Best way to backup XP

[Firecat]

Need to backup all my data. I pretty much want to back up everything. Like a bootable backup or something.

What would be the best & easiest way to do this? I recently backed up my mac on a 1TB drive which I partioned, and would like to use one of those partitions.

I'm also worried about my e-mails, I think maybe my inbox just got too big. Outlook won't even start, it just hangs at the startup screen.

[PacketCollision]

Windows is notoriously cranky about being booted from a different drive than it is used to, but you might be able to use some sort of cloning software to do it. Being a linux guy my immediate thought is to try dd for initial backup, with rsync for updates, and using GRUB or NTLD on the second HD to boot the backup, but you might also do well with something a little more user-friendly. Try looking here to see if any of this looks right for you.

If booting the backup isn't a necessity, you have lots of options. If it is, and you can't switch to OSX or Linux, you may be in for a rocky ride.

[matt2000]

I stick firmly by going a bit OTT and doing a full partition image. The software isn't expensive, it takes an hour to backup my 500GB XP partition onto an eSATA external drive and I know that should my main HDD fail or Windows becomes corrupt I can wipe or replace the drive and put the image back on and have Windows exactly the same as it was before. All programs are there, all settings are there, all files are there, all drivers are there.

I do the same at work, which has been invaluable because some disks have been dying recently.

[epp_b]

Back when I used Windows 98, I would just literally copy the partition over to some space I had at the end of the drive (or to an external drive) and hide it. Since Windows 2000, though, Windows is really fussy about from where it boots and where it's been. I just image the Windows partition to an external drive. A full 16GB partition takes 10-15 minutes to backup or restore.

I'm also worried about my e-mails, I think maybe my inbox just got too big. Outlook won't even start, it just hangs at the startup screen.

Outlook is notorious for having stability issues when you accumulate a lot of mail because it stores everything in ONE file (hurrrdurrr). Do you have anything against moving to another email client?

[thevictor390]

re: Outlook stability

Archive your mail folders and start a new one. When .pst files get aove 2 GB you're in for a fun time.

[brydiem]

http://www.macrium.com/reflectfree.asp

I used this to do an image backup of my Vista installaion recently before installing Win7, and it worked well enough for a free program. Only thing it didn't like was how I tried to backup multiple partitions (my C primary OS and D backup) to the one image file, but I assume most of them won't do that anyway and I didn't need to backup that partition anyway. It also does a good linux-based recovery CD that you can boot your image from.

I also reccommend doing a windows easy transfer backup. I used that instead of my manual backups for my recent upgrade (did a custom install) and it re-installed things like my email backups (windows live mail), my internet settings (favourites, home page, etc) and such. That wasn't a good thing in my case, but it's definitely good in case you lose everything.

[eddysdaman]

Originally Posted by thevictor390

re: Outlook stability

Archive your mail folders and start a new one. When .pst files get aove 2 GB you're in for a fun time.

Alternatively obtain Outlook 07. It supports PSTs way above and beyond 2GB. Which is infinetly infuriating in a business environment...

[Buba]

Obtain Acronis TrueImage, backup, done...
I found its clone feature especially comfortable when moving an Xp install from a smaller to a bigger drive. Its all easy peasy and comes with the ability to create a bootdisk... I love it...

[Firecat]

Thanks guys. I am gonna get another hard drive first and then go through all these options on backing up the data.