Backup bootable C on Windows

[Tygara_191]

Hi all! I have a bit of a situation:

I have my SSD and a HDD.
My SSD has a copy of windows 10 installed and personalized and I love it. However, I want to try out linux, obviously I want to install it on my SSD because understandable reasons.

Also because of understandable reasons, I want to backup my windows installation to be able to revert to it if I find it necessary down the road.
So, what software do I use to take a backup of my C and be able to restore my bootable windows as if nothing had ever happened if I need to?

The windows is installed under Legacy MBR.

Please excuse me if this is a duplicate topic, I did some digging, but could not find anything to soothe my needs.
Thanks in advance! Cheers!

PS: I don't really fancy having both installed at the same time for a number of reasons, the most significant being that my windows is rather big with a lot of software installed and that would leave a bit too little free space for me to use my computer comfortably.

[TheGlenlivet]

5 minutes ago, Tygara_191 said:

Hi all! I have a bit of a situation:

I have my SSD and a HDD.
My SSD has a copy of windows 10 installed and personalized and I love it. However, I want to try out linux, obviously I want to install it on my SSD because understandable reasons.

Also because of understandable reasons, I want to backup my windows installation to be able to revert to it if I find it necessary down the road.
So, what software do I use to take a backup of my C and be able to restore my bootable windows as if nothing had ever happened if I need to?

The windows is installed under Legacy MBR.

Please excuse me if this is a duplicate topic, I did some digging, but could not find anything to soothe my needs.
Thanks in advance! Cheers!

PS: I don't really fancy having both installed at the same time for a number of reasons, the most significant being that my windows is rather big with a lot of software installed and that would leave a bit too little free space for me to use my computer comfortably.

How big is the SSD?  I have set up a dual booted system on one drive where Linux installs the grub bootloader that lets you pick which system you boot to every start up.  As long as the drive has enough room, that is the easiest way to do it.

[Tygara_191]

1 minute ago, TheGlenlivet said:

How big is the SSD?  I have set up a dual booted system on one drive where Linux installs the grub bootloader that lets you pick which system you boot to every start up.  As long as the drive has enough room, that is the easiest way to do it.

I intentionously added the PS. I know of dual boot, but it does not soothe my needs. My ssd is 110gb and my windows is 98gb, so yeah... a bit too close for comfort.

[Mira Yurizaki]

You can create a system image by going to Control Panel -> All Items -> Back up and Restore -> Create a System Image (it's on the left pane).

 

If you're only trying out Linux and don't need any fancy hardware features, I recommend using a VM instead.

[TheGlenlivet]

Just now, Tygara_191 said:

I intentionously added the PS. I know of dual boot, but it does not soothe my needs. My ssd is 110gb and my windows is 98gb, so yeah... a bit too close for comfort.

Weird, was that there the whole time and I missed it?!?!  My eyes suck...

Anyway, then I would just system image it with windows.  It's in the back up section of settings.

[Tygara_191]

2 minutes ago, M.Yurizaki said:

You can create a system image by going to Control Panel -> All Items -> Back up and Restore -> Create a System Image (it's on the left pane).

 

If you're only trying out Linux and don't need any fancy hardware features, I recommend using a VM instead.

Yeah, I did consider VM-s but the thing I want to test out is whether the software I use will run smoother on linux and I can't really do that on a VM because obvious reasons.

[Tygara_191]

Will try windows system image and see where it gets me. Thanks for the replies.

[ProjectBox153]

I wouldn’t recommend wiping your drive if you’re just trying out Linux. Make a small partition (come on, you can make some room) or install it onto a USB flash drive. Running from a USB 3 drive feels just as fast as from my SATA SSD. 

[BeefyMeats]

If you want a simple 1 to 1 copy of your windows SSD to a mechanical HDD than I would recommend you download CloneZilla on a (LIVE BOOT version) USB and start a backup.

Than you could always pop in the HDD and it would be as if nothing happened.

 

I would recommend using YUMI  to make the live CloneZilla ISO bootable on the USB for the easiest method.

[Yvette222]

Hello, If you want to back up an image for Windows to another drive, and then restore the backup file. I would like to recommend MiniTool ShadowMaker, with which we can back up specific files, a partition, a whole drive, or Windows.

[Supportsneedlove]

On 13/3/2018 at 10:46 PM, Tygara_191 said:

Hi all! I have a bit of a situation:

I have my SSD and a HDD.
My SSD has a copy of windows 10 installed and personalized and I love it. However, I want to try out linux, obviously I want to install it on my SSD because understandable reasons.

Also because of understandable reasons, I want to backup my windows installation to be able to revert to it if I find it necessary down the road.
So, what software do I use to take a backup of my C and be able to restore my bootable windows as if nothing had ever happened if I need to?

The windows is installed under Legacy MBR.

Please excuse me if this is a duplicate topic, I did some digging, but could not find anything to soothe my needs.
Thanks in advance! Cheers!

PS: I don't really fancy having both installed at the same time for a number of reasons, the most significant being that my windows is rather big with a lot of software installed and that would leave a bit too little free space for me to use my computer comfortably.

Couldn't you just do a system backup, delete the os, install linux, reinstall windows when you're done and recover from the backup?