Hi thumpergirl,
I am looking into the Macrium backup and will buy a USB to put it on. Better safe than sorry for sure. I may get a backup hard drive to clone my drive also. Looks like this is getting expensive lol.
It would be best for your future to get used to using Pen drives & External Hard disk. They are quite cheap on Best Buy etc. Isn't it ? If you don't want them right now, there are some options depending on certain conditions.
1. You only need an empty 4GB capacity USB 2.0 pen drive for Macrium Rescue ISO. If you don't want to buy a pen drive right now, you can simply make a Macrium Rescue ISO & burn it to a DVD. Your pc should have a working DVD drive for that & you should be able to boot into it.
2. A 1 TB External Hard disk should be more than enough for now & future needs. But if you put a little more money into it, you would get a 2 TB hard disk. External hard disk helps you in the case something goes wrong with your internal hard disk. If you are sure about the life of your internal hard disk & don't want it right now, you can put your System Image on your Internal hard disk. There should be sufficient empty space on your Internal hard disk for that.
3. You actually don't need to clone your complete hard disk & just a System Image is more than enough in this case. A System Image is by default an exact copy of the system crucial partitions only. If something goes wrong with the system / installation, you can use the System Image to revert back to the working system status.
4. I need two Snapshots from your Disk Management to share some important tips about the whole process.
Disk Management - Post a Screen Capture Image
(a) Standard View as shown in the above link.
(b) Advanced View : In the Disk Management window, there is a menu bar on the top. Click
View & navigate
View> TOP> Disk List. Then take the snap shot.
Not sure why I'm clicking on things and they are downloading to my computer here. Just clicked that attached file dism.txt and it did..I had no idea it would. Really strange.
1. Simply some confusions & doubts, click only when you are sure & one click at a time!
2. That's just a text file! It mentions the
folder in question, tells how to Take Ownership of the folder & asks to copy that folder to desktop for the safety precaution.
After copying it to the desktop, delete it from the original location & run the DISM.
If the error/problem is solved & everything goes well, you can delete the folder from desktop as well.
3.
To avoid any confusions : The text file tells about the steps to manually Take Ownership of the folder by Modifying File/Folder Permissions.
OR
You can do it using the Take Ownership Context Menu Shortcut :
Take Ownership Shortcut
Anything else, Any doubts, Any queries ?
Let me know.
Thanks & Regards. ...