Having backups won’t do you any good if you don’t know how to use them. I can guarantee you’ll need them if you have to reinstall everything on your PC or if your PC’s hard drive conks out and you have to purchase a new one. If you’ve tested your backups already, you’re halfway there though. Let’s look now at performing a real backup.
Restoring personal data stored in folders on a CD, DVD, or external hard drive is as simple as dragging the data from the media to the appropriate folder on the recovered or new PC. To drag and drop data from the My Documents folder (or Documents on Vista) on the external media to the My Documents (or Documents) folder on the new PC, for instance, just open the folder on the external media, choose Edit and Select All, and then drag and drop. You can perform the same tasks to copy and move the data from the My Movies or My Pictures folders to their appropriate counterparts too. Just repeat the steps with all of the folders of personal data you’ve backed up.
If you’ve backed up the mail and Internet data to a CD, DVD, or external drive, you can’t really drag and drop that data easily. (You can, but not easily!) To restore mail and Internet data, you’ll need to import the data back into the original program, and this will generally require that you use the same utility that you previously used to export it.
For instance, to restore an address book in Outlook Express on XP or Mail on Vista, you’ll choose File, then Import, and then Other Address Book. You choose Other Address Book because you previously saved the address book in a CSV, or comma-separated values, file. That’s now a “real” address book. You’ll then browse to the file on the CD, DVD, or external drive and choose OK and the address book will be restored automatically.
Importing messages in Outlook Express or Windows Mail requires a little more knowledge. Here’s how to import messages you’ve backed up previously:
1. Open Outlook Express, and on the File menu, point to Import, and choose Messages.
2. In the Select Program page, select Microsoft Outlook Express 6 (or Microsoft Outlook Express 4 if that’s what you used). Click Next.
3. In the Import From OE6 page, select Import Mail From an OE6 Store Directory. Click OK.
4. In the Location of Messages page, click Browse and locate the saved message files. Click OK and then Next.
5. In the Select Folders page, select All Folders. Click Next.
6. Click Finish when the process is complete.
There are a few other things you’ve backed up you can import. In Outlook Express or Mail, you can choose File, Import, and Mail Account Settings to import the settings for your e-mail account(s). In Internet Explorer, you can use File, Import and Export to import backed-up favorites or cookies.