thehottest
say if I get a 1TB external hard drive to back up my current drives. I have 2 hard drives on my pc... I want to get a new mother board an cpu etc. I kno that I have to wipe out the main drive of my pc an reinstall windows. so if I move all my programs documents an etc to the external hard drive and install new mobo, will all my programs work they way it did when the mobo and cpu is installed with fresh new windows? meaning will they openin up with out giving me errors? I'm a music producer so I'm mainly talking about fl studio, plugins, and pro tools etc. what do you think?
Answer
A program "installed" into Windows has tentacles down deep within it, and so can't simply be copied from drive to drive. It actually has to be installed...
...that is, unless it's "portable." That's what "portable" apps means: The app can be manually copied into a manually-created folder in the "Program Files" folder, and it will run... even without having far-reaching tentacles.
But the apps you mention... they're so tightly integrated into Windows, once they're installed, that you can't just copy back and forth.
Now, if you "image" drive C: to an external drive, then you can re-deploy that image back to the new hard drive, and it will boot right up, and your apps will work...
...except for one thing: The new drive will be in a new computer, the drivers and other Windows internals for which will not be right. So you'll have a hugely error-infested, crippled, godawful boot-up.
It's a better idea, believe it or not, to just back-up your entire drive C: as files, not as an image. Let's say that the external drive is drive F:, then the ROBOCOPY command to just copy all of C: over to F: would be:
robocopy c: f: /e copy:dat /a-:sh /xj /r:0 /v
It will take some time... maybe hours. Go get coffee or sleep or something.
Then just make sure that you have all of your original software installation CDs or DVDs (or that the downloaded installers were successfully copied over to F:) and that you have all the serial numbers.
Then rebuild the machine; install Windows and make sure that all drivers are working, that all Windows updates are applied, and that you have a pristine version of Windows. That, right there, would be the time to make the one-time set of backup CDs or DVDs so you could restore the system to that point at some point in the future, if you ever needed to.
Then re-install all your software and plugins.
Then copy all your data files and emails (in your user directory and sub-directories) back over onto C:.
At that point, if you think about it, you'll be back in perfect shape...
...and even though it will have seemed like more work to some who would counsel you to use the imaging approach...
...it will, I promise you, not actually be. It will, in fact, be far, far cleaner, overall.
Then, once you've got that all set up, you need to use that nice new external drive for routine imaging and backup. You would image the whole hard drive C: periodically to one partition on the big external drive that's sized so it's about five percent larger than your drive C:; and you would do ongoing synchronizing (or just periodic incremental backups) to another partition that's about five percent larger than your drive C:
That way, if you ever needed to wipe the drive again, as long as all the rest of the hardware was unchanged, you could just restore from the image, then touch-up subsequently updates files from the sychronized or incremental backup.
A third partition on the big external drive would be for archived music and other files... stuff that would add-up and just fill your dive C: in no time.
That's PRECISELY how I do it. I've been in IT for 32 years, and I've never lost a single BYTE of data. Not one. Ever. In all that time.
Hope that helps.
A program "installed" into Windows has tentacles down deep within it, and so can't simply be copied from drive to drive. It actually has to be installed...
...that is, unless it's "portable." That's what "portable" apps means: The app can be manually copied into a manually-created folder in the "Program Files" folder, and it will run... even without having far-reaching tentacles.
But the apps you mention... they're so tightly integrated into Windows, once they're installed, that you can't just copy back and forth.
Now, if you "image" drive C: to an external drive, then you can re-deploy that image back to the new hard drive, and it will boot right up, and your apps will work...
...except for one thing: The new drive will be in a new computer, the drivers and other Windows internals for which will not be right. So you'll have a hugely error-infested, crippled, godawful boot-up.
It's a better idea, believe it or not, to just back-up your entire drive C: as files, not as an image. Let's say that the external drive is drive F:, then the ROBOCOPY command to just copy all of C: over to F: would be:
robocopy c: f: /e copy:dat /a-:sh /xj /r:0 /v
It will take some time... maybe hours. Go get coffee or sleep or something.
Then just make sure that you have all of your original software installation CDs or DVDs (or that the downloaded installers were successfully copied over to F:) and that you have all the serial numbers.
Then rebuild the machine; install Windows and make sure that all drivers are working, that all Windows updates are applied, and that you have a pristine version of Windows. That, right there, would be the time to make the one-time set of backup CDs or DVDs so you could restore the system to that point at some point in the future, if you ever needed to.
Then re-install all your software and plugins.
Then copy all your data files and emails (in your user directory and sub-directories) back over onto C:.
At that point, if you think about it, you'll be back in perfect shape...
...and even though it will have seemed like more work to some who would counsel you to use the imaging approach...
...it will, I promise you, not actually be. It will, in fact, be far, far cleaner, overall.
Then, once you've got that all set up, you need to use that nice new external drive for routine imaging and backup. You would image the whole hard drive C: periodically to one partition on the big external drive that's sized so it's about five percent larger than your drive C:; and you would do ongoing synchronizing (or just periodic incremental backups) to another partition that's about five percent larger than your drive C:
That way, if you ever needed to wipe the drive again, as long as all the rest of the hardware was unchanged, you could just restore from the image, then touch-up subsequently updates files from the sychronized or incremental backup.
A third partition on the big external drive would be for archived music and other files... stuff that would add-up and just fill your dive C: in no time.
That's PRECISELY how I do it. I've been in IT for 32 years, and I've never lost a single BYTE of data. Not one. Ever. In all that time.
Hope that helps.
Portable External Hard Drive?
Enchantres
Help me find one, for my needs, please?
Requirements:
Bare minimum hard drive - 500gb. 1TB would be better, but mehh.
Size: relatively small, not extremely heavy or bulky. In other words, portable.
Password protection option.
Relatively fast transfer rate. I do not want to be waiting six hours for a few gb to transfer.
Easy to use, something like drag-and-drop or similar
Back-up software, so I can copy my harddrive contents to it in case of computer crashing emergency.
USB 2.0 powered only, since I don't want to plug into the wall and I don't have a firewire slot.
Price range - up to $150.
I was thinking a Toshiba one, since it might be best compatible with my Toshiba laptop?
Answer
Do you have a Best Buy or similar type of computer store where you can go look at them?
I would recommend looking at them in a store, and being able to talk to a knowledgeable sales person.
They would be better able to help you.
There is so many kinds / styles available, I would want to look at them all, and read the specifications on the box of the hard drive.
As for the back up- if you have much really important stuff on your computer, I would go with an
on-line back up, such as Carbonite.
I have a Carbonite back-up for mine, and it is great!!! It backs up my stuff automatically, every day.
An external hard drive for back up is good, but it still is a hard drive, and thus subject to crashing just like the internal hard drive in your computer.
Chances are slim, but you never know!
Good luck in your searching, and I hope you find a good one that does what you want it to do.....
Do you have a Best Buy or similar type of computer store where you can go look at them?
I would recommend looking at them in a store, and being able to talk to a knowledgeable sales person.
They would be better able to help you.
There is so many kinds / styles available, I would want to look at them all, and read the specifications on the box of the hard drive.
As for the back up- if you have much really important stuff on your computer, I would go with an
on-line back up, such as Carbonite.
I have a Carbonite back-up for mine, and it is great!!! It backs up my stuff automatically, every day.
An external hard drive for back up is good, but it still is a hard drive, and thus subject to crashing just like the internal hard drive in your computer.
Chances are slim, but you never know!
Good luck in your searching, and I hope you find a good one that does what you want it to do.....
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