Lesson: Backing up your PC

[awitch]

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There is likely to be a day when your computer will fail and you'll need to rebuild it from scratch. With a little planning, the process won't be a nightmare. This week's lesson is disaster recovery. Again, feel free to ask for details on anything.

I recommend getting an external USB hard drive. They are inexpensive and easy to find at any store that sells computer parts and electronics. These days 250-500 GB are the norm, and should be more than sufficient to back up typical user data. Some drives may even have software in which you configure what you want to back up, then press a button on the drive and the backup runs.

If you've purchased a brand name computer like Dell or HP, you will want to keep the recovery CD that came with the computer in a safe place (however, some computers now come with a recovery partition on your hard drive that you can boot from if you need to restore your system to factory defaults).

If your PC did come with a recovery CD, it is likely that it came with a drivers/utility CD that you can use to set up the hardware that specifically came with your computer. Keep it safe. If not, you are likely to be able to get all the driver installation files from the manufacturer's website. Usually, it's a matter of entering the make/model of your PC and then specifying what operating system you are running and it will give you all the drivers. Since some computers ship with different parts, you may want to make a note of the make and model of each piece of hardware listed in the device manager. It's a good idea to have these drivers saved someplace on a CD or flash drive.

If you purchased any software that came on a CD, make sure those CDs are all stored in a safe place with the license or activation key that may be required to re-install it.

If you've purchased software that you downloaded directly from a website, copy those install files to the external drive and you can create a text file with the license key. Make sure the file name is descriptive so you know what it is.

If you've lost your license keys, you can download and install Belarc Advisor for free. This utility takes an inventory of your computer, but the most useful information it gives you is all of the keycodes used for each program installed. Print out the results and keep the document safe.

Finally, check your Add/Remove Programs applet in the control panel and make a note of what's installed so you remember what you need to put back.

What else to back up?
I tend to frown on the idea of backing up your entire system. It takes a long time and uses a lot of disk space unnecessarily. If you're going to rebuild your machine, it's best to do it with a clean install, and then put back what you need. So, here is what I back up:

Backup any folders off the root of the C drive that you may have created.

In Windows, each user has their own profile where user data is stored.
Windows XP:
c:\documents and settings\username\

Windows Vista and 7:
c:\users\username\

You'll want to backup the following folders in each user's profile. You may have to unhide your files and folders to see them.

Desktop
My Documents
Favorites (this is for Internet Explorer)
If you use Mozilla Firefox or another non Internet Explorer web browser, open that program and manually export your favorites and/or bookmarks and then back up that file.

If you use Windows XP and Microsoft Outlook for email, you'll want a copy of all the .pst or .ost files located here by default:
C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook\

If you use Microsoft Outlook 2003 or 2007 you'll want the .nk2 file (the auto complete dictionary) located here:
C:\Documents and Settings\username\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook\

In Windows Vista and 7 you'll want to save the following folders for each user:

Contacts
Desktop
Documents
Downloads
Favorites
My Music
My Pictures
My Videos
Saved Games

The Outlook .pst file is located here for Outlook 2003 and 2007:
C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Outlook

The Outlook .nk2 file is located here:
The location of the nk2 file is C:\Users\username\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Outlook

Video games can put saved games in various places on the drive, but usually you can find them in the c:\program files\title\ folder. Check the manual for details.

If you need a VPN (virtual private network) client to connect to your office from home, make sure you have the installation/set up information from your employer's network administrator.

That's pretty much it.

You may consider using the Files and Settings Transfer wizard in Windows XP, but I've seen it miss files on occasion and Windows must be at the same version and service pack for you to be able to import your data.

The Windows 7 equivalent is the "Windows Easy Transfer" program, but I haven't tried it out yet.

I also suggest disconnecting your external USB hard drive before restoring your system; don't want to format your backup by mistake.

 

[EphesiaNZ]

Nice article about backups

I usually backup the whole of "documents & settings" on XP or, "users" folder for Vista/7. Doing this captures anything that tends to slip through the cracks.

As for backup software, just use the internal windows backup that is supplied with XP/Vista/7 - it's good enough for most users plus you can backup the system volume and system state data too. Below, shows what I usually backup on an XP box,

I don't tend to backup else anything usually unless it's needed.

Using the internal backup software Windows provides allows for scheduling of jobs and also whether further backups overwrite (full backup) or append newer data (incremental or differential).

Windows backup software does a good job IMHO - I used it to backup servers in a commercial environment where the $$$ were lacking for enterprise solutions such as Backup Exec.

