System Backup to 2 drives. HOW?

This doesn’t seem like it should be this difficult – I has to be me and I’m missing something simple.

Plain, ordinary Windows 11 PC. Removable HDD.

Note: I was planning on just doing some cloud backup and not even MESS with “backups”, but was told I SHOULD be doing “system backups”. So now I need to know HOW to simply (and hopefully easily use 2 HDD for backups).

I have 2 backup drives and I want to rotate them weekly. Plug in drive 1(whatever drive letter it is) connect it and let the backup write to it for a week. Then switch drives so drive 2 is written (using the same drive letter) for a week and drive 1 is on the shelf. Switch back and make weekly backups. This how what I’ve read SAYS this works. Keep the backup drive that’s not in use in a safe place and swap the drives weekly.

It doesn't work. I know I have to manually go into Computer Management>Disk Management and manually tell the computer to use the Drive Letter I want for the backup. That’s fine.

I followed the recommendation use Hasleo Backup Suite Free for the system backups.

I’ve been unsuccessful at getting Hasleo to work with the 2 backups. Yes, I’m using the SAME Drive letter each time, but Hasleo APPEARS not to let me swap the drives and reuse them. What do I have to do to use to just get a simple system backup to work?

You can just hook up both drives after you make your backup (saved to one of them), and just copy/paste the backup to the other.

You don't really have to swap the working drive... weekly.
Just have one drive as the working drive, and only hook up the other to copy the backup(s) over.
Then disconnect it again.

Rinse and repeat.

I do the same thing with internal drives.

The 4TB is my "working" storage drive. The 8TB is a copy of the 4TB.
I use the free program Karen's Replicator to copy the 4TB to the 8TB.
I copy/paste the backups manually though.

The "jobs" in the RED box are the ones I'm referring to. The rest are just backups of game save files.

On the G: partition, I only keep the latest backups of Win 10 and Win 11.
On the K: partition, I keep about three months of backups of Win 10 and Win 11.

You can also do a system Image file.
You can use the totally free Hasleo Backup Suite Hasleo provides Windows Backup & Clone, Data Recovery, Windows To Go Creator, and more. or your favorite paid Image/Clone app

Once installed you can create a USB Flash drive Emergency Disk from the app inside the Tools menu.
When You boot off of this flash drive, it is the same App, but you will use it outside of Windows.
Here you choose System Backup. The app will Select All the partitions on the drive with Windows on it as your Source. Under Backup Options, choose Full Backup.
Then select the drive that is the Target where you want to store the Image file on. Your backup drive.
This is a compressed file, so you can store other backups on the same drive.
Once that Backup is complete, you can copy that backup file to the other Backup drive.

later on you can add to this backup as an Incremental Backup. Backing up just the system files that have changed since the last backup

I’m not hooking up both drives simultaneously. I’d like to use ONE drive and switch the backup disk as needed. Is there some reason it’s SO difficult to take a couple disks, and use them for a rotating system backup?

Isn't this what I should be getting from Hasleo Backup?

GracieAllen said:

I’m not hooking up both drives simultaneously. I’d like to use ONE drive and switch the backup disk as needed. Is there some reason it’s SO difficult to take a couple disks, and use them for a rotating system backup?

Isn't this what I should be getting from Hasleo Backup?

Click to expand...

I'm just saying there's no need to rotate. Rotating the drives won't gain you anything.

Make one of them your "working" storage drive. The one you'll actually save your backups to.
Then every week or so... hook up the other one and just copy/paste your backups to it.

I have 2 backup drives and I want to rotate them weekly. Plug in drive 1(whatever drive letter it is) connect it and let the backup write to it for a week. Then switch drives so drive 2 is written (using the same drive letter)

Click to expand...

Hasleo might be using the disk and partition id instead of a letter

Spunk said:

you can copy that backup file to the other Backup drive.

Click to expand...

Copying an image is where I see a problem. For example, my images are around 85gb.
I do not use Haselo but I do use Macrium. It has been reported here that Haselo images are on par to make images almost as quickly as Macrium.

It takes Macrium less than 5 min to image my entire system disk. Granted I am writing to an external usb 3.1 nvme drive. I have't tried copying that image but needless to say it would take waaay longer to copy it that it did to create it. (depending on the usb type and type of drives and she indicated HDD so I'm suspecting that may be connected via usb 2.0).) There's also a slight chance it might get corrupted in the copy process.

Like Gracie, I too, alternate my drives when imaging.

@GracieAllen When you successfully create an image on your first disk, then replace that disk with the second disk, what message does Haselo give you as to why it is failing to image the second time on the second disk.Also since you do not have both eternal drives plugged in at the same time, does explorer assign the same drive letter to both disks?

A screenshot of the error Haselo is throwing out would be helpful.

