We all know we should be backing up our computers. Losing years worth of pictures and documents or even emails not to mention years worth of family history and genealogy research can be devastating,
It only takes about $100.00 to buy an external hard drive and a few clicks to configure a full Windows back up or at least Windows 10 File History.
Windows 10 offers 2 back up options (*). File History and Backup & Restore.
File History takes a regular backup (hourly by default) of your desktop, documents, music, photos and videos and other files contained in your user folder.
Backup and Restore allows you to backup the the computers entire drives as well as files in your user folders.
There are advantages and disadvantages to each.
Put simply,
File History backs up only your user files, it does this hourly and is quick.
Back up & Restore backs up your entire computer, data and programs, typically performed once per week and takes more time.
For most people we recommend the Back up & Restore option.
How to set up Back up & Restore
How to set up File History
* One Drive and other cloud options can be used to back up files but have a limited amount of storage