Solved File History or Backups

DirtRider

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I am so used to doing a scheduled backup and image of my install once a week but now I see it is file history. I am really not sure how this feature works in relation to the old image and backups. I have partitioned a portable drive of 500GB for my backups and have started doing the file history. I am now looking at the advanced settings and see this

fileHistory.PNG

Now as I was not thinking of leaving my portable turned on 24/7 as I used to do a scheduled backup once a week so now I am a bit stuck.

The setting "Size of Online Cache"has also got me confused. I have set it to the max of 20% disk space.

What I was actually thinking of doing is to make my first "backup"of my fresh install of Win8 and keep this as a restore backup if I ever want to revert back to this point of my setup. I was then going to use another partition on my portable drive for my weekly backups as I did before :confused:
 

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    Win 8 64 Pro
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Additional information

My C: - 500GB
D: - 300GB This drive is space so if I have to have a drive that is on all the time could I use this one. The one thing that worries me is the difference in size?
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Win 8 64 Pro
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    PC/Desktop
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    Proline
    CPU
    Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 CPU 870 @ 2.93GHz
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    H55-G43(MS-7638)
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    4GB
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Hello Dave,

File History is not a backup or image of Windows 8.

File History is a new feature introduced in Windows 8 that automatically backs up only files that are in your libraries, contacts, favorites, Microsoft SkyDrive, and on your desktop. If the originals are lost, damaged, or deleted, you can restore all of them. You can also find different versions of your files from a specific point in time. Over time, you'll have a complete history of your files. The tutorial below can give you more info about File History. Be sure to see the related links at the bottom of the tutorial as well.

If you wanted to create an image backup of Windows 8 instead, then you could create a custom refresh image.
A good 3rd party backup and imaging program is Macrium Reflect.

Hope this helps. :)
 

My Computer

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Ah thanks after scratching around a bit more I found this option in my CP "Win7 File Recover"looking at it it seems to do the same function as what the Win7 backup and restore did. I created a system image and now I have set it to do my backups weekly as I did before. I will now also read a bit more on the File History setup, thanks for the info :cool:
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Win 8 64 Pro
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Proline
    CPU
    Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 CPU 870 @ 2.93GHz
    Motherboard
    H55-G43(MS-7638)
    Memory
    4GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    NVIDIA GeForce GTX 470
    Browser
    FireFox
    Antivirus
    Kaspersky

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    64-bit Windows 10
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Custom self built
    CPU
    Intel i7-8700K OC'd to 5 GHz
    Motherboard
    ASUS ROG Maximus XI Formula Z390
    Memory
    64 GB (4x16GB) G.SKILL TridentZ RGB DDR4 3600 MHz (F4-3600C18D-32GTZR)
    Graphics Card(s)
    ASUS ROG-STRIX-GTX1080TI-O11G-GAMING
    Sound Card
    Integrated Digital Audio (S/PDIF)
    Monitor(s) Displays
    2 x Samsung Odyssey G7 27"
    Screen Resolution
    2560x1440
    Hard Drives
    1TB Samsung 990 PRO M.2,
    4TB Samsung 990 PRO PRO M.2,
    8TB WD MyCloudEX2Ultra NAS
    PSU
    OCZ Series Gold OCZZ1000M 1000W
    Case
    Thermaltake Core P3
    Cooling
    Corsair Hydro H115i
    Keyboard
    Logitech wireless K800
    Mouse
    Logitech MX Master 3
    Internet Speed
    1 Gb/s Download and 35 Mb/s Upload
    Browser
    Internet Explorer 11
    Antivirus
    Malwarebyte Anti-Malware Premium
    Other Info
    Logitech Z625 speaker system,
    Logitech BRIO 4K Pro webcam,
    HP Color LaserJet Pro MFP M477fdn,
    APC SMART-UPS RT 1000 XL - SURT1000XLI,
    Galaxy S23 Plus phone
I wonder why they are removing the option to do backups like this
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Win 8 64 Pro
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Proline
    CPU
    Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 CPU 870 @ 2.93GHz
    Motherboard
    H55-G43(MS-7638)
    Memory
    4GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    NVIDIA GeForce GTX 470
    Browser
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    Kaspersky
It was due to another antitrust lawsuit against Microsoft.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    64-bit Windows 10
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Custom self built
    CPU
    Intel i7-8700K OC'd to 5 GHz
    Motherboard
    ASUS ROG Maximus XI Formula Z390
    Memory
    64 GB (4x16GB) G.SKILL TridentZ RGB DDR4 3600 MHz (F4-3600C18D-32GTZR)
    Graphics Card(s)
    ASUS ROG-STRIX-GTX1080TI-O11G-GAMING
    Sound Card
    Integrated Digital Audio (S/PDIF)
    Monitor(s) Displays
    2 x Samsung Odyssey G7 27"
    Screen Resolution
    2560x1440
    Hard Drives
    1TB Samsung 990 PRO M.2,
    4TB Samsung 990 PRO PRO M.2,
    8TB WD MyCloudEX2Ultra NAS
    PSU
    OCZ Series Gold OCZZ1000M 1000W
    Case
    Thermaltake Core P3
    Cooling
    Corsair Hydro H115i
    Keyboard
    Logitech wireless K800
    Mouse
    Logitech MX Master 3
    Internet Speed
    1 Gb/s Download and 35 Mb/s Upload
    Browser
    Internet Explorer 11
    Antivirus
    Malwarebyte Anti-Malware Premium
    Other Info
    Logitech Z625 speaker system,
    Logitech BRIO 4K Pro webcam,
    HP Color LaserJet Pro MFP M477fdn,
    APC SMART-UPS RT 1000 XL - SURT1000XLI,
    Galaxy S23 Plus phone
Oh boy so now we need to purchase a third party application to do this. I have used Macrium Reflect free edition for some time now but have never tried it on Windows 7 or 8 doing a restore only XP and that worked great. The thing is it the paid version will be needed to do scheduled backups as I am doing now so I suppose I better start looking at this
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Win 8 64 Pro
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Proline
    CPU
    Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 CPU 870 @ 2.93GHz
    Motherboard
    H55-G43(MS-7638)
    Memory
    4GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    NVIDIA GeForce GTX 470
    Browser
    FireFox
    Antivirus
    Kaspersky
Did they remove "Easy Transfer" as well? It figured, once I finally got the hang of "File Recovery" they removed the F out of it! :/
 

