Questions re: backup and system image

bru · 08 May 2011

I did my first backup using Windows 7 built-in backup and restore last week. Chose to let windows decide what to backup and also do a system image (basically the default settings). It took quite a long time, almost 4 hours.

Tonight it did its weekly scheduled backup and another sytem image. Since it only copied any new files that part went fast but the system image took a long time, almost 1.5 hours.

When I look at manage space the system image is using 124GB. This seems huge. I thought it should be maybe 20GB or so. Data files being backed up are 71GB. Other files are 4GB for a total of almost 200GB.

This is a relatively new computer so why is the system image so large? Is there a way to verify that it should be that large? Will it always take so long to do the system image?

kado897 · 09 May 2011

The image file also contains you data if it is on the same partition. Also you have done two images backups and this is reporting both of them. Windows sets aside a certain amount of space (I think about 20% of your backup drive) and keeps as many images as it can in this space. So the actual image size is about 60MB which is about the same as mine. You might want to read this tutorial Backup Complete Computer - Create an Image Backup by Brink.