Hi,

I have my Win7 Pro machine daily backup my libraries and a few other folders to a 1Tb network drive. I'm not making a system image.

It works fine except for that it just keeps getting bigger. It is now out of space and therefore no-longer will back up.

The total size of the files I want backing up is about 280Gb yet the size of the backup is now over 750Gb.

It is as if windows is just making duplicate backups over and over. Is there some way to make it not do this as it is totally pointless if the files are not changing?

You need to check your backup program and adjust the settings. Most allow you to keep x number of days or not exceed a certain size. Many allow you to delete individual backup manually.

I'm just using the backup facility built into Windows 7. I can't seem to see any useful options like that

How To Use Backup and Restore in Windows 7 - How-To Geek

So I do the "Manage space" thing, and the there is only one backup period listed. So basically, I have to delete the whole backup and start again. I suppose that is that then.

Originally Posted by rpmorrow

How To Use Backup and Restore in Windows 7 - How-To Geek

So I do the "Manage space" thing, and the there is only one backup period listed. So basically, I have to delete the whole backup and start again. I suppose that is that then.

I find it a little odd you only have 1 listed. How big does it say that backup is?

It said 780Gb. Perhaps something went wrong initially. Anyway, I've deleted it and am starting again. Hope this works better!

Yeah, that is huge. I just ran Win7's backup on this system. I have a little less than 60Gb of data and the backup file is just over 5Gb - or just under 10% of the total.

Start over with a full backup and then change the automatic backup to be a differential instead of incremental.

I do weekly differentials and a full about every 4-6 weeks.

Originally Posted by townsbg

Start over with a full backup and then change the automatic backup to be a differential instead of incremental.

I do weekly differentials and a full about every 4-6 weeks.

Not necessary with Windows Backup. Windows Backup creates a full backup the first time, then automatically does differentials after that. Then periodically does a full backup.

By default, it is designed to use no more than 30% of the disk and will automatically purge older backup files when space is needed.

Well could it somehow be set to incremental? It's something to check out.