How to backup all your files on Windows10 OS without taking windows with it

[Branchingsalmon]

I am going to backup all my files and put it on my new SSD along with my OS but first I need to backup my files without taking Windows 10 with it because I feel I might need to do a fresh reinstall Windows 10 it has been buggy. The problem is every time I look this up all I find a guide to how to backup files with Windows. I would reinstall everything manually but I only get about 3 gigabits a second at my house so there's no chance of me downloading over 500 gigabytes of files again. I have a 2 terabyte external hard drive as well as flash drive on hand

 

[Razec69]

Copy and paste whatever files you want. Have the structure of folders set if you want to as well so that all you have to do is drag and drop the files.

What specifically are you trying to save? Some programs need to be installed again. There are ways on getting them to work, but I won't get in to that.

Again, copy and paste and let us know what files you are trying to copy over. Is it Steam games? Or another platform? Etc...

 

[JackNaylorPE]

Before SSDs forced this upon us, this was done by simply formatting the HD. A setup might be for example:

C:\ Boot Partition w/ OS
X:\ 2nd OS or copy of C:\
D:\ Temp and swap files
E:\ Programs
F:\ Data

If you haven't prepared for this scenario, it of course becomes rather difficult to implement. But this should take care of most:

1. Grab 250 / 2566 GB SSD and connect it to lowest numbered SATA port

2. Unplug the data cable for your HD, unplug ethernet cable

3. Install Win10 fresh you our SSD.

4. Stop Win10 from installing any hardware drivers
http://winsupersite.com/windows-10/stop-automatic-driver-updates-windows-10

5. If the tracking features of Win10 bother you, install Antibeacon
https://www.safer-networking.org/spybot-anti-beacon/

6. Install all drivers from original CDs

7. Run Windows Update as many times as it needs until it says "No more"

8. Turn off and connect HD to 2nd lowest SATR port

9. Optional: Copy all your Programs (ProgramFiles/ProgramFiles86)from their original location to the same location on the SSD

10. Install of your programs ... if you did step 9 , make sure that you use identical location. Installing the programs over themselves will set up necessary registry entries in the new OS but keep all your preferences and customizations.

11. Looking at the SSD, delete all the same files in the root directory on the HD that you see on the SSD.

12. Carefully check each folder on the HD to see what can be deleted once finished (Windows, ProgramFiles/ProgramFiles86)

 

[Branchingsalmon]

Well a huge chunk of it is Steam games but also a lot of movies / TV shows. I'm willing to reinstall something like an browser general that doesn't do well with a backup anyway and they're relatively small but the main thing is I just don't want to have to redownload anything large. So basically I'm going to try to bring over anything I can that seems too big and if it won't work after the back up then I can just suck it up and reinstall it

 

[SBMfromLA]

Your best bet is to just do it manually... It's so simple. Just go to your "Personal Folder" in Windows and copy Music, Documents, Videos, Pictures and then copy your Steam Folder.. and you should be good to go.

After you do your reinstall, just copy those folders back into their proper locations and that's it. This is why I always recommend that people keep all their media files on separate drives so they don't have to worry about doing stuff like this.

 

[LukeFatwalker]

Most disk imagers will let you mount the image and manually take out the files needed. I do that regularly with Drive Cloner, not sure what disk imager (if any) you use but you should look into it.