 

[MrJim]

With my mac I'm using Time Machine with external HD + Carbonite...and using Carbonite alone on the PC

 

[EphesiaNZ]

Just to follow up, with Linux you can backup with a simple script - like this,

#!/bin/bash
#
# script to copy files to backup media
#

# backup home dirs and useful system files & configs
sudo cp -ruxv /root /media/backup__
sudo cp -ruxv /home /media/backup__
sudo cp -ruxv /etc /media/backup__

The script simply copies the entire contents of /root, /home and /etc to the backup path of (in my case) /media/backup__

It will only backup files that are newer than those on the backup drive hence, once you do a full backup, subsequent backups should be fairly quick.

 

[MPaul]

Just to follow up, with Linux you can backup with a simple script - like this,

#!/bin/bash
#
# script to copy files to backup media
#

# backup home dirs and useful system files & configs
sudo cp -ruxv /root /media/backup__
sudo cp -ruxv /home /media/backup__
sudo cp -ruxv /etc /media/backup__

The script simply copies the entire contents of /root, /home and /etc to the backup path of (in my case) /media/backup__

It will only backup files that are newer than those on the backup drive hence, once you do a full backup, subsequent backups should be fairly quick.

That's good to know. Now... how do you restore?

 

[EphesiaNZ]

That's good to know. Now... how do you restore?

Well, you could simply copy and paste back the directory structures using Nautilus file manager if using Ubuntu - as I do sometimes when reinstalling Ubuntu when a new version comes out. If you want to restore /home, just reverse the source/destination in the script eg,

sudo cp -ruxv /home /media/backup__ # to backup

sudo cp -ruxv /media/backup__/home /home # to restore

I've never had to do full restore to be honest but the only problems usually are with permission on a file or folder.

Another thing I do once a week (or thereabouts) is to do a,

dpkg -l > ~/mypackages

at the command line - this will dump a list of installed packages on your machine. Assuming the list gets backed up, should you need to rebuild a machine, that package list is a working reference as to what to reinstall back onto the new machine.

If you want to make it easier to backup Ubuntu for example, there are tried and trusted tools like rsync - see Ubuntu docs page,

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/rsync

 

[MPaul]

Actually, I do not store anything I'm working on to the hard drive. I keep it on thumb sticks and external hard drives. I might keep a file on the desktop to have it real handy, but I always back it up before shutting down. Doing it this way is also secure, in case people ever got into my computer. It used to be they would get a lot of bible information, but now they won't even get that.

So.... for myself personally, I really do not have the need to back-up, as I can reinstall the system in about an hour, or that is, the OS with all software I use. However, I never even have to restart my system to correct a problem, but I just never ever have any problems. So it keeps my mind off of doing back-ups.

But it is interesting to know about an OS back up.

 

[paul1149]

I believe in full image backups of, if not the entire drive, at least the MBR, the BCD system reserve partition if there is one, the C drive, and the OEM restoration partition if there is one. If a restoration partition is used, instead of supplying CDs, if the whole drive goes what then does the user do? This only has to be done once, though a differential update can be added after major system changes.

Then I do user file backups separately. I like to place them in an encrypted local folder that gets automatically backed up to the cloud.

Once the system is set up, it's all automatic. I just have to remember to turn on the external drive.

Thanks for the reminder of Belarc's reporting of product keys. I had forgotten that, and it does an excellent job.

 

[awitch]

For those who would like something a little more hard core, I also recommend Acronis True Image. You have to pay for this one, but it takes a volume level backup, like a snapshot of your PC at the time you run it. When you restore this snapshot, the PC returns to the exact state it was in; everything in place. All you need is an external drive to save the snapshot to. It's easy to use and great if you like tinkering with all the settings or experimenting with software.

 

[pgp_protector]

Well, you could simply copy and paste back the directory structures using Nautilus file manager if using Ubuntu - as I do sometimes when reinstalling Ubuntu when a new version comes out. If you want to restore /home, just reverse the source/destination in the script eg,

sudo cp -ruxv /home /media/backup__ # to backup

sudo cp -ruxv /media/backup__/home /home # to restore

I've never had to do full restore to be honest but the only problems usually are with permission on a file or folder.

Another thing I do once a week (or thereabouts) is to do a,

dpkg -l > ~/mypackages

at the command line - this will dump a list of installed packages on your machine. Assuming the list gets backed up, should you need to rebuild a machine, that package list is a working reference as to what to reinstall back onto the new machine.

If you want to make it easier to backup Ubuntu for example, there are tried and trusted tools like rsync - see Ubuntu docs page,

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/rsync

Is their a good way to have my Ubuntu box back up itself to a WHS ?
Right now I've got it doing a nightly backup of the Database to a Shared Directory on the WHS Box, and that's working.
Also I'd rather it does a Daily Backup to the network\shared\DBBackup\DayOfWeek than network\shared\DBBackup\ and I manually copy it to the DayOfWeek.

