Is OneDrive a Backup?

❎ OneDrive is a powerful tool, but thinking of it as your backup leads down a dangerous and risky path.

❎ Is Onedrive a backup?
OneDrive has many features that are like backups, but it also has characteristics that make it act like not being a backup at all. While you can use OneDrive as an important part of an overall backup strategy, it’s critical not to rely on it solely, or for things it’s not designed to deal with. At a minimum, OneDrive is no substitute for a regular image backup.

Chapters
0:00 OneDrive backup
0:50 OneDrive by itself is not a backup
1:20 It’s not just OneDrive
1:50 OneDrive is only one place
3:20 OneDrive isn’t everything
4:30 Part of a healthy backup plan
6:15 File History

4:40 OneDrive as part of a healthy breakfast

More Ask Leo!

#askleo #onedrive #backup

[askleonotenboom]

Assuming it is can put your data at risk.

[hassanmaje]

The important point as you may have mentioned in other posts, the Cloud files have to be always on PC or available offline or mirrored on PC. Then only the external backups will capture the files and folders. If they are on "free up space" mode the backups would not capture.

[batman]

We had a small network using OneDrive. One compute was infected with Ransom Ware which, having altered all the files on the infected computer then uploaded the "amended" files to OneDrive, and back down to all the others on the network. A real mess.

[MarkUnique]

5:31 image backup includes "everything" ... "the files in OneDrive, the files not in OneDrive" ... this might need clarification for some people.
By default, OneDrive Files-On-Demand is turned on and will not store files created online in OneDrive on the PC ... so an image backup won't include all files in OneDrive, only those files in OneDrive that have been used on the PC. Or turn off the OneDrive Files-On-Demand option to have all OneDrive files on the PC.

[walter.bellini]

Great video thank you
Personal Vault within OneDrive is extremely important to place very important files to truly safe gaurd them from virus infections and encrypting ransomware. It doesn't update but it keeps the files safe because you need to authenticate to get inside of it.

[lorinarcampbell]

Leo, you made OneDrive easier for me to understand it's shortcomings. Im Thanks! I assume the same is true for Google Drive. I only use OneDrive for documents (I'm a writer) because of it's limited free space. I use GoogleDrive (free) for docs and everything else. I've been afraid of backup/restore; I believed once data was b/up it is secretly "coded" for restoring, so I copied and pasted files instead, but took up too many bytes. Not a reliable method sometimes. I used to b/up data as an employee in the '80s, at age 40. Now this old lady, now understands more at age 70, and will schedule it daily... oh yeah, I use SDs when I want to store data for posterity...

[SupersMan]

I have used Macrium Reflect to backup my PC for years, and I have had to make use of it. I came home one day and found that my SSD had died. I suspect it was caused by a brown-down that occurred during the day. This was before I had all my computers on UPS units. Fortuntaely, I had Macrium Reflect set up to image my computer regularly, and I was able to quickly get back up and running with a new SSD.

[relaxingnature]

Free Cloud storage is tiny, and large is expensive ..its better to own extra harddrives

[ThomasThornhill]

Thanks Leo. Appreciate your lesson. How would I back up on an external drive what is already in the Onedrive cloud? I have filles with the "cloud" symbol meaning it is not on my local computer. If I back up my docs file from onedrive, will it actually download all my files or only the link to the cloud.

[timjohnson]

How do I include files that I have stored on my OneDrive account in a system image backup?

[sotecluxan]

Love ur quest....MS is soooo trustworthy!

[Matschbacke]

Can you create a video like „The Ultimate Backup Guide“

[GraemePayneMarine]

Can I assume that this also applies to Google Drive?

[sunyadong]

Hi Leo, what if the harddrive which inlcudes onedrive file can not be accessd due to hardware failure, can I still access the data in the cloud using my onedrive account ?

[alslitter]

Hello Leo, I am sorry to contact you but I have an issue which I am not able to address. I am running Linux Mint and am looking for a open source product where I can do a full back up and then with this software do incremental backups. In a earlier video you gave two recommendations but they appear to be Windows based solutions. I understand that I can do a image of my system and then use something like Time-shift to do the incremental's. However is there a better solution?

[shanechiddy]

Hi Leo, love your videos.
I backup my data to a QNAP device (using Macrium Reflect) and another local Unraid server (using the Windows inbuilt backup) but would like to backup to the cloud also.
Can I backup some files / folders directly to a folder on OneDrive (using Macrium or Windows Backup) that is not available on the PC. I.e. folder in the cloud that is not synchronised to the PC. File access would be via the web interface only.
Any help is appreciated
Shane