backing up windows

Dross

Dross

New Member
Hi everyone,
Anyone have any suggestions for methods (or apps) to backup my files and programs running on XP?? I used to just backup important files, but in the last 6 months, I've installed a bunch of applications (and spent a ton of time configuring them) and want to preserve those in case of system failure...I have tried using the windows backup utility to "backup all information" on the machine, but as the backup is running, it says I can only backup 4G on my external hard drive because of the file system type... Any one have any suggestions???

Thanks!
 
You cant backup your apps, because if you reinstalled windows they wouldnt work correctly, and would have to be reinstalled. You have a few options though.

You can use a ghosting utility, which will make an image of your hard drive, and store it to another drive, or to CD/DVD's.

Or you can just copy the important files.
 
ghosting app and ext. hard drive

Great; the ghosting app is what I am looking for...basically, if my system fails, I want to be able to just reinstall an image of my existing OS...a couple of questions:

1. any recommendations for a ghosting app.

2. my external hard drive is formatted to FAT 32, I want to be able to put my backup image on there, but the max file size is 4GB...can I just wipe that external drive and reformat it to something that will hold my entire image??

Thanks!!!
 
I would recommend Norton Ghost, but that costs money.

If you're in Windows now, you can just right click on the drive and format it as NTFS.

How big is the backup drive? How much data is on your current drive?
 
The backup is 150G and has 30G used up...thanks a lot for your help; it is much appreciated.
 
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