As I have said before, backups are important. Exactly how important is up to you. How upset would you be if your computer broke, and you lost all of the information on it? Photos, letters, funny pictures, invoices, receipts, notes. All of it. If the answer is not “There is nothing there that I need” then you need backups.

My previous Article showed how to do Manual backups, but as people are forgetful, and put things off, I shall also explain how to set the Windows 10 Automated Backup.

You Will Need:

An external hard disk, with lots of spare capacity (how much will depend upon how much data you have, but 1 Terrabyte/1,000 Gigabyte is usually sufficient.)
An hour to read this Article and set up your Backup.

To Begin:

Connect your external drive. This is usually done via a USB cable. Most desktop computers have USB sockets on the front. Laptops have them positioned at the sides, or sometimes the back. It may take a moment or two for the PC to recognise the drive. It may chime to tell you that it has been detected.

If you open File Explorer, and use the Left-hand Navigation Pane to go to “This PC”, the drive should be displayed in the main screen. Now that we have confirmed that the Drive exists, we can close File Explorer.

Now, we go to the Windows 10 Settings screen. Click your START Button to see the Menu, and click on the “Settings” icon. This will open a new Window, with many Settings available. Take a glance, to see what sort of things you are able to alter, and find the Icon labelled “Update and Security (Windows Update, recovery, backup)”. This is where we find the backup Settings!

Three Little Symbols

I like to make sure the Settings Window fills the entire screen. To do this, as we learnt previously, you can click the “Maximise” square int he top right of your Window.

Setting up the Backup

On the left of the Update and Security window is a list of different areas we can change. Today, we want “Backup”. Click on it.

You should now have the Backup Settings screen. AS you have not used this External Hard Drive before, you will have to “Add a Drive”.

Clicking the Add a drive Icon will produce a list of available disk drives. You should be able to identify your External Hard disk on this list, and click on it.

You should notice the “Add a drive” button has now changed! In its place is an “Automatically back up my files” switch. You can switch this On or Off by clicking on it. We want it On!

The backup is now set!

We could leave it there, but you may wish to check the “More Options” area, to see what is happening.

More Options

This area allows you to fine-tune your backup settings. It is perfectly OK to leave it alone, as Windows 10 has pretty good default settings. But let’s take a look anyway!

Overview – This gives us some details of the Drive we are using.
Back up my files – sets how often to do backups.
Keep my backups – you can set for older backups to be deleted. I do not recommend this! Keep them forever!
Back up these folders – There should be a losy of which folders Windwos has decided to back up. Look through this list, to make sure that the folders you need are there! This would usually include: Documents, Pictures and Desktop. If you also store Music or Videos, check that these folders are listed. There will be other folders listed, and it is best to keep these.

Back Up Now!

Now we are happy that the back up settings are correct, scroll to the top of the Window and click the Back up now Button!

How long this will take depends upon how much data you have. I would suggest leaving your PC for at least an hour to ensure that the files are successfully copied to your backup drive.

You can continue to use your PC while it is doing backups.

Data-Loss is Unforgivable

Over the years, I have seen so many people lose data.

Wedding photos, baby pictures, invoices, tax and payroll data, love letters, and schoolwork.

I lost all of my University work (luckily after I had finished!), along with quite a lot of notes and pictures I had made.

Never again! Not on my watch!

There are so many simple ways to back up your data, that I have started using the phrase “If it isn’t backed up, it isn’t important data“.

So, to avoid the Wizard’s wrath, what can you do?

Commercial Solutions

Norton backup, Apple iCloud, Google Drive, Micrososft OneDrive, PC World Knowhow Cloud. There are many.

Most are perfectly good enough, and this article is not a review of Cloud Services.

Local Storage

You have probably heard of USB Memory Sticks and External Hard Disk Drives.

These are Local, as they are in the same building as your PC (as opposed to across the street (Off-Site) or on some other side of the Internet (Remote).

They are connected to your PC via a USB plug. Sometimes with a cable, sometimes not. Windows doesn’t really care. It is on the USB Socket.

So, if you could nip and get one. It may be in your sock drawer, or under the sofa, or possibly still at the shop. Memory Sticks are not expensive (~£20. 32 or 64GB), although the significantly-larger-capacity External hard Disks are a touch pricier (£50-£100 and more. 500GB+)

Go get one. I can wait. I have plenty of work to be doing.

Oh, hi. You’re back! OK, lets get this data backed up!

Doing the BackUp, Just Like We’ve Learnt

Plug in your Storage Device (USB Stick or External Hard Disk)
You may get a notification from Windows that you have done this. For my method, we ignore this.
The “File Explorer” Icon
Open File Explorer, and check that your Device has been recognised. You should have an entry in the Navigation Pane. If you do not see it, click on “This PC” to view all of your Drives. It may be labelled “USB Drive (E:)” or may have the manufacturer’s name.
Once we are happy that we know where the drive is, we then need to Copy all of our Files to it.
While you are in “This PC”, you should have a list of your Default Folders at the top of the page. Select Documents. Choose to Copy it (Note, we do not have the usual Ribbon here, so you will have to use right-click > Copy, or CTRL-C).
Now that the Documents Folder is on the Clipboard, select your Storage device, and Paste (right-click > Paste, or CTRL-V).
A Progress Window will appear to show how the Computer is getting along with Copying it. This will either be very brief, or quite a long time (My folder can take an hour or more, but it is HUGE! Yours is likely to be done in a minute or two). When done, the Window will disappear.
Confirm that the Data has been Copied, by going into your Storage Device, checking that a Documents folder exists, and then looking inside that to see that your data is there.
Go back to “This PC” and repeat for any other Folders you may wish. Usually this will include “Pictures”, and also Music and Videos, if you have anything in these folders.
Always Safe Eject!
When this is finished, DO NOT UNPLUG YOUR DRIVE YET! Always use the Safe Eject command! Click on the Safe Eject icon, at the bottom right of the screen, by the Digital Clock (This is called the “Notification Area”, by the way). You will get a menu, and you can click on “Eject <name of your device>”. Once you get the Confirmation message, you may safely unplug your device.

Summary

Now, that looks like quite a task, but I shall summarise it briefly:

Plug in Device
Open File Explorer
Navigate to “This PC”
Confirm that device is detected.
Select Documents folder. Copy/Paste to Device.
Repeat for other Folders.
Confirm Data transfer.
Safe Eject device.
Unplug Device

You may now put your device away somewhere safe and secure.

You are Backed Up!

For now …

Presumably, you will, at some point, take more photos, write more letters, save more interesting stuff from the internet etc.

Every now and then (the more often, the better), update your BackUp by following through the exact same procedure we have just done.

PLEASE let me know if you have any problems following this.

Or let me know what back up solutions you have used, for good or ill.

Tag: backup

How to Set Up Automated Backups