Can I back up Windows...let me explain....
I have windows 7 64 pre-installed on this computer. After surfing the web yesterday, what I would like to do, with Acronis' help is:
*put just the system files, (not that I know what all of them are,) on one drive. That way, if I were to get attacked by a virus, it will only find the OS on the drive, and everything else (data and installed programs) will be on another drive. That way, in the worst case scenario, only the OS goes down, while the other drives remain intact. I'm told most programmers are going after C because most everyting is located there. On the other hand, if there are other drives attatched, i.e. externals, they could potentially be infected; atleast that's what I was told.
Can Acronis separate out just the system files to back up, so that I could then restore them to an another drive?
Thanks in advance,
CotS


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Thanks for the info. I don't know what I want to do yet.
CotS
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Ditto Bobbo here! Practice the same myself and have for many years and it serves me very well. Another benefit of this approach is that moving to a new OS with a clean install and having all your data seperate on another drive makes that process much easier!
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I am another who tries to limit system drive to Windows and Apps (SSD) and store data on larger mechanical HDDs (usually WD Black). For video edting I use a couple of SSDs (and an old 'retired' WD 10,000 rpm SATA 3 HDD). While I have tried shifting outlook and the like to another drive, with Windows 10 and Office 2016 Enterprise this can sometime result in significan peformance degredation. I have had this happen on one system.
Ian
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I'm similar to the MVPs who have posted in this thread, except that my laptop has only a single physical hard drive. To allow for quicker and smaller OS backups and quicker restores, I partitioned my drive. I have C: for the OS, D: for most user data, and E: for music. If I ever have system issues, I can fairly quickly restore just the C: partition.
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The OP is, I think, missing the point of backups.
I have the operating system on an SSD, while everything else is on an HDD. Backing up the former lets me recover from an OS crash or malfunction. Backing up the latter lets me recover lost or corrupted files.
Both are desirable -- and frankly, necessary -- backups.
Do a complete backup, then create the boot media that let you restore the OS and user files if the operating system won't run. (This is explained early in the manual.) Once this "life saver" backup has been made, you can read the rest of the manual to decide how you wish to customize your backups to meet your particular needs.
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That was my understanding.
CotS
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