Solved Windows 10 Copy Backup or Clone?

[CptCookie]

Wasn't sure where to post this, but I have an ASUS X551MAV laptop running Windows 10 x64.
New Hard Drive -
Seagate 500GB BarraCuda 5400 RPM 128MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 2.5" 7mm Laptop Internal Hard Drive ST500LM030

Prior to this my last laptop default generic hard drive died.
I simply want to be able to clone the drive or copy, backup, whatever I need to do so that in the future if this hard drive dies, I won't lose my OS and everything on the drive and can simply restore on a new hard drive.
Went thru a hassle with the last hard drive because I didn't have a back up for it. Originally bought the laptop from Wal-Mart and it came pre-installed with Windows 8.1, so of course all it had is the OEM product key for Windows embedded in a chip on the motherboard and you can't re-install that on a new hard drive unless you have the original factory recovery media which costs like $50. Luckily, I was able to simply download and install Windows 10 and it automatically pulled the product key from BIOS for me. So now I'm running Windows 10.

But back to the point..Can I back it up to a CD or DVD, disc, or what are my options?

 

[managed]

I would get an external Usb 3.0 hard drive and make an Image of the whole laptop hard drive using Macrium Reflect free version.

 

[crjdriver]

You have a seagate drive. You can download the free version of acronis true image to make the image. For seagate, the program is called disk wizard.
FWIW I always use the bootable or recovery usb for all imaging, cloning, etc. This removes windows from the task. The acronis bootable usb is actually running a version of linux.

 

[CptCookie]

Managed:
I actually do have an external USB hard drive, but it's got a lot of data on it already.. Preferably I was wanting to somehow burn a whole image (I guess it's the same as "ghosting") of the laptop onto a disc.. Like how back in the day, some of the older laptops I had bought would come with a recovery CD with everything on it.

If anyone knows a way to do that or can explain to me what I have to do I'd greatly appreciate it!

CRJDriver:
I will check that out today.
I'm not quite ready to go into Linux yet though..maybe later when I have more time to explore it.
Is there a way it can copy Windows 10 as well cause for me that would be convenient. In-case they stop doing the free upgrade of Win 8.1 to 10. Cause then it would no longer pull the key from BIOS automatically for me if the hard drive dies in the future or I need to re-partition it and then I would be without an OS and have to go buy another one. Nor would I have a backup copy of Win 8.1 because it's an OEM key and I don't have the factory recovery media to trigger it. So I just skipped Win 8.1 altogether and did a fresh install of Win 10.

Or does Acronis DiscWizard only copy without copying Windows 10 as well?

 

[CptCookie]

CRJDriver:
Could you also please post or PM me the link(s) to that, so I can download it.
I googled it and it seems there are a few options, not sure which link to go with. I saw options from both Seagate & Acronis, wasn't sure which site I should be downloading from.

 

[crjdriver]

https://www.seagate.com/support/downloads/
Diskwizard is the third one down.
One of your disks must be a seagate disk or the software will not install.

 

[managed]

A single sided DVD holds about 4.7GB so you would need to burn several.

Might be better to put some of the data from the external hard drive onto DVDs and use the space created for Images.

 

[CptCookie]

CRJDriver:
Thank you for the link, I will check it out.
I only have one internal hard drive for the laptop and it's the one I posted above in the original post, yes it is a Seagate, so I should be good to go on that note.

Managed:
Thanks for the heads-up tip.
I'm planning to image the internal Seagate hard drive right off a fresh install. I haven't added all the programs and such that I will later on after I back-up the hard drive first. It's a fresh install with just Windows 10 installed.
Do you happen to know or can estimate how many GBs that would take up? I realized the Windows 10 bootable flash drive I made was about 8 GBs. So I'm guessing somewhere around 10GBs or less? Which isn't too bad.

After I do that, I'll go ahead and install everything else on it and then ghost to the external USB drive(not Seagate). I just wanted a back-up fresh install on-hand in-case I ever want a fresh start.

 

[crjdriver]

You can store multiple images on the external drive. The image file is compressed so that if your system drive is 50gig with win10, office, a few games, etc, the image file will be approx 30gig.

What I do when I install is to make an image after the install, all drivers, patches, updates, etc. I label this one as "Clean install" After that, I make at least one image per week using the date as the file name.

 

[managed]

A clean install of Windows 10 64 bit uses about 20GB of hard drive space, should be about the same when you've added drivers, updates etc.

However as crjdriver said the Image file is compressed, with Macrium's default compression it would be about 9GB.

 

[CptCookie]

CRJDriver:
Oh okay, kinda like a ZIP File. It reduces the initial size, more compact storage. But does it only compress for an external hard drive or it works with DVDs as well?

I don't know if I'm gonna have time to do it once a week, but probably once a month would work for me.

That's what I was thinking, I wanted to just have one fresh copy on DVD and then I could store multiple images throughout on an external hard drive.

Managed:
I'll check what my data usage is at, usually it shows you right there in my documents.

Okay, so I'm guessing Macrium is another option for back-up. Not sure which is better, Acronis or Macrium. I've also been told Windows 10 can do a full back-up as well on it's own.

 

[crjdriver]

I would really doubt you are going to get a win10 image file on a single dvd. I know acronis will split the file so you could use multiple dvds however I would REALLY just use the external usb hard disk to store images. I do not know if macrium will split files; someone who uses it will have to tell you.

 

[DaveA]

A 1-4 TB external USB drive will cost a lot less that a stack of one time used CD/DVD's

I mean Disk Drives and not what is called a Flash or Thumb drive.

 

[managed]

I think using DVDs would be very inconvenient after a while, you would have to label them carefully and make a new one after any substantial change like installing a new program, adding new windows updates etc.

Using an external hard drive would be much easier.

Also to start with why not use Acronis and Macrium ?

I think Macrium can split an image so it will fit on DVDs but I've never tried it.

 

[CptCookie]

CRJDriver:
Oh, I wasn't thinking or planning to get it all on one disc, since they are 4.7GB.

DaveA: Yes, I briefly browsed and saw they have some cheap ones, saw one for $24 that was like a 50 GB. But I have about three dusty stacks of unused DVDs from years ago, might as well use some of them. And I don't know, it's just a preference to have one copy on disc, I can do the rest on external drives.

Managed:
I do have some left-over DVD print labels I can use. This is just a one-time thing though, I'm not planning on making back-ups with DVDs only or every time I back-up, just one set copy. Like how purchased pre-installed computers/laptops used to come with a back-up disc to restore to factory defaults.