Ask Jack: Cloning a Windows hard disk

Data on the computer hard drives can be copied or cloned. Photo: Scenics & science/Alamy

After replacing my laptop work, had I not reinstall Windows 7
Once, but several times. (PC was replaced under warranty, and think
OK now.) Given the time to install Windows, Microsoft Office, and
a load of specialised stuff used for work, I wonder if I should
Cloning an entire hard drive on a regular basis. To give it a try,
I would use the same make (WD) and their software. Is this totally
brainless?
Andrew Whitehouse

There are two ways to back up Windows and other operating systems. The traditional way is to copy all files to a separate hard disk, and the somewhat newer method is to carry out a bit for bit copy or "clone" of the entire hard drive. Copying can cause problems, because Windows will lock and refuse to copy any of the files, it is using, and when Norton Ghost appeared shortly after Windows 95, this gave a very simple and quick way for users to clone and restore their drive. Acronis software was later, popular for the same purpose. It is somewhat easier to clone Windows, if you do it under the control of another operating system, typically Linux or a separate server.

Many large companies have today, their own Windows "disk images", as the copy to new PCs. This makes it possible for them to get Windows and all their corporate software installed in the time it takes to copy the image to your hard disk. The same idea is used by many spilleklubber and some libraries and schools: instead of trying to clean up an operating system, there may have been compromised or misused, they can just start each day with a fresh image. Microsoft provides free Windows Steady State software for this purpose, but there are commercial alternatives such as ' Faronics Deep Freeze and Fortres ' clean slate.

"Disk image" or snapshot approach is ideal if you want to return a system to a known state. As well as is useful for schools and libraries, it is good for journalists to test a lot of software or work with malware, and I am sure at least a couple of home users do the same with computers their children use. For most users is periodic or continuous file-based back-ups is probably still the best approach. However, the trend is towards the back-up software that supports both.

If you pay for the software, Acronis True Image Home probably 2011 still the system of choice. The latest version can do disk imaging. file backups, and full, incremental and differential backups. There is also a free version for the Western Digital hard disk: Acronis True Image WD Edition software.

There are also some good free clone applications including Paragon Backup & Recovery free and PING (Partimage is not Ghost). (Perhaps I should admit that use Clonezilla from a Linux-GParted Live CD, but if you do not already know about this program, you probably should not use it).

When you are lucky to using Windows 7, you can, however, use the built-in Windows backup and restore program. This is not the most sophisticated software, but it seems to be reliable, and it is very easy to use. If you take brain-free option to let it do whatever it likes, it will make both a copy of the file-level and a clone of your hard disk. The minor restrictions is that it will always back up the system partition either you like it or not, and that it only works with NTFS drives.

If you have a couple of PCs, you can also consider purchasing a Windows Home Server. This is sold as a network device storage (NAS) and a media server, but it will also automatically back up multiple Windows PCs and MACS.

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