Solved New PC: Is Making a Disk Image No Longer Necessary?

Marcus Vinicus · Feb 11, 2026

To answer the OP question in the thread title.

With the complexity of modern operating systems such as Windows 11 the importance of having system images regularly kept up to date is more important than it ever was.

AllenChicago · Feb 11, 2026

antspants said:
Yes, a recovery drive is good to make.

But seriously, a system image could save your bacon where nothing else can.

Try Hasleo, free version 5.6.2.0

antspants - Tips for using Hasleo Backup (Free) for the first time

This Tutorial will help guide you with using Hasleo Backup (Free) for the first time. A step by step process for creating a Windows 11 system image which is a comprehensive backup of your entire computer, including the operating system, installed programs, system settings, and personal files...

www.elevenforum.com

Also, Recovery Drive.

Create Recovery Drive in Windows 11

This tutorial will show you how to create a bootable USB recovery drive that boots to advanced startup (WinRE) to troubleshoot, restore, or recover Windows 11. If your PC won’t start, you can use a recovery drive to restore from a system restore point or recover your PC. It's a good idea to...

www.elevenforum.com

Thankyou. I made a recovery drive using a USB stick. It used 17gb of the 32gb drive.

I'll be downloading/installing HASLEO tonight. Used Macrium on my last PC, but it's no longer free.

Thankyou for the advice and also for links to the appropriate ElevenForum tutorials.

AllenChicago · Feb 11, 2026

mngerhold said:
Make sure that the Drive backup operates as a backup, and not just as a sync tool: if it just syncs, then files deleted from the main store (perhaps in error) will be cleared from the synced drive in the cloud. That may not be what you want.

I know what you mean! With Google Photos, the deletions are unpredictable. Sometimes I delete one from my phone and it deletes from the Cloud, even though that's not what I wanted. Anyway, it will be awhile before I set up the PC-to-Cloud backup. Very little official document creation, now that I'm retired.

AllenChicago · Feb 12, 2026

Steve C said:
You must use reliable third party imaging to recover a fully working PC. Like many here I use Macrium Reflect which has never let me down and is developed in the UK not China.

Your post reminded me to back up my wife's PC. Hadn't done so since Aug 2023. I put Macrium Reflect on it back with the software was free. Worked great last night, so the free version still functions. (But I've read that as Windows evolves, there will be a time when the free version will not make an accurate image.)

AllenChicago · Feb 12, 2026

hsehestedt said:
I'm just going to add a summary here: It sounds like most people agree that having a full image backup is a good thing and I'll simply add that I agree with that as well. Bear in mind that I reinstall Windows every single day sometimes more than five times in one day. This is largely because I do an inordinate amount of testing. So even with all my automated processes for installation I still use image backups on my daily use machines because it makes recovery so much easier. Remember that with a full disk image backup you can not only restore your entire system to the exact state that it was in when the backup was created but you also have the versatility of being able to go and pull individual files which is basically what you would be doing if you backed up your files to a service like Onedrive.

In my opinion I think that a full disk image backup is even more important for users with simpler needs. This is because such users often don't want to go through the hassle of setting up windows completely from scratch. Remember that after you install Windows you still need to install all your drivers. Then you need to customize all the Windows settings to suit your needs. You also need to install all your applications and programs again and possibly do a whole bunch of updating not only of Windows but other things as well. So, there's a good amount of work involved in setting up windows from scratch. Yes, all your important data may be saved some place like OneDrive but if your whole system goes boom then you're going to have a lot more work to do than just restoring files from OneDrive and that's where a complete disk image can really save your bacon as one of the other respondents noted.

Thankyou for the thorough and easy to understand explanation! I didn't know the image allowed accessing specific files, if needed. Maybe an image can be stored on and restored from a cloud too. That would be extra insurance, in case your local backup is destroyed in a storm or fire. After I get the local image made, I'll research putting one on my Google Cloud. (I think its a 2TB cloud)

Stigg · Feb 12, 2026

There are two types of backups that the OP may need to know about.
File backups (e.g. Bvckup 2)
System image backups (e.g. Macrium Reflect)

File backup applications can replicate your files onto another drive so you have a spare copy. They won't save our system, but will save your personal files.
System image backups create an image of your entire system for restoration in case of drive failure, system errors, malware etc.

