Windows 7 is w7 backup any good?

elcid123

New Member
I have just got w7 and was wondering whether to use it's backup, I was using norton ghost 15 and there was to many bugs not like previous versions that I,v used for years with xp and win 98.
Can I back up ALL my complete os including all apps and return w7 to exactly the way it was every byte?
Has any one used w7 backup if so whats the best way to use it so if possible you can return everything just the way it was.


Regards Steve
 
Welcome to the Windows 7 Forums :)
As patcooke mentioned, it's a critical task.
I'd say you can trust the task to Windows 7.
Of course you should always backup in more than one place with a few different services.
I just learned that the hard way over the last week or so :(
 
I use W7 to do a full backup daily to different internal hard drive, I have it set to do this at 6:00 AM, I have it set to only keep one backup. I also use Macrium reflect Macrium Reflect FREE Edition - Information and download
which is free to do a full backup weekly every Wednesday to a different internal hard drive. I like redundancy on backups. I have purchased version of of Macrium Reflect which can do a incremental backup which the free version cannot do.
It is far better than Acronis, but does not have a clone feature as Acronis does
 
Hi

I too use multiple backups, Windows 7 and Norton Ghost to back up my computer and I do it to both a second internal hard drive and an external USB drive.
I haven't noticed any problems with Norton Ghost 15 and my Windows 7 64 bit installation.

I have used it to backup both or my internal hard drives to an external one.

I also have a second external hard drive on which I backup really important stuff, that is on my second internal drive, music files, photos, and old job files in an uncompressed format. So that no matter what happens I will still have access to them, even if both of my backup options fail.

I have two recovery DVDs, one made by Windows and one made by Ghost.

Mike
 
Same here recovery Discs by Macrium Reflect, and By Windows 7. I have had occasions in the past to use both. I was up and running after using either one in less than 25 minutes.
 
As far as Win 7 backup I haven't used. Just too leary of the OS backing itself up.
I use Acronis from the F11 boot where OS is not loaded

Acronis for me since XP and only 1 major error with Mikeysoft dynamic disk. never use that. Acronis now recognizes that &%#@ MS disk
With Acronis I can be back online in 4 minutes

With 7 I make backup of all updates installed and no programs except acronis. Then backup that to an external usb drive in different steps.
I have a program I use to install my programs so I can select and change. It backs up all my settings serial reg and so forth including Office 2007

I believe with backup you have to explore and use what work's for you and keep your method updated. Use several at first till you are confident
 
I have used the Win 7 Image several times to replace a drive for whatever reason. It works well and using and eSATA external drive is fairly quick.

Acronis (latest version), which will cost money, also works well and has more options than the Win 7 version, especially when it comes to size of drives/partitions during the restore process.

I always suggest you test whatever system you choose before it becomes necessary...

And don't get confused by terminology used is certain situations. To do what you seem to need is an image backup and not a file backup or transfer wizard. If you use Acronis, do not clone the drive, just make a backup image.
 
Win 7 will make a disc image and will also backup sets of files.
At first it seemed to take a lot of space, and also seemed like it was not saving the files incrementally, so that each file backup was as large as the original one.
Mysteriously that seems to have settled down, now.
 
As experienced as I am, I've never used the disk image feature.
For my own clarification:
It completely backups up the operating system and all your user files, to be reinstalled via the Recovery disc?
 
It should completely restore the drive from a recovery disk and a backup file stored on another drive or set of disks.
And I believe will restore the image on a new hard drive if it becomes necessary to replace one.

I have done this using Norton Ghost many times on several computers but I have not actually done it using Windows backup.
I don't remember how many times Ghost has saved my tail though, from either a crash or a really bad virus infiltration.

Right now I have both a Windows and Ghost backup of my C: drive and 2 boot-able recovery disks, one for each.
 
Hi all, first post here.

I recently tried Windows 7's imaging feature to back up an Acer Aspire 6930G laptop disk with three NTFS partitions.

To test the backup feature I intentionally destroyed the filesystem and partition table, and installed grub to shift out any Microsoft pieces of the mbr.

