Backing up your data is such an important and essential operation that it is (or should be) taken for granted, both at home but above all at work. There are very many programs and there are numerous variations of what is generically called "backup”. It is therefore good to understand what we are talking about in order to choose the option that best suits your needs. Without excluding an excellent solution offered directly, and free, in the latest versions of Windows 10, with a practical and easy option that allows you to save and restore not only data and programs but the entire mass memory including the operating system without being an expert.
Local, network, cloud, data or image backup?
The type of backup is essentially divided into two large families: data copying and system backup and performs functions that are superimposable but not the same.
The most common way of saving involves copying only the data (word files, photos, documents, etc.) to some external memory, be it a hard disk connected to the PC or another PC connected to the network, or even some cloud via the Internet. In case of problems with your computer, just attack the hard disk, or connect to the cloud, and recover all your data or only selected ones.
This system, which in turn is made up of many other types of backup (incremental, continuous backup, etc.) allows you to recover the data files, but in the event of a failure of your computer, for example due to a break in the hard disk , does not recover the installed programs and the operating system.
In short, it must reinstall Windows and then also reinstall all the programs that were present on the PC, as well as reconfigure everything, often starting from scratch.
To avoid this slow and annoying procedure, you need to make a system backup or better still a system image, a sort of photograph of the hard disk that will allow you to restore everything exactly as it was when it was taken.
The system image, once restored, allows you to restart your PC with the operating system, programs and data installed in the exact location when the system image was created. Beware that using this method it is not possible to choose the individual elements to save and restore: either all or nothing.
The Windows 10 system image
There are many programs, paid and free, that allow you to create the system image of your Windows PC, but there is an integrated function that performs this backup very well without having to resort to other software.
From the menu "start” of Windows 10 just open the “control panel” or search for it in the search field. At this point you have to choose "system and security” and then the entry “backup and restore (Windows 7)". In reality, you don't have to worry about the writing relating to the old operating system, but simply choose the item on the left "create system image”. At this point a very simple procedure starts to create the system image, technically a sort of huge file that will be created in an indicated destination.
However, the destination must be chosen with sufficient capacity for the backup, the program immediately supplies the size that will be used and it is therefore easy to know if the chosen destination has sufficient empty space.
In the event of a fault, even serious, on your hard disk, you can recover everything by doing the reverse procedure, using the restore function in the same menu. Just install a new hard disk and start the computer with one of the various emergency procedures (recovery DVD or bootable stick), or even restart it with a fresh installation of Windows 10 and choose the destination from which to recover the system image. At the end of the procedure, even if you start from a PC with settings and programs already installed, you will find your old PC just as you saved it.
