backup to harddisk?

I am trying to make a scheduled backup in vista for the second time. the first time i did it, i used dvds. This time I would like to store i on the d drive which is the partition drive. It only has 464 mb free of 6.25 gb. How do I free up space so I can store the backup to hard disk instead of a dvd.

 

Delete whatever is on the hard drive? Are you saying there id only 464 mb on there after you formatted it?

 

the D drive has a recovery partition.I thought I was not supposed to touch the partition.

 

You can't. That stuff is there so in case your Vista messes up due to your or Microsoft's incompetence, you can just restore it to original factory conditions.

Basically, there's no free storage, and if you want to make safe backups then consider a separate HDD.

 

I see. So Would it also be safe if I just did it on a dvd rw all the time.

 

If you have a full set of recovery discs, you shouldn't need the recovery partition. If, however, you did not purchase or receive these discs you'll need that partition to restore your computer. The discs are cheaper if you buy them with the computer, but can definitely come in handy.

There is no "rule" saying you need to keep that partition. It's just recommended to aid in recovery.

 

Unless the recovery discs are corrupt. Happened to a friend of mine recently. These were manufacturer supplied discs, too.

 

Good point! I guess it just depends on how much space you have on your main drive. You could always use a 3rd party program to create another partition especially for backup purposes.

 

Yes, that's acceptable. Kinda slow though, and I don't know how many re-writes your particular DVD-RW can take.

This is still better than backing up your data on the same hard drive (via a different partition), because if your hard drive dies you lose everything*.



*Unless you wish to spend mucho $$$.

 

thankyou for all the replies