complete system backup

please help me i want to do a complete system backup windows xp cd-rw12x. thankyou!

 

Click Start > Help and Support. Search for backup. The information you need is in the results.

 

Backup is not available on xp

I also cannot find backup program on windows xp. its new, just out of the box, and the search you said to do does not list it. it lists restore intead, which is not recording files to external media. Does one need to aquire the backup program via download? maybe?

 

HOW TO: Install Backup from the Windows XP Home Edition CD-ROM (Q302894)

 

You'd be better off using programs specifically designed for back up to external media such as Powerquests's Drive Image 5.0 or Norton 's Ghost.

With either of these programs you can copy individual partitions to CD-R or CD-RW and you can access them from DOS by creating boot disks for those programs that will allow you to resore saved image files from CD-r or CD-RW as long as you make sure the drivers for your CD or CD-RW drive are loaded at boot up.

Unlike Windows backup, these programs copy everything in a partition to an image file which can be compressed to save space... I use Drive Image 5.0 with XP and it's been a real lifesaver for recovering from bad software installs.

 

I use NTBackup on my XP Home machine to backup my data files and I use Drive Image 5.0 to backup my OS partition. To effectively backup you really need both types of utilites.