How to make a System Image backup

A System Image backup is an exact copy of your computer as it is right now. Think of it as a clone of your hard drive.

If anything ever happens to your computer, the System Image will help you recover all of your data.

Seagate 1 TB External Hard Drive

*** My gear ***

Camera - Canon EOS 700D (Rebel T5i)

Microphone - Rode Videomic Pro

Laptop - HP Spectre x360

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[realperson]

After a complete weekend lost watching all the present content on YouTube about recovery drive, repair disc, system image, file history, set up backup, system restore, and so many other intertwined terms that work combined or sometimes substitute one another (yeah, after a complete weekend all these things are not completely clear to me) I'd just like to express how your videos are the best ones on these matters. The most clear in my opinion. Thanks for making them so complete. I'm sure that if I could have an afternoon with you I would leave as an expert on this subject, you know everything. The completeness on the theme, the clarity on the explanations, the appropriate editions for the understanding of the common noob like me. Thanks a lot. I just would like if you had videos on all the doubts I have, like the counterparts of all the mentions I did for Win7 and linux. But for what you offered in your channel so far, I have nothing but to thank you a

[abhijitpanda]

THIS VIDEO coupled with the other one about how to make a recovery drive using a memory stick has been an absolute gem of a learning lesson. thank you Dave. appreciate your hard work.

[patmanning]

You have been an absolute lifesaver with this tutorial! Thank you! For your recovery usb drive and wipe and reset tutorials too! I have to send my HP Spectre 360 back to the retailer for investigation, as one of the thunderbolt USB ports has failed, and it appears to heat up quite quickly too, during ordinary usage. They told me I had to send it back wiped, just in case! I was panicking big time, until I found your amazing tutorials and advice. So simple and straightforward. What more can I say. As a 67 year old woman from the UK, who likes to think she’s more than a little up there, technically minded, and up for a challenge, it truly was a blessing in disguise!

[jaimiecross]

I just bought a new laptop and looked for videos on how to make a system image and a windows recovery drive. Your videos are the clearest and easiest to use i found. Thanks so much.

[KeynrHaX]

Just a tip, you can hold your left shift key and click on restart and it will make your computer reboot into the recovery environment :) You can do this instead of turning it off 3 times.

[rubyzeng]

Here I made a system image with aomei and restore to another pc, worked well.

[CrownK]

Excellent! Clear and concise, straight to the point. Great tutorial!

[boyka]

Nice video buddy. Extremely helpful and easy to understand. I don't know why is it so hard for other people to explain in their video of "what is the system image". Most of the videos are junk.

[unknownmemory]

Thank you for this beautiful guide.
It took me a total of 35 minutes to completed a "System Image backup" with a storage size of around 200 GB.

[ronbennett]

Just used this now in 2024 ... brilliant thank you so much

[judykettenhofen]

Yes, years ago, w/win8, my drive would lose its mind; repair wouldn't work, but I could get into the "advanced options" and restore the system image backups I made. I got used to doing this on a regular basis.
It HAS been a long time. Originally, I had to start from scratch and re-install updates'n'things. Later, I discovered I could make a system image that included installed programs, etc.
Back then, I could make incremental system image backups so it was pretty slick.
Thanks for the advice about using a quality usb drive for the recover drive in your prior video.

[drmikeosgood]

Hi Dave; I found your videos and boy they're a real help to unscrambled O S systems even to 76-year-olds that did not have pcs even in school and very little at work before retirement. Thanks a really big bunch!!

[ash]

Hey Dave, an FYI, I used your video and backed up my windows 11 today. It did exact job as win10. Thanks a lot buddy, you are the best!

[randallroberts]

Hey Dave, thank you for your YouTube "How to Make a System Image backup" It was a life saver. Cheers Mate

[MrPatdeeee]

Well FINALLY. For I have been trying to recover a FULL computer; after the internal HDD failed. And I have a "backed up" HDD; with even a "computer" Image and a "Shadow Copy" plus every Files on the old HDD.

But NO one could tell me how to recover my computer; and told me only how they recover files. That will NOT fill my wants.! Yet I have backed up my computer EVERY night; for years; with "ALL" things backed up. But I did not know what to do; when my internal HDD failed. Not even Microsoft could tell me. Sad, but OH so true.

And you told us that in a short time. WOW!. Thank you kind Sir for that. Awesome!

[Meatcrob]

Great explanation. Just had a complete catastrophe from a botched windows update. I lost all of my data and will not be making the same mistake again. Now that I have my computer up and running again after formatting both my hard drives and using a USB drive to boot from and install windows on my main drive I will be making a system image as shown in this video. Very clear and easy instructions thank you!

[keyiwan]

What to do when I have no system back up and cannot boot

[christslove]

Very well done. I never understood the new way that Windows does backup since they moved away from NT Backup after XP/2003 Server. You remedied that in this and your last videos like no one ever ever been able to or documented well enough to. I like the file versioning better from before too, although at least that change they can make an argument for. Now that I understand it, I know that I'm not missing anything, and wouldn't consider using it.



With ShadowProtect and Macrium Reflect, you can easily do automated continuous incrementals, (Synthetic Full Backups) that can give you 15 minute snapshots. You can browse or roll back and entire computer to a consistent point in time from minutes ago to months ago. You can also have them do periodic full images, all unattended. Moreover, you may want a copy of your old machine for software, operating system, or any other reason in the future. You can turn their backups into virtual machines and boot them on completely dissimilar hardware, and move them back in minutes. I've had to do that before with a server at a factory and they ran on it for 4 days and didn't notice any difference in performance or any other aspect. (Which you can do with Windows 10 images as well) Health checks are done automatically. The one that makes the most sense for home use is Macrium, while I tend to use ShadowProtect on servers. Macrium is $70 a license and $140 for 3. The free version will do about everything the pay-for version will except Synthetic Full Backups. It even makes it easy to restore from larger to smaller partitions.

[rebeccalynn]

Years ago, my laptop suddenly refused to load windows. I bought a disc containing Ubuntu and used it, but I kept losing my desktop. It seemed like a Unity issue, so I went to Linux Mint. Mint extended the life of my laptop for the next five years. I finally got a new laptop last year, and I'm afraid of it happening again. Thank you for showing us how to back it up. I have some DVDs here for a recovery disc, plus a thumb drive.

[cpat]

Great video. I’ve had the unfortunate experience of my hard drive completely crashing without a recovery disk. Super helpful in the event this happens again.