To my surprise it restored everything including the partition layout and boot manager :)

In the past I have used CloneZilla with success (it's probably the most polished free and open-source alternative to Norton) but I just wanted to give this a try.
 
It should completely restore the drive from a recovery disk and a backup file stored on another drive or set of disks.
And I believe will restore the image on a new hard drive if it becomes necessary to replace one.

I have done this using Norton Ghost many times on several computers but I have not actually done it using Windows backup.
I don't remember how many times Ghost has saved my tail though, from either a crash or a really bad virus infiltration.

Right now I have both a Windows and Ghost backup of my C: drive and 2 boot-able recovery disks, one for each.

It's good to hear someone else mention the backup program "Ghost". I've been using it since it was first released, by an obscure little company in New Zealand in ~1997. It was all DOS in those days and up through version 2003 is was still able to be run from a single floppy disk (in DOS).
There is also Acronis True Image, which you can get for FREE, totally Legal, on a Seagate Seatools disk or a Maxtor 'Maxblast' disk.
Actually you can download either Seatools or Maxblast and use it to make your own Backup Boot CD.

But whatever program you use, it should be able to make an exact image of your HD, save it to an external media or DVD and be able to put itself on that media, making it able to boot your computer and do a full restore.
You're going to really know that I'm OLD SCHOOL when I tell you that my main OS is Windows XP-Pro, run from a FAT-32 formatted HD.
Sure I have Windows 7 Ultimate 64 too, but it's on a separate HD.
Backing up my XP drive is a piece of cake using my old reliable Ghost 2003, booting up from a floppy disk. It takes about six minutes and even with an integrity check and restore (it's my 100% Defrag) it still only takes less than 15 minutes.
I can make a quickie backup of my C drive to a second partition on the same physical drive or a more secure backup to a second HD or the ultimate backup to a bootable DVD (that takes a bit longer).

Regrettably, I've not tried the so called backup program that comes with Windows 7. I'll read this thread with interest though, to see just how that works out.

OT
 
I use it all the time and it does a system image as well .you can set it to backup every week ,it will only back up the new files
 
did MS finally get something right lol
I'll stick with my acronis with more features that I only use from the F11 when GUI is not running. Never failed me there.
but we can tell others that W7 backup is better than having nothing

OldTimer, I was rock solid XP but now with a fair pc, not the best of best but 64 rocks on W7. I won't go back now.
 
must admit acronis is the best and quickest .but win7 backup is very good .it does take a bit of time ,but end result is great
 
When your HD has arc'd, sparked and smoked, you need more than just incremental data backups.
You need a 100% image of the entire HD, that you can easily restore from either another HD or from DVD's.

For daily data backups I just use a Backup.bat (batch file) that I wrote using XCOPY. Doing the incremental backup takes only about three seconds. NO additional software needed. I run it manually, but I could put it in my startup folder, attach it to my Quick Shutdown routine or even set it up in the Task Scheduler (my least favorite method).

Setting up a 100% effective backup scheme can be either as simple or as complicated as you want to make it.
I'd just as soon Keep It Simple. I've been running Ghost, in one version or another, for fifteen years and I'm very familiar with it, so continuing to use it is just second nature for me. I can see no reason to go off into something else that may not really do me as well.

The Ghost versions written after Symantec bought the program have gotten more and more bloated and worse and worse.
They lost me when they went from a DOS based program to one that will only run in Windows.
I've totally stopped updating Ghost since Ghost 11.5 which can run from a DOS boot Flash Drive or CD and will back up Vista or Seven.
Ghost Explorer is great and is run from within Windows, to restore a single (lost) file from within any previous Ghost Backup Image File.
I've not had to use that often, but when I did, it was a real life saver.

Cheers Mates!
OT
 
I had a problem with Windows 7 Backup but I found the solution. The backup couldn't complete. I found that the problem was that I had set up a link to my "Downloads" folder in "Libraries". Of course there are .zip and .rar files in there and backup couldn't deal with them so it just stopped. I removed the link to the "Downloads" folder and that fixed it.

I don't know why it couldn't just copy the compressed files as they were though. It copied them under the "Users" folder.
 
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