How to Backup Computer to External Hard Drive in Windows 10

Updated on Nov 11, 2023 | by Jeremy

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Windows 10 is a GUI-based operating system developed by Microsoft, the 10th series of Windows operating systems. Sometimes, users of Windows computers lose their important data due to hardware failure. In hardware failure, there is a chance of data loss. If anyone loses their data in Windows, there is no need to worry, because the backup feature in Windows 10 is used to create a full backup of the system including the OS, applications, and your personal files. Still, if you have faced data loss and you do not know how to backup your computer to an external hard drive on Windows 10, then this guide can help. With the help of this article, you will learn everything about Windows 10 automatic backup to an external drive and how to backup Windows 10 to an external hard drive easily. There are 2 ways to backup Windows 10 to an external hard drive. You will learn everything about them here.

Part 1: How to Backup Windows 10 to External Hard Drive Manually

In Windows 10 operating system, you can easily back it up by using Windows 10 external backup process. Windows 10 has built-in features that can be used to backup Windows 10 to external hard drive. It helps to create windows 10 system image backup or file backup. The worst thing is, you can't restore single files by using this feature, you have to do a full system restore if any software bug or hardware failure causes the problem. Here is how to backup computer to external hard drive Windows 10.

Step 1: First, you need to type "Control Panel" in the search bar then select the "Control Panel" option from the search results. Then from the "System and Security" option, you need to select "save backup copies of you file with File History".

Step 2: Next you need to click on the "System Image Backup" option from the bottom left corner of your screen.

windows 10 backup to external drive

Step 3: Now you need to select "Create a system image" option from the next window. Next, you have to select your hard drive and click on the "next" button to backup Windows 10 to external hard drive.

how to backup computer to external hard drive windows 10

Step 4: Finally, you need to click on the "Start Backup" button to begin the Windows 10 backup to external drive process. It can take from 10 minutes to a couple of hours to back up your data.

Part 2: How to Backup Computer to External Hard Drive on Windows 10 Automatically

When we use the Windows 10 built-in feature to backup data, there are more chances of errors, and it is also a very time-consuming process. This is the reason why QILING Disk Master is the right tool for you to backup data quickly. QILING Disk Master is one of the most powerful tools which can backup data from hard disk drives, SD cards, external hard disk drives, raw devices, USB devices, and backup Windows 10 itself. It is a fast and reliable tool that empowers you to backup files on Windows 10 from the storage media of your computer system as well as external devices. The Windows 10 backup tool uses the automatic backup technique to make it easier, more efficient, and faster. To get a clear picture of QILING Disk Master, the following are some features of this software.

Your Backup Windows 10 to External Drive Software

How to Backup Computer to External Hard Drive in Windows 10

First, you need to download and install the backup external hard drive Windows 10 program and connect your external disk to the computer.

Step 1: Choose Backup Types

Then you need to launch the backup system software and you can find the "Backup and Recovery" tab page of the program. You will find a list of backup types, including File Backup, File zip, File sync, Drive Backup, and System Backup. Choose the type you need.

Step 2: Set up Preferences

No matter if you backup Windows 10 files or system to the external hard drive, you can set up the schedule, location, as well as backup names in the next window. Make it the way you need and click "Proceed", letting the software backup your computer to the external hard drive. My suggestion is enabling the scheduled backup. It will do the backup in the background for you.

Part 3: Comparison between the First and the Second Windows 10 Backup to External Drive Way

Windows 10 Built-in Feature QILING Disk Master
Advantages
  • It helps to create full backup hard drive, including files, documents, etc.
  • You can manually use this technique for backup the hard drive.
  • It is a very easy way to back up the hard drive. You need to follow some steps to back up your hard drive.
  • Algorithms used in this feature are very advanced.
  • QILING Disk Master is a fully automatic tool used for backing up the system, drives, as well as files.
  • It is easy to use as compared to the Windows 10 in-built backup mechanism.
  • It is a fast and guaranteed solution technique for backup. You can schedule the backup as you need. It will backup Windows 10 automatically for you.
Disadvantages
  • It is a very slow process to back up the hard drive.
  • The time of backup depends upon the size of data if you backup too many files then it will take more time.
  • It may have chances of failure to recover the hard drive.
  • There is no disadvantage of this way by using QILING Disk Master. After all, it's designed to do the backup for Windows PC.

Both ways stated above are useful to backup Windows 10 to the external hard drive and they are efficient at doing their jobs. But QILING Disk Master is much better compared to the Windows 10 built-in features for backing up your computer to an external hard drive in Windows 10. The reason behind this is that with the help of this amazing software, there are no chances of error. If you want relevant and accurate results, then we recommend you start using this tool.

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