The backup on the notebook can be a great ally for the user when it comes to preserving important files and documents. After all, backup helps keep your files safe when formatting , selling a device or even freeing up storage space on your machine. In this text, you will learn how to back up your notebook, what is the ideal time to carry out the procedure and you will also learn about the different ways to do it.
WHEN TO BACK UP ON THE NOTEBOOK
If you are still not in the habit of making frequent backups, know that it is advisable to start adopting this practice. For notebooks for home use, it is recommended to back up at least once a month. This may vary according to the volume of files and documents moved by the user. Also, it’s good to be careful with physical storage solutions such as external hard drives and thumb drives, as they can become damaged or malfunction over time.
HOW TO MAKE A BACKUP ON YOUR NOTEBOOK
There are different methods to back up your notebook. Initially, we are going to deal with two of them, ways that are well known among notebook users and serve to accomplish this task. We are talking about backup through an external HD and a pen drive.
BACKING UP WITH EXTERNAL HDD
If you are looking to back up your notebook using an external HD, it is recommended that you choose hardware with at least 1TB . This is because a domestic external HD is a considerable investment by the user, varying according to the model and, above all, the storage size that the product offers. HD’s with greater capacity can even exceed R$ 1 thousand.
There are different types of external hard drive available in the market. However, the best sellers have a capacity of 1TB, 2TB and 4TB, respectively.
1TB HD : store 1,000 hours of video, or 250 two-hour movies, 3,200 digital photos, or 16,600 hours of music.
2TB HD : store 2,000 hours of video, 500 two-hour movies, 6,400 photos or 33, 2,000 hours of music.
4TB HD : store 4,000 hours of video, 1,000 two-hour movies, 900,000 photos or more than 66,000 hours of digital music.
Backing up with these devices is very simple: all you have to do is connect the component to a USB port and wait for the notebook to recognize the hard drive. Afterwards, you need to right-click on your backup folder, go to the “Send To” option and select the desired device.
The caveat is that external hard drives can fail, and the reasons will vary. It may be because of the inferior quality of the product, because it has been used for a long time with the notebook or even if it is poorly stored and suffers from falls and stronger shocks. Therefore, also pay attention to these issues when considering the purchase of an external hard drive to back up your notebook.
BACKING UP WITH PENDDRIVE
Even though other methods have taken the spotlight away from Pen Drives, such as cloud storage, which we will see below, these items are still a great option for storing smaller and not so bulky data. The pen drive’s great advantage is also, without a doubt, its portability, allowing the model to be connected to any computer or notebook very quickly.
As mentioned above, pen drives are best suited for storing not-so-large files. The component, which is smaller than the external hard drive in size, is also more compact in its capacity. The units available with more storage are around 256GB. Which, by the way, will be more than enough to save thousands of documents, photos and videos.
However, it is also necessary to pay attention to the fact that Pen drives can break, fail or become corrupted, which makes them unusable. They are resistant components and are unlikely to present internal failures, but the user needs to be aware of this possibility, even if it is very small.
BACKUP SOFTWARE
Another option is to use a backup program, which may offer more advanced alternatives than the native Windows tool. Check out some free alternatives below:
COBIAN BACKUP
A simple handling tool, complete and free. This is how Cobian can be defined, one of the best software to help you with notebook backup. With it, the user can create complete, differential and incremental backups. In addition, you can encrypt and schedule backups for whenever you want, thus increasing the security and practicality of the process.
PURESYNC
Another good free tool to make a complete backup on your device, PureSync is also a very simple software to use. In addition to performing backups, it is possible to synchronize folders automatically, as PureSymc recognizes when an external drive is connected and, thus, offers instant options to the user.
SYNCBACK
With options ranging from free to paid versions, the SyncBack tool is another very complete program for backups. With it, you can make full, partial, encrypted or scheduled backups. The paid options also allow carrying out the process on external servers, which makes it also suitable for companies and companies.
BACKUP THROUGH THE CLOUD
Another practical alternative is to backup the notebook through the cloud. We can define the cloud as a model created to store data outside the machine and without the use of external components. Tools like Google Drive and Dropbox are examples of this, and already have options to perform automatic backups, which greatly speeds up the procedure.
The big problem is that the complete backup will hardly be possible for the user only using the free plans. That way, if you want to use the cloud to protect your files, be prepared to spend a certain amount in the paid version of these tools. Both programs carry out monthly billing, relying on a monthly fee system.
There are several cloud storage services, but below we will quickly teach you how to back up using Google Drive, one of the most popular programs, since it is already linked to your Google account.
Step 1 : Go to the Google Drive website and sign in with your Google account.
Step 2 : On the home screen, click on “New” and choose whether you want to upload a file or a complete folder.
Step 3: Select the folder and click “Upload”. Your files will be uploaded to the Google Drive cloud and can be accessed and downloaded from anywhere.