- #WHAT SIZE LACIE BACKUP DRIVE FOR 1TB HARD DRIVE HOW TO#
- #WHAT SIZE LACIE BACKUP DRIVE FOR 1TB HARD DRIVE FULL#
- #WHAT SIZE LACIE BACKUP DRIVE FOR 1TB HARD DRIVE WINDOWS 10#
- #WHAT SIZE LACIE BACKUP DRIVE FOR 1TB HARD DRIVE FREE#
- #WHAT SIZE LACIE BACKUP DRIVE FOR 1TB HARD DRIVE WINDOWS#
Suppose you backup your computer once a week. If the external hard drive can store several backups, you can revert to multiple previous versions of your files. How Much Bigger Should an External Hard Drive be?Īn external hard drive to backup your computer should preferably have enough space so that it can store more than one backup of your computer. Always calculate your external hard drive capacity needed to backup your computer in function of how many backup copies you want to be able to keep. While it is true that most backup programs use compression to save space, you should not rely on the compression algorithm to compensate for additional backup copies. It should be noted that, if your computer has multiple hard drives (for example also a d: drive) and you want to include that data in your backup as well, then you will need to add the storage of the additional hard drive to the capacity needed on the external hard drive for your backups.Īlso, the example above is the most basic method of determining what size of external hard drive you will need to backup your computer, because it only calculates the capacity needed to hold one backup copy. This compression results in a backup set that is usually a lot smaller than the actual amount of data that is backed up. Especially if we take into consideration that most backup programs compress the data they backup.
#WHAT SIZE LACIE BACKUP DRIVE FOR 1TB HARD DRIVE FULL#
If I were to get an external hard drive of 500 GB, that would give me plenty of space to make a full backup of my computer.
#WHAT SIZE LACIE BACKUP DRIVE FOR 1TB HARD DRIVE FREE#
In this case the total space reported is 451 GB and free space is 25.8 GB, resulting in about 426 GB (451 GB - 25 GB) of storage space needed to backup everything. At this point, if I want to determine the size of the external hard drive that I would need in order to backup my computer, I would take the total storage space reported minus the free space reported.
If we take a look at my c: drive on my laptop in the image above, we can see that it’s way too full, but cleaning that up is something for another time.
#WHAT SIZE LACIE BACKUP DRIVE FOR 1TB HARD DRIVE WINDOWS#
Press the Windows logo key on your keyboard + the letter e to start Windows file explorer. Let’s go over these steps in more detail. The total capacity minus free space is the minimum capacity that your external hard drive needs to be in order to hold one full backup copy of your entire computer. On the right, under “Devices and drives”, you’ll get an overview of your hard drive(s), their capacity and free space.
In order to see how much storage capacity your external hard drive needs to have, press the Windows logo key + e to launch file explorer and then click on the “This PC” icon in the left part of the window. What Size External Hard Drive do I Need to Backup my Computer?
#WHAT SIZE LACIE BACKUP DRIVE FOR 1TB HARD DRIVE WINDOWS 10#
Windows 10 offers a very convenient way to inform you of the used capacity on your hard drive. The amount of data that you need to backup is going to be one of the main contributing factors in determining the capacity for your external backup hard drive. Before we start talking about how many file versions you want to keep available (if any at all), you need to establish how much space your files actually take up. And I’ll explain how you can save on storage by using incremental backups so you can revert back to previous versions of your files.īut, first things first.
#WHAT SIZE LACIE BACKUP DRIVE FOR 1TB HARD DRIVE HOW TO#
I will show you how to find out the amount of data you’ll need to backup and also whether or not you want to keep older backups. The goal of this article is to help you figure out how to determine what size of external hard drive you will need for your particular situation. In other words, the answer to the question “What size external hard drive do I need to backup my computer?” is: it depends on your needs and requirements. If you are going to make weekly backups and you need to be able to revert back to a file version from three weeks ago, you’re going to need more backup storage than only the amount of data that goes in one backup copy. The reason I was surprised to see this is because obviously the size of the external hard drive that you need is going to depend on the amount of data that you need to backup.Īnd also on how many backup copies you want to keep.