For anyone good with computers…

[NickDeer]

I need to backup a pretty old computer. I’m not sure how old but it has out lived any other computer in the house. Anyways, i need to backup documents and other things to an external hard drive. What’s the safest way to do this without over running the computer. I feel like at this point the entire thing is fragile haha. Would it be better to do a couple files at a time or use the built in Windows back up feature?

 

[ClemsonRangers]

Not sure if I qualify, but

I would probably drag and drop each folder. I did it with an external 1TB seagate external drive. Didnt take long.

It even held all my work computer stuff with room to spare.

 

[660griz]

ClemsonRangers is right on...Drag and drop. I could try and impress you with fancy command line ways to do this. But, honestly, after 30+ years, I still drag and drop. You can research how to hold down ctrl to select multiple files or hold down shift to select multiple files in a row. Then ctrl C and ctrl v on target drive. Or, just drag a bunch or just one.

 

[treemanjohn]

You can take the hard drive out and put it in hard drive dock. Then remove everything you need.

 

[dwhee87]

If it'll connect to the internet, I'd recommend setting up a free dropbox account, and putting it in the cloud. You can then easily access it from any computer, or download it to a new computer.

Dropbox is 'drop & drag'.

 

[Waddams]

If it will connect to a portable hard drive via a USB, then just get one, plug it into the computer, and drag and drop. In the Windows Explorer windows, you can create any folder structure you want to organize the files you're copying and backing up.

I'd be tempted to try organizing them all with subfolders under a single folder on my computer, then grab that one folder, and drag and drop the portable HD. Then just let it crank on copying the data. If it bombs out, then you can go back and copy things subfolder by subfolder.

 

[Jim Ammons]

Drop & drag on to a 512 or 1T or 2T gb flash drive if computer has USB capability.

 

[Shane Dockery]

If it'll connect to the internet, I'd recommend setting up a free dropbox account, and putting it in the cloud. You can then easily access it from any computer, or download it to a new computer.

Dropbox is 'drop & drag'.

This right here is the ticket. Easy as can be. If you get a new computer at any point, or another computer, just login to that dropbox account and you can put it all back on the new one. Or just keep it there.

 

[specialk]

if you aint got a lot of movies and videos a 128g thumb drive will work.....

 

[pjciii]

Have not done this in a while. Cant you remove the hard drive and make it a slave to the new computer harddrive?

 

[natureman]

if you aint got a lot of movies and videos a 128g thumb drive will work.....

I have all my docs and photos on a thumb drive which I regularly backup.

 

[georgia_home]

I guess it’s windows based on the responses? Which version? And does it boot now?

if it doesn’t boot now, you may be able to take the disk of the old pc and use an adapter that will convert Sata to usb. Then just plug it in when you need it… and copy off as needed . This will also work if you just don’t want to run the old computer. Usually… it will work


If the old of runs, as suggested, drag/drop an that’ll get ya started.

If it’s a newer version of windows, and you have another good computer around. You can make a copy of the system and run as a virtual machine. Google Disk2vhd (to make the vm) and virtual box (Runs the machine)

essentially the old machine still lives as a disk file on a new machine.

this technique is useful for a lot of learning and experimenting.

 

[Matt.M]

Loads of great intel here.

For simplicity, just grab a USB thumb drive and copy/paste the files you want to save. Don't cut/paste.

2nd critical step is to put them on your newer machine and then make sure you have a cloud based backup solution (One Drive, Drop box, there are numerous ones). That way you can forget about a backup solution. It just works in the background.

No need to get a VM running.

 

[specialk]

just remember, if you have no internet connection you no got access to a ''cloud'' ie your files....