Keep your files safer with Windows Live OneCare
If you’ve spent a lot of time working on your computer, chances are you’ve experienced an unexpected problem that causes your computer to stop responding or even to turn off completely. Sometimes those unexpected computer problems can escalate into real-life problems if an important file becomes lost or damaged in the process. Windows Live OneCare can help you protect yourself in case it happens again.
What’s a backup?
A backup is an extra copy of a file that is stored in a separate location. Think of it as a safe-deposit box for your computer files with easy access to it whenever you want. Backups can be useful not only if you experience a hardware problem (like a hard drive failure), but also for recovering files that get damaged or corrupted, or for reverting to a previous version of a file.
With Windows Live OneCare, there are two types of backups:
| • | Full backup. A full backup is a complete copy of all of the important files on your computer. |
| • | Incremental backup. An incremental backup occurs after the full backup is done and only copies new files and files that have changed since the last backup happened. |
First things first
First, you need to get Windows Live OneCare. Go to the Windows Live OneCare website, and then click Download your 90-day free trial today.
Once you’ve got Windows Live OneCare up and running, you can perform a full backup:
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| | 1.
| In Windows Live OneCare, click Start a backup.  If you are prompted for an administrator password or confirmation, type the password or provide confirmation. | | 2.
| Follow the instructions on your screen. |
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Select a location
The next thing you need to do is select the location where you want to store the copied files. Windows Live OneCare can backup files to:
| • | An external hard drive |
| • | A disc burner (like a CD or DVD burner) |
| • | A network share |
| • | A portable device (like a flash memory stick) |
When selecting a location for your backup, it’s a good idea to keep in mind what you’re using the backup for. If you want to create a one-time backup and want to store it in a separate location, then burning a disc with your backup files is a good idea. Keep in mind, however, that if you have a large number of files to back up, a CD might not have enough space. Also, if you want to do automatic backups you’ll have to remember to have a blank disc ready whenever the backup is scheduled.
A good option if you want to schedule automatic backups is to use an external hard drive. Most external hard drives typically have plenty of room to store many backups and as long your drive is connected to your computer, Windows Live OneCare will automatically backup your files according to a schedule that you set.
Set the schedule
When you start your first backup, Windows Live OneCare will give you the chance to specify whether you want to schedule an automatic backup. You can also choose to set how often you want the backup to happen—you can back up your files daily, weekly, every two weeks, or every four weeks. If you’re using Windows Live OneCare’s Performance Plus features, you can have backups run along with your regular computer tune-up. Depending on whether you change your files often, you can select either daily backup or you can consider less frequent backups. At the very least, you should back your files up every 4 weeks.
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| Schedule options |
Choose the files that you want to backup
The next step is to choose which files you want to backup. Even though Windows Live OneCare automatically backs up most common file types, you can also choose specific files and folders to backup. For more information about what file types are backed up automatically, click the name of the file type in the Windows Live OneCare Backup wizard.
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| Choose files to backup |
Now what?
You’re all set. Windows Live OneCare will copy your important files to the location that you specified. If you need to, you can restore files individually, or you can restore an entire backup. Just click Restore files from backup in Windows Live OneCare and follow the instructions in the Windows Live OneCare Restore wizard.
Help and How-to
