Use the backup agent to help upgrade your operating system

Overview

You can use the backup agent to ensure that your personal files are safe when you upgrade your operating system. This article explains how the backup agent can help before and after an operating system upgrade.

Considerations

If you are upgrading to a new version of your existing operating system, you can often perform an in-place upgrade, wherein you don’t have to remove your existing operating system prior to installing the new operating system. Typically, your personal files, as well as all compatible applications, are preserved when your perform an in-place upgrade.

You may prefer, or be required, to do a clean install, in which case you must remove your existing operating system (including all personal files) prior to installing the new operating system. For example, if you are upgrading from Windows 7 or Windows 8 to Windows 10, you should do a clean install.

Before upgrading your operating system

Whether you are performing an in-place upgrade or a clean install, ensure that you have a complete backup.

For an in-place upgrade, having a complete backup is a precautionary measure — your personal files should not be impacted by the upgrade. However, with a clean install, you need to use the replace device wizard to choose the device that was previously backing up and then transfer your personal files to the newly reformatted device.

Confirm your backup file selection

You can confirm that you are backing up all of your important personal files by viewing backup file selection within the backup agent.

Go to Manage Files.
(Optional) Click the options menu and select Show hidden files to view hidden files.
Navigate to the drive, folder, or files that you want to add or remove, then:
- Deselect the check box next to any item you want to delete from your backup.
- Select an empty box to add an item to your backup.
- A minus sign indicates that a subfolder within this folder is selected for backup. New subfolders within the folder will not be automatically added to your backup file selection.
- A check mark indicates that this folder is selected for backup. New subfolders within the folder will be automatically added to your backup file selection.
Click Save.
If you deselected any files or folders, the Delete Files from Backup warning displays.
If applicable, select I understand to confirm you want to delete deselected files from your backup.
If applicable, select Delete.
After changing the file selection, the agent synchronizes the files selected for backup with the files already backed up to that destination.

Are your files protected?
If you are unsure what you should backup, you can follow these simple guidelines. If you have questions about backing up files for specific applications, our Backup guide has a number of tutorials about backing up files for various applications.

Confirm your backup is complete

After verifying that you are backing up all of your important files, confirm that your backup is complete on at least one destination (for example, the Code42 Cloud). If you are performing a clean installation, you should also have a complete backup on a local destination, like an external drive. When you restore from a local destination, your files are restored faster and you conserve bandwidth.

You can view your backup status on the agent Home view. You can start a backup manually by clicking Run backup now for each destination.

Troubleshooting
If the agent appears to be unable to back up one or more files, follow our troubleshooting article to diagnose and resolve the issue.

After upgrading your operating system

In-place upgrade

If you completed an in-place upgrade, your personal files should be unaffected by the upgrade. Additionally, all of your settings for the backup agent should be preserved.

Clean install

If you upgraded by performing a clean install, you must first download and install the backup agent, then use the replace device wizard to choose the device that was previously backing up and transfer your personal files to the newly reformatted device. All of your backup agent settings are applied to your computer automatically during the replace device process.

Is my backup starting over?

After an operating system upgrade or device replacement, the backup agent will launch a file verification scan to compare the contents of your backup file selection against your existing backup archive. It may look like your files are backing up again, and the estimated time to complete may seem unusually long.

However, the backup agent will only back up what has changed (for example, folder paths for moved files, new files), and it will use data de-duplication to identify files that are already backed up. This is a normal part of the backup agent's operation, but if you are concerned, there are several ways to confirm that your backup isn't starting over.

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