Obviously I have media and documents on a different drive (partition actually), but what other files and settings must I remember to backup? Any ones that anyone has forgotten in the past, only to realise too late?
Always a must have. I like to keep copies of the installers for the apps I always use when I reinstall(drivers, FireFox, etc..) so that I don't have to spend time downloading all the installers after each reinstall of windows.
i prefer to not keep installers kicking around, so that i always get the latest versions of stuff when i reinstall. i recommend keepiing your documents folder on a separate partition so that you dont have to worry about this stuff. last time i reinstalled i didn't do any prep. just wiped my windows partition and installed, and all i lost was the games i had downloaded through steam.
I should be able to simply wipe that partition, but I want to be safe. I also need to work out why my machine currently has Windows on what it calls F:\!
Fonts I've found, liked, and stuck in the Win\Fonts folder, soundbites I have in Win\Media, Word templates (.dot files) I've created along with my personalized normal.dot, email accounts (export). A few folders can be moved from the default location to under MyDocs to make backup and/or a reinstall easier.
Stuff in the Windows folder you need, like if you have a Hauppauge remote control then the config for that is stored in the Windows folder.
I'd make an image of the system partition using e.g. TrueImage. A trial version would do the trick, since they run for 30 days. Just make sure not to have any files either encrypted or using NTFS compression (Windows sees those as encrypted). Make sure to store the image on another partition/drive and then you could later mount that image and copy any files you may have forgotten to copy/backup earlier.
Or just use Seagate DiscWizard - which is free, and basically just a cut-down version of Acronis True Image Or use HD Clone - another free program
That's what the "e.g." was for... Last time I checked that meant "example given". Not that your points aren't valid...
Indeed I was merely providing additional information - for the benefit of the OP, to show they don't need to use trial software
playlists for your itunes or whatever. stuff you've downloaded but not filed, your itunes downloads i think are in a seperate file to your music, am i right?
.dbx and .wab files if you use outlook express/mail. .pst files if you use outlook. Any rogue jpg or mp3 files.
cheers guys and gals. no itunes, playlists are on the drive with the media itself. downloads are filed as soon as I get them, and on a separate drive anyway. I use Fx and Tb so use MozBackup.
Just make sure to do a double take before committing to a reformat! Sometimes i'll do a windows scan for all the files i have that i might have missed due to copying them to different locations like using *.avi *.mpg searchs just to be double sure!
