The new Windows Backup app and the restore course of connected to recent Windows 11 big fall updates confirms emotions I’ve held for a very long time: I simply can’t stand Microsoft’s method towards backing up my recordsdata within the cloud.
Windows 11’s fall 2023 replace provides a brand new Windows Backup app, which might be accessed from the Start menu. Launch it, and Windows guarantees to again up your folders, apps, settings, and credentials.
That’s easy sufficient. Provided that you’ve sufficient out there OneDrive storage, Windows will copy these recordsdata into the cloud. If you purchase a brand new PC, the “out of the box” expertise (OOBE) guarantees to revive that backup on a brand new PC, basically transferring your work or play setting to upgraded {hardware}. That’s the way it’s speculated to work, anyway.
Unfortunately, Microsoft’s course of assumes that your PC consists totally of Microsoft apps downloaded from the Microsoft Store — and even then, doesn’t work because it ought to.
Further studying: The best Windows backup software, free and paid
How to make use of the Windows 11 Windows Backup app
To be protected, I up to date my authentic (which I’ll name the backup PC) PC to the present Windows 11 model, after which requested for the most recent updates through Windows Update. I chosen two different PCs to revive (which I’ll consult with because the “target” PCs) and up to date them, too. I then used the “Reset my PC” perform inside Windows to wipe them clear, eliminating all private recordsdata, apps, and settings. I used the choice to revive Windows utilizing the native copy already on the machine.
On the backup PC, I opened the Windows Backup app. To its credit score, the Windows Backup app is well designed. You can open it from the Start menu, by typing in “backup” and opening the recommended app.
Once the app launches, you’ll be confronted with a small field along with your PC’s title in it, and the final time that this PC was backed up, if ever. You’ll even have 4 drop-down menus: Folders, Apps, Settings, and Credentials.
Mark Hachman / IDG
Under every, you’ll be requested to make some decisions. Folders, for instance, checks to be sure to need to backup your PC’s desktop, plus the Photos and Documents folder; Settings asks for those who again up your Personalization settings; and so forth. The first time I examined this, I allowed Windows to make backups of all the things. When I opened the Backup app a second time, the entire choices remained toggled on, with no possibility to show them off. Also weirdly, I nonetheless do not need the choice to robotically again up my movies within the cloud — despite the fact that Microsoft’s support page tells me that I can.
Once you make your ideas, you may click on the “Back up” field on the backside of the app, and Windows will go to work. Make positive that you just’re related to the Internet, and logged into OneDrive. (Although I didn’t particularly strive, I wouldn’t anticipate that you just’d be capable of substitute a third-party service like Dropbox as a substitute.)
After a couple of minutes, it is best to discover that the Backup has robotically constructed a “backup” of your PC. The app appears to replace this backup robotically, however for those who’re contemplating migrating to or including a brand new PC, it could be value double-checking that the method has begun and/or accomplished.
Microsoft doesn’t formally name out the brand new “Restore” course of inside Windows. It’s simply designed to be a part of the Windows 11 setup expertise, as you step via the method: choosing a language, keyboard structure, agreeing to the license phrases, after which choosing a community and getting into your Microsoft account info. Restoring a backup is carried out halfway via the method. Windows presents you the choice of choosing the latest backup because the default, but in addition allows you to scroll via an inventory of older backups or these from different machines. As you progress via the remainder of the setup course of — choosing your privateness settings, selecting your profile (leisure, gaming, productiveness and so forth) — the OOBE restore course of works within the background. Eventually, you’ll be requested to attend as the ultimate steps are accomplished behind the scenes.
Mark Hachman / IDG
Don’t anticipate an excessive amount of. When Windows emerged from its setup course of on my goal PC (a contemporary Samsung Galaxy Book2 Pro) it definitely didn’t look something like my previous PC, which was sitting proper close by. And a number of the omissions have been surprisingly primary.
For one, I take advantage of Windows Spotlight to alter and personalize my PC’s desktop background. Windows 11, for some cause, didn’t perceive this, opening a command immediate and biking via numerous efforts to presumably configure Spotlight earlier than giving up. I used two goal PCs: the Galaxy Book2 Pro — and, only for enjoyable — an older Microsoft Surface Laptop Go, and neither might course of the Spotlight choice.
I cut up time between Edge, Chrome, Opera, and Vivaldi. I’ve pinned Opera to my taskbar, and Windows preserved that change.
The drawback is that you just’d anticipate Windows would simply do extra. We’ve had package managers like Chocolatey for greater than a decade, which might be configured to obtain and set up numerous functions within the background. If Microsoft does this, it doesn’t say. For one factor, my checklist of Start menu apps was poorly rendered, with what appeared like some type of a standing message beneath every app, however obscured.
Mark Hachman / IDG
Some apps appeared like they have been downloaded as a part of the set up course of, however many weren’t. As you may anticipate, apps appeared as placeholders, and wanted to be clicked on to be downloaded and put in — and that solely labored in the event that they have been within the Microsoft Store. For the query avid gamers are asking: no, Steam wasn’t put in, and any video games that you just had downloaded with Steam (or Epic, or GOG, et cetera) weren’t both.
What I was stunned by, nonetheless, was {that a} sport, Warhammer III, that I had downloaded from the Microsoft Store on my backup PC neither downloaded and even supplied to obtain on the goal PC. Instead, it instructed me that I must purchase it from the Microsoft Store.
It all felt a bit like when your first-grader volunteers to assist and also you spend as a lot time cleansing up after them than really doing the work.
What I hate about Windows backup (with a small “b”)
What I more and more dislike about Microsoft’s backup technique is the truth that it merely desires to again up all the things to the cloud: my recordsdata, paperwork, movies, and so forth — but in addition any benchmark software program, utilities, and so forth that I carelessly go away mendacity round. For years, I might merely go online with my private account and really feel pretty safe in the truth that I might simply drag a folder of benchmarks to a brand new laptop computer, block it from backing up the desktop, and go from there. (I discovered way back to not muddle my desktop with piles of recordsdata, however I do use it as a touchdown pad for issues I’m making an attempt out.)
It appears, although, that Microsoft has develop into extraordinarily aggressive in the way it backs up information. I’ll open up a laptop computer and marvel why it’s so sluggish, then uncover that Microsoft is making an attempt to sync a file that was carelessly left on the desktop on one other machine.
I’ve one other bone to select, too: placeholders. Microsoft desires to make sure I’ve shortcuts to each file I’ve ever uploaded, and to point out them each time I open, say, the Pictures folder.
If I snap a screenshot, do I actually need to need to pore via years of archived photographs and different screenshots simply to seek out the one I would like? I’d desire my recordsdata (on this case, my paperwork and photographs) to again as much as OneDrive, however with out the necessity to navigate via all of the visible cruft of recordsdata which are already saved to the cloud. If I need to discover a file, I can go to the OneDrive folder. That’s why I desire treating every new laptop computer as its personal entity, and minimizing OneDrive’s backup as a lot as potential.
The level is that I would really like Windows Backup and Restore to helpfully obtain and set up the apps that I do need. Instead, Microsoft appears decided to sync and obtain recordsdata that I don’t need. Since Backup and Restore doesn’t appear to resolve my drawback, again I’ll go to managing PCs on a person foundation, fairly than a cohesive complete.