Windows operating systems

Planning your backups (Windows)

If you are a first-time user, or if you only back up files occasionally, you can use the table in this topic as a checklist of preliminary steps to consider before performing a backup.

Read the tasks listed in this table to determine whether you are ready to back up your data.

Table 1. Planning your backups
   
Decide whether you want to back up or archive files. See When to back up and when to archive files for more information.
See Pre-backup considerations (Windows) for important migration information, and how you might increase performance before backing up files and directories.
Create an include-exclude list to specify files and directories you want to exclude from backup services. See Control processing with an include-exclude list for more information.
Decide what type of backup you want according to your needs. See the following sections for more information:
For additional backup considerations, see Backup (Windows): Additional considerations.