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  • OS
    Windows 8 Pro with Media Center/Windows 7
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    "1842 x 1036"
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    WDC WD50 00AAKS-007AA SCSI Disk Device
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    Eset NOD32 6.x/Win Defend
    Other Info
    Recently lost my Windows 8 on my main PC, had to go back to Windows 7.
Oh boy so now we need to purchase a third party application to do this. I have used Macrium Reflect free edition for some time now but have never tried it on Windows 7 or 8 doing a restore only XP and that worked great. The thing is it the paid version will be needed to do scheduled backups as I am doing now so I suppose I better start looking at this

I can confirm that Macrium Reflect Free works perfectly on Windows 8.1.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8 Pro Windows 8.1 Preview
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
Did they remove "Easy Transfer" as well? It figured, once I finally got the hang of "File Recovery" they removed the F out of it! :/

Nope, "Windows Easy Transfer" (Migwiz.exe) is still in Windows 8 and 8.1. :)
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    64-bit Windows 10
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Custom self built
    CPU
    Intel i7-8700K OC'd to 5 GHz
    Motherboard
    ASUS ROG Maximus XI Formula Z390
    Memory
    64 GB (4x16GB) G.SKILL TridentZ RGB DDR4 3600 MHz (F4-3600C18D-32GTZR)
    Graphics Card(s)
    ASUS ROG-STRIX-GTX1080TI-O11G-GAMING
    Sound Card
    Integrated Digital Audio (S/PDIF)
    Monitor(s) Displays
    2 x Samsung Odyssey G7 27"
    Screen Resolution
    2560x1440
    Hard Drives
    1TB Samsung 990 PRO M.2,
    4TB Samsung 990 PRO PRO M.2,
    8TB WD MyCloudEX2Ultra NAS
    PSU
    OCZ Series Gold OCZZ1000M 1000W
    Case
    Thermaltake Core P3
    Cooling
    Corsair Hydro H115i
    Keyboard
    Logitech wireless K800
    Mouse
    Logitech MX Master 3
    Internet Speed
    1 Gb/s Download and 35 Mb/s Upload
    Browser
    Internet Explorer 11
    Antivirus
    Malwarebyte Anti-Malware Premium
    Other Info
    Logitech Z625 speaker system,
    Logitech BRIO 4K Pro webcam,
    HP Color LaserJet Pro MFP M477fdn,
    APC SMART-UPS RT 1000 XL - SURT1000XLI,
    Galaxy S23 Plus phone
Hi there
Windows Backup was never IMO any good anyway -- a robust 3rd party application like Acronis was far better -- but there are Free one's available.

File History is perhaps OK in emergency situations -- it's a bit like "Incremental file backups" where only the CHANGES from the previous version are saved - so much less data needs to be kept than if you do a complete file backup.

However IMO the best strategy (especially now with Large HDD's available) is to separate your OS / applications into its own partition -- around 50 GB should be more than enough in most cases -- even for a largish installation. Back this up regularly as a full image --there might also be a small system 100MB partition too--if that exists save that as well in the image backup.

For your DATA do a complete backup ONCE --then take incrementals -- that's what a lot of the commercial programs do --they make it easy to schedule daily incremental backups.

To recover a file from an incremental backup -- restore first from the FULL backup and then recover from the various incremental backups until you've got the version you want.

For Music files I backed up the whole library about 3 months ago and just do incrementals about twice a month - these files don't change much. For other data I might do a complete backup once a month and run the incrementals backups once a week -- you need to devise a decent backup strategy for DATA depending on what it is and how much you need it.

I backup the OS NIGHTLY as well as before adding / installing any software or making hardware / other configuration changes -- backing up an OS that's on an SSD to another SSD takes around 5-7 mins -- time well spent however you look at it. !!!

If you do use incremental backups don't forget to take a FULL backup every so often.

Cheers
jimbo
 

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