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Restoring Incremental Backup

N

nLinked

Member
This is regarding Windows Backup Utility. I have made a normal backup of my entire drive and System State. I will now use my computer as normal, adding files and removing files as usual.

Next week I will make an incremental backup which will compare for changes since my full backup and backup only what's changed. If I need to restore the incremental backup at some time for whatever reason, it will restore my full backup, and then the incremental. Does that mean any files I had deleted after my full backup will be restored as well because they are in the full backup? Does the incremental backup know that those files shouldn't be there anymore so it will remove them afterwards?
 
You're right. I've just tested this by making a full backup of some music. Then I deleted some music and made an incremental backup. When I restored the increment (which includes the full backup and the increment), the music I deleted before making the incremental backup came back with the full backup.

That's not very reliable then is it? If I ever have to restore to an increment, it's going to be restoring deleted things that are in the full backup, not taking into account that the incremental backup never had those files.

Any way to overcome this? So that when I have to restore an incremental backup, it will know that I have deleted things since the full backup and so it shouldn't restore them? I only want to use Windows Backup Utility.
 
A restore is only going to put back files. It's not going to delete files that were removed between the full backup and incremental or differential backups.

I think you're better off using a drive imaging program. That's a snapshot of your existing system and all files added/removed would be there as they were at the time of the image.
 
Netbackup gets around this by using what they call "True Image Restore"....it knows what files were deleted prior to the incremental and when you restore it only puts back what was there before the incremental. Then again, Netbackup is probably a little out of your price range.
 
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