How to Backup PC to External Hard Drive in Windows 10
Quick Navigation:
- The benefits of backup PC to External Hard Drive in Windows 10
- Part 1. How to Backup PC OS to External Hard Drive
- Part 2. All-in-one Solution to Backup PC to External Hard Drive in Windows 10
- Step-by-step guide for how to backup PC to external hard drive in Windows 10
Many people say it's very important to backup the Windows 10 OS to an external hard drive in case of system crash in the future. It's a great way to prevent any incidents like computer crash, virus attack, and reinstall the computer, etc. Actually, it's the same important to backup the whole PC, including documents, files, software, videos, pictures, music, and more to the external hard drive, because these files are private important files. There aren't many duplicates at all. When you lose it, then you'll never get them back unless you try your luck with data recovery software. Here in the following, we're going to talk about how to backup PC to external hard drive in Windows 10, including backup the OS and files.
The benefits of backup PC to External Hard Drive in Windows 10
- 1. Get the image backup of Windows 10, preventing any accidents in the future which will result in reinstallation.
- 2. Backup all files from PC to the external hard drive in case of computer damage, system crash, virus attack, intentional or unintentional deletion which will result in files lost permanently.
- 3. Backup PC to external hard drive for convenience. By doing this, whenever you ditch for a new computer or go to a new place without the computer, you'll have all your data in the little hard drive and make it available for you anywhere at any time. It's awesome.
The above 3 reasons make people need to backup Windows 10 PC to external hard drive. Let's get down to the steps for how to backup computer to external hard drive in Windows 10.
Part 1. How to Backup PC OS to External Hard Drive
As we all know that Microsoft offers the default way to backup PC OS. Though you might have different Windows 10 installed, the steps for backup PC OS are almost the same. Here are the steps for how to backup PC OS to external hard drive in Windows 10.
Step 1: Connect the hard drive with your computer first because you're going to backup your OS Windows 10 to it. After then, click the Start-up Windows icon at the very bottom left, and type "Control Panel" in the search bar. When you see the Control Panel, click it on the right list. See the "System and Security" option? Select "save backup copies of your file with File History".
Step 2: Click on the "System Image Backup" option from the bottom left corner of your screen.
Step 3: Choose the "Create a system image" option. Select your hard drive and click on the "next" button to backup the PC Windows 10 OS to external hard drive. Click on the "Start Backup" button to begin the Windows 10 backup to external drive process.
For part 1, it only backup the OS of your Windows 10 PC to the external hard drive, the files covered are libraries, desktop, contacts, and favorites. As for files in the other partitions, not Letter C partition, are not backed up at all. If you want to backup PC to the external hard drive, recommend you try the all-in-one backup PC to external hard drive Windows 10 solution in Part 2.
Part 2. All-in-one Solution to Backup PC to External Hard Drive in Windows 10
For sure you can backup Windows 10 OS to external hard drive easily. However, when it comes to files on your PC, it might become a nightmare for you to do the backup because there are hundreds of files, it's big and time-consuming and you have to do it manually. What might be worse is that if your hard drive is not big enough, it can't hold the backup at all. To avoid the incidents, I recommend you try QILING Disk Master. It's a professional tool to help you back up the whole computer to an external hard drive easily, effectively and intelligently. How?
Your Backup PC to External Drive Windows 10 Software
- It has 3 backup options: backup files, backup drives, and backup system. The 3 options cover all you need to backup PC to external hard drive.
- All the backups are packages which save space of your hard drive
- You can schedule the backup, making it work in the ground. It works for you as you've set up beforehand, making the backup before even if you forget it in the future.
Step-by-step guide for how to backup PC to external hard drive in Windows 10
Step 1. Download and install the latest QILING Disk Master on your computer. It's virus-free and easy to use. Standalone, stable and professional. The backup PC to external hard drive Windows 10 tool fully compatible with all Windows PC. Next, connect your external hard drive with your computer, making sure your computer recognize it as an external hard drive.
Step 2. Launch the PC backup software. From the "Backup and Recovery" tab page, you can see 5 option: File Backup, File zip, File sync, Drive Backup, System Backup. Choose the backup feature as you need. My suggestion for you to backup PC to external hard drive is: doing the drive backup and system backup. It's enough unless you want to do file backup as well.
File Backup will needs you to select files from the drives on your computer. It takes some times but it's a really great backup file in Windows 10 option if you want better protection of your personal files.
Drive Backup saves you time since you have at least 2 partitions on your Windows PC. Only 2 or 3 times you can get it all backed up.
System backup, of course, will save as an image for future usage.
Though it seems it's troublesome to backup PC to external hard drives, it is worth if you want your computer and files are safe and keep them with you all the time.
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