I see on some forums where people have all these anti-malware programs on their computers running constantly when, in my opinion, making regular system image backups would suffice. I don't run any anti-malware programs at all, and haven't done for 15+ years. But all my PCs are on regular system image backup schedules. If I run into problems, I simply restore a system image. System image backup applications have come a long way in recent years. Most of the popular ones are now very reliable and fairly easy to use.

Tip: Backup, backup, backup.

Bree · Feb 12, 2026

AllenChicago said:
Used Macrium on my last PC, but it's no longer free.

Reflect Free v8.0 may have been retired, but it's still downloadable from Macrium and still works, even with the latest Insider Canary build 26H1. Link to get the Reflect Free download agent at the bottom of post #1 here: Latest Macrium Reflect 8 updates

AllenChicago · Feb 12, 2026

gunrunnerjohn said:
There's no way I'd trust Microsoft and One Drive to be my only backup! Hell, I don't even trust One Drive at all.

There are too many "drives/backups" thrown at us. My Samsung phone has Google Drive, One Drive, and Samsung backup. It's maddening. Also, the Artificial Intelligence programs are showing up, like we're all STUPID. Gemini, Copilot, Perplexity, Grok.... I think my Samsung S25 has them all, and I use NONE OF THEM (intentionally).

AllenChicago · Feb 12, 2026

Try3 said:
That does not change the amount of time, effort & aggravation you would save by having a system image ready in case of disaster.

Denis

Thanks to the selfless members of this forum, I now understand that nothing replaces the elegance of a disk image. I've never used one, but like a kitchen fire extinguisher, it's apparently a very good idea to keep a regularly updated image.

AllenChicago · Feb 12, 2026

glasskuter said:
Guesstimation here as I have never timed it all. The last time I clean installed, it was unavoidable since getting tp 25h2 forced me to do. It took all day. :
Install windows - 15 min
set up personal preferences - 15-30 min.
tweaks - if you don't have them all written down or in a reg file, even using Bink's tutorials could still take hours to find the exact ones you want.
install apps, preferences, and other stuff- hours. OMG this part was brutal, irritating, and time consuming.

restore an image- 10 minutes. No muss, no fuss and you're back in business.

Thankyou for providing a real-world example of the PAIN involved with reinstalling Windows from scratch.

AllenChicago · Feb 12, 2026

Bree said:
Reflect Free v8.0 may have been retired, but it's still downloadable from Macrium and still works, even with the latest Insider Canary build 26H1. Link to get the Reflect Free download agent at the bottom of post #1 here: Latest Macrium Reflect 8 updates

I think someone in this thread said one day, restoring from a free Macrium Reflect won't work, because the Macrium software is not kept current with Windows, as the O.S. advances.

AllenChicago · Feb 12, 2026

Bree said:
What sort of user files? What software did you use to make them?

Its not just about restoring Windows and your files. If you have paid for software like Office you'd also have to reinstall/reconfigure that too. Do you even have all you licence keys to hand? A system image puts them all back and working without worrying about stuff like that.

I have a half-way house approach. I make a full system image once a month, after the Patch Tuesday updates. For the rest of the month I just back up any changed/new user files twice a week to a local network drive. Should I ever need to restore a system image it's a simple task to copy back any user files that had changed since the image was made. I've had to do that a very few times, but a system image saves a lot of time reinstalling all my software.

The only software program I MAY NEED this year is the Turbo Tax program I used last year to do the family taxes. But all the TurboTax data files and each prior year's returns are on my Google Drive, so not having all that on my PC may make importing data a bit more challenging this April, but not by much. There are no other programs. The P.C. I retired and replaced 2 weeks ago had only 253GB of the 1TB hard-drive utilized, and it was my main PC since 2009. I'm a "boring" PC user, LOL. Thanks for further confirming that a disk image is the way to go. -Allen

gunrunnerjohn · Feb 13, 2026

AllenChicago said:
The only software program I MAY NEED this year is the Turbo Tax program I used last year to do the family taxes. But all the TurboTax data files and each prior year's returns are on my Google Drive, so not having all that on my PC may make importing data a bit more challenging this April, but not by much. There are no other programs. The P.C. I retired and replaced 2 weeks ago had only 253GB of the 1TB hard-drive utilized, and it was my main PC since 2009. I'm a "boring" PC user, LOL. Thanks for further confirming that a disk image is the way to go. -Allen

All my data is stored locally. I do have a cloud backup for my critical data, but it's a backup and not the only copy of the data. Personally, I'd NEVER have only one backup copy that was in the cloud, my primary backups are on a different physical drive in the computer, my NAS, and finally some USB drives that are disconnected except to execute and check new backups periodically.

