates donations).
Both are good to use, but I've been using Carbon Copy Cloner for about ten years now as my first method of backup and so it's what I recommend to my clients. Both programs work in the same basic way, so pretty much anything I say about one applies to the other.
Unlike Seagate Discwizard on Windows PCs, CCC doesn't require a particular brand of hard drive, and unlike XXClone (which as you remember only works with a single version of Windows should work with pretty much any fairly recent Mac.
On any type of computer, the time it takes to complete the backup varies a lot depending on how much you've got on your hard drive, and what type of connector (USB, Firewire, eSATA) you use for the external drive. To do a full backup it can take anywhere from a half hour to several hours in extreme cases. But that would primarily be on PCs with extensive stores of movies, audio, or pictures.
But if you do back up your computer using cloning, you have a backup that can save you headaches and expense when the unavoidable occurs. Arming yourself with good computer training will be a huge help as well.
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