GracieAllen said:

I’m not hooking up both drives simultaneously. I’d like to use ONE drive and switch the backup disk as needed. Is there some reason it’s SO difficult to take a couple disks, and use them for a rotating system backup?

Isn't this what I should be getting from Hasleo Backup?

Click to expand...

Hi, Gracie.

Hasleo and possibly any other backup software may likely be recognising the drive as separate due to ID’s or some other method.

So you create one backup with Hasleo, and when you want to secure that backup, you would simply plug both drives in at the same time and clone the recent System Backup drive to backup drive 2 using Hasleo


OR

GracieAllen said:

I’d like to use ONE drive and switch the backup disk as needed

Click to expand...

You create two backup tasks.

In the tutorial below, when you get to naming the System Backup Task, call the first task “Backup Task Drive One”(or something) and complete the System backup.
Then, remove the drive, plug the next one in and create another task after connecting the 2nd drive “Backup Task Drive Two”

Label the drives with a marker or something: Drive One/Drive two. After that is done from here on:

Run “Backup Task Drive One” when the first drive is connected
Run “Backup Task Drive Two” when the second drive is connected

When you open Hasleo, you will see two tasks

Backup Task Drive One
Backup Task Drive Two

Run the applicable task as per the drive that is connected.


It’s just as simple.

Jump straight to “First Run”

Note the section under “First Run” where you can create a task name (4)



Make sure you have your emergency/recovery USB created (The top section of the Tutorial) Creating a Hasleo Emergency Disk

The only reason I can think of that you can’t use the same Backup Task for two drives, is because as SIW2 mentions, the backup isn’t directed to use the Drives drive letter. That, or as I mentioned, Hasleo is identifying them as different by some other means.

Make sure the drives volume names are named the same (< tutorial link) or create the same folder on the drives (like, “Hasleo Folder”) then in the Destination section, direct it to the correct drive letter and folder (5)
Both drives have to have the same structure as to where you’re saving the System Backup to, or Hasleo won’t be able to find the job on one of the drives.

E.x.
Drive One\Hasleo Folder\
Drive Two\Hasleo Folder\

NOT

Drive One\Hasleo Folder\
Drive Two\Different Folder\Hasleo Folder\





In my opinion, creating two Backup Tasks can’t hurt.

I have a slightly different recommendation. For a weekly system image, I have two external USB 4TB SSD drives. I plug one in each week and save a backup image of my Windows boot partition and separate backups of all my data partitions. After the backup process, I unplug the drive. The next week, I use the other identical drive and do the same process.

This is in addition to automated backups on internal drives. The external drives insure that no matter what digital catastrophe befalls the system, I have a complete backup of all my files that's no more than a week old.

Yes, I also have a cloud account that has automatic real-time updates.

Hasleo uses the unique partition identifier instead of the drive letter to identify a path. USB drive letters

The best strategy IMO is to let system backups be created onto a secondary internal drive or data partition with, in the Command category of the backup task's Backup options, the Post-command and Execute if the backup succeeds options ticked. Specify FastCopy with the necessary parameters in the Command and Parameter field. Backup Options - Advanced backup settings of Hasleo Backup Suite
Set it up so it will copy the backup file from the secondary internal drive or data partition onto the external drive.
Then, after you swap the external drives, you can use FastCopy to copy the backup file one more time, this time from the secondary internal drive or data partition onto the other external drive. Use the Verify option of FastCopy (and, additionally, also consider to use the ability to let FastCopy calculate file hash codes an write them to the log file) to assure that the copying will be free of the type of errors that otherwise could potentially go undetected.

gunrunnerjohn said:

I have a slightly different recommendation. For a weekly system image, I have two external USB 4TB SSD drives. I plug one in each week and save a backup image of my Windows boot partition and separate backups of all my data partitions. After the backup process, I unplug the drive. The next week, I use the other identical drive and do the same process.

This is in addition to automated backups on internal drives. The external drives insure that no matter what digital catastrophe befalls the system, I have a complete backup of all my files that's no more than a week old.

Yes, I also have a cloud account that has automatic real-time updates.

Click to expand...

My backup strategy is almost the same.

I've used only a C: drive since my first hard drive about 40 years ago.

I work entirely from my local 1 Terabyte C: Drive and all my data and photos are kept in my OneDrive folder. I'm a Microsoft 365 subscriber which includes 1 Terabyte of OneDrive cloud storage. I have OneDrive set to mirror my local OneDrive folder; thus I always have all my work backed up throughout the day in real-time as I work. This is vitally important to me as I don't ever want to lose anything I'm currently working on.

I make a Macrium Reflect image every night before shutting down, alternating on two 4TB Samsung T9 Portable SSD's each containing 7 rotating daily images. The image only takes about 5 minutes to make. This results in always having a full image of my drive going back every day for two weeks.