RD Mercer · Feb 13, 2026

If you only have the OS and one browser on your disk like me, reinstalling an OS doesn’t really bother me at all. Of course at 74, not much does bother me anymore, well maybe if I run out of coffee.

gunrunnerjohn · Feb 14, 2026

RD Mercer said:
If you only have the OS and one browser on your disk like me, reinstalling an OS doesn’t really bother me at all. Of course at 74, not much does bother me anymore, well maybe if I run out of coffee.

If you don't have multiple applications that you need to install, etc. just installing bare Windows is no problem.

Hazel123 · Feb 14, 2026

I do a few things:

1) System images - do my image twice on two different external usb hard drives, because external drives can fail - eg dropped or not removed properly
2) Idrive cloud backup daily (personal files only)
3) Personal Files back up on external usb drive occasionally - so files are in more than one place.

I've rarely needed to restore an image, but if I do need to, and it's not up to date by a couple of weeks or more, I can just delete all the files, and re-add them from my cloud file backup (so my files are up to date).

I think having file backups as well is important as if you have computer failure you may need to set up on a new machine and do a clean install. As happened to me recently.

Winuser · Feb 14, 2026

jimbo45 said:
If you use physical vhdx files to install windows then you don't even need specialized backup software. Simply boot the Windows install media and choose repair system->command prompt and copy a backup vhdx file back to disk with the copy command -- standard windows. To create the backup file in the first place simply copy with file explorer to any device.

If for any reason you have to re-install the bootloader simply do it via DISM. All 100% native windows commands.

The only reason I see these days for any sort of 3rd party backup software is for DATA backup, saving multi-media files e.g music or Archiving

Do you honestly believe that a computer novice even knows what you're talking about?

AllenChicago · Feb 16, 2026

gunrunnerjohn said:
All my data is stored locally. I do have a cloud backup for my critical data, but it's a backup and not the only copy of the data. Personally, I'd NEVER have only one backup copy that was in the cloud, my primary backups are on a different physical drive in the computer, my NAS, and finally some USB drives that are disconnected except to execute and check new backups periodically.

The only things I have 2 backups of, are photos and videos I've taken over the years. I have them on hard drives under my desk, and also stored (in lower quality) on Google Photos cloud. Those are what I care most about, but strangely, I never look at any of them.

AllenChicago · Feb 16, 2026

jimbo45 said:
@Steve C - not completely true. BTW reading about some of the chaos coming out of the UK currently I wouldn't necessarily agree that software developed in the UK is any better / worse than that developed in China !!

A lot of so called I.T hacks actually aren't hacks at all -- just a convenient excuse for poor or sloppy I.T upgrade management. Some deliberate hacking does occur on behalf of various "rogue parties" whether country sponsored or individuals but not that much actually that gets through.

If you use physical vhdx files to install windows then you don't even need specialized backup software. Simply boot the Windows install media and choose repair system->command prompt and copy a backup vhdx file back to disk with the copy command -- standard windows. To create the backup file in the first place simply copy with file explorer to any device.

If for any reason you have to re-install the bootloader simply do it via DISM. All 100% native windows commands.

The only reason I see these days for any sort of 3rd party backup software is for DATA backup, saving multi-media files e.g music or Archiving which you only need to do once since stuff rarely if ever changes and as everybody has different needs that's far too big a topic to give a simple answer on. I simply use the built in Linux command from a NAS server rsync using a GUI front end grsync. This handles windows NTFS stuff with no problems -- and I use the cloud for really important stuff too.

A lot of practices and software were designed back for C20 systems both hardware and software especially things like 3rd party A/V stuff and backup suites. For DOMESTIC computers things have moved on hugely now. Corporate / Work places have different issues but I assume most on these Forums are domestic users (who may be professionaly involved in I.T - but still also have home type machines too).

Cheers
jimbo

Jimbo, because you devoted so much time to explaining your system for backups, I invested some time studying it. So now I have an up-to-date Disk Image that's 27GB and a USB Stick made by using Windows11 backup. It's 16GB. Hope to never have to use either. Thankyou for the detailed explanation, Jimbo. -Allen

Solved New PC: Is Making a Disk Image No Longer Necessary?

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