We’ve covered previously a number of different backup solutions for your Mac including Mac Online Backup, the Snow Leopard Time Machine approach, and even backing up your photos with iPhoto. Now we’d love to show you a quick and easy way to backup your Bootcamp installation of Windows on your Mac.
As always, backing up your data is very important. You never know when the next system failure, disk corruption, or power surge will leave you without your important documents and files. Additionally, backing up whole partitions like Windows on Bootcamp allows you the flexibility to know that your system can be restored quickly and easily to exactly the state it was last backed up in.
The approach we explain below is very similar to the snapshot feature you see in virtual machines like Parallels or Fusion by VMWare. The entire partition, all of its files, the configurations and settings will be saved in and backed up as they are currently configured.
How To Backup Windows on a Bootcamp Partition
To backup Windows on your Mac:
- After you’ve installed and configured Windows exactly the way you’d like to back it up, Download and install Winclone, a cloning software designed for Bootcamp Backup.
- Once Winclone is installed, open it to get started with your backup. The first time you open the software it may request you download and install an NTFS related software package. If it does, click download and install the package.
- Re-open Winclone and select the image tab and your Bootcamp partition in the Source field
- Next click Image, select where you’d like the and let Winclone create a backup of your Bootcamp partition.
If all has gone well, you’ll have a Bootcamp backup ready for use in the future that can easily be restored. If you’re like me, you may want to make sure that the backup of your bootcamp partition stays safe. I take advantage of Mozy online Backup to keep my files backed up, secure, and safe. They offer a great service of unlimited backup for a small monthly fee. You can even try out their free service for backup of a few gigabytes. If you’re not already using Mozy you should try it out. The setup only takes a few minutes and you’ll a location to save your Bootcamp backup.
Restore your Bootcamp Backups
Your backup is now created and ready for when you need to restore it. When the time comes that you need to restore a bootcamp backup, open Winclone, select restore, the backup image and then the Bootcamp partition as the destination.