The other content on the box (configurations, web page source, ect) are just manually backed up for now, though having that do an automated backup would also be nice.

 

[EphesiaNZ]

Is their a good way to have my Ubuntu box back up itself to a WHS ?
Right now I've got it doing a nightly backup of the Database to a Shared Directory on the WHS Box, and that's working.
Also I'd rather it does a Daily Backup to the network\shared\DBBackup\DayOfWeek than network\shared\DBBackup\ and I manually copy it to the DayOfWeek.

The other content on the box (configurations, web page source, ect) are just manually backed up for now, though having that do an automated backup would also be nice.

Assuming you had folders called Monday, Tuesday... Sunday then, bash has an easy way to extract the day out of the date command,

#!/bin/bash
#

day_of_week=$(date "+%A")

echo $day_of_week

This will output the day of the week so, we can adapt this script to copy your database to your WHS folder according to the day of the week,

#!/bin/bash
#

day_of_week=$(date "+%A")

backup_cmd="cp -ruxv /<database-folder> /<WHS-server-path>/"$day_of_week

$backup_cmd

If you need to backup other folders into your daily folder on WHS, just repeat the last two lines with the correct folder (replacing <database-folder>) to be backed up.

 

[Custry]

Great post. Thanks.

 

[Nanopants]

Another option that I haven't seen mentioned is using a RAID array of hard drives.

Personally, I use an array of two identical hard drives, which is divided into two partitions: One for RAID 0 and one for RAID 1. Everything which isn't a big deal to lose I'll load onto the RAID 0 partition for the performance increase, and all of my important data is saved on the RAID 1 partition.

 

[EphesiaNZ]

Another option that I haven't seen mentioned is using a RAID array of hard drives.

RAID isn't really a backup strategy to be honest - it's a fault tolerance system. Granted it can save your bacon quickly if a drive dies but won't help much if your machine burns in a fire (assuming your backup is offsite).

With a RAID 0/1 partition sharing two drives you may experience loss of I/O performance anyway due to the slower writes to your RAID 1 segment. What is good but, over the top for a PC, is RAID 10 where you have two sets of striped disks in RAID 0 but each pair are then mirrored as RAID 1 - I/O performance is great, usually used for databases which need quick access times.

My preference for an average desktop is a RAID 1 mirrored pair and a very good backup of the data. My desktop usually has a SSD for OS speed and 2x SATA drives (mirrored) for data and then a portable USB drive as a backup system.

 

[awitch]

My desktop usually has a SSD for OS speed and 2x SATA drives (mirrored) for data and then a portable USB drive as a backup system.

Haven't had much experience playing with SSD. Are they worth the price yet?

 

[KenE]

If I may add another 2 cents worth:

Don't forget that if you have added Rules in MS Outlook (used to organize and reduce th stress of information-overload) these need to be manually backed up (via the Export dialogue in the Rules and Alerts pull-down menu) as they are not stored in the .pst, etc files

Very important to know that you cannot backup Outlook while this program is still open! Please ensure Outlook is closed before your backup run or you will have the nasty experience of finding that no emails have been backed up.

I have written some very simple backup scripts for Windows XP\7 that use only the programs supplied with Windows if anyone would like to make use of them.

 

[paul1149]

Evidently Outlook rules are stored in different places, depending on version. For Outlook '10, for instance, see here, where they are stored in a file that can be backed up.

You should be able to back up open files through use of the volume shadow service, VSS, which you can invoke/close via command line in a script. I haven't tested that with Outlook specifically, but I have used it otherwise.

 

[EphesiaNZ]

Haven't had much experience playing with SSD. Are they worth the price yet?

Well I think it was worth it anyway. Yes they are still pricey compared with SATA drives but the decision to buy SSD is usually made for speed. I purchased an Intel 40GB drive when they first appeared - this has a fairly poor write speed for a SSD drive but is still faster than conventional SATA, it's write speed is pretty quick too but, slow by todays SSD's. Used as an OS drive, the read speed is the important factor as an OS does more reads than writes.

Prices are starting to drop on SSD's and soon will be affordable for most pockets when building a new PC. I guess I will upgrade my SSD for more speed when it comes to a new PC build and the current SSD will go into my 4 year old Lenovo to give it some additional clout!

 

[EphesiaNZ]

If I may add another 2 cents worth:

Don't forget that if you have added Rules in MS Outlook (used to organize and reduce th stress of information-overload) these need to be manually backed up (via the Export dialogue in the Rules and Alerts pull-down menu) as they are not stored in the .pst, etc files

What a mess to backup Outlook - I remember this from my sys admin days. You would have thought the messaging flagship for MS would have had an easier backup/restore method...