Free Easy To Use Backup Software for Windows?

Operating Systems & Open Source
1

Hey all, I am used to using rsync to backup stuff in linux so haven’t done any real backup stuff in Windows in years. I have a business partner that would like an easy to use piece of software to backup his windows profile and settings on an external drive.

I have had him move his profile over and restore with that but it really screwed up office, in particular outlook and his contacts.

How do you all go about backing up windows 11 these days?

2

I’m fond of Veeam Endpoint, which is free to backup your computer to an external drive or network share. The other option is EaseUS Todo Backup, which works pretty much the same as Veeam.

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3

Instead of just selected things, let him make a copy of the entire system / partition C, it will be most convenient for him.

  • Acronis If this is to be done on a running system.
  • As outside the system, it’s Acronis or Rescuezilla.
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4

I also used to use Acronis. I’m pretty sure I paid for True Image and it did a good job of imaging all the partitions, and doing incramental backups.

(Before I learned one can do the same in live USB Linux)

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5

I used to always recommend Macrium Reflect, the free version is all you need for backups, imaging, and disk cloning. I much preferred it over Acronis. That being said, the free version is going away with the start of 2024… :grimacing:

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6

Buy him a Synology. Built in free backup software + storage. He’s gotta pay for the storage anyways.

Otherwise, Veeam has a free tier that’s decent.

Edit: misread that he has an external. Yeah Veeam is what I’d use.