How to Replace the C Drive With a Copy of the C Drive on an External USB Drive

The Windows 7 operating system lets you create system backups and store them on any external media including a USB hard drive. If your system crashes and you need to restore from your personal backup copy, you can accomplish restoration using the Windows 7 Recovery Console, which is a part of the installation DVD. Restoring a hard drive replaces all information with the backup, so you can recover a hard disk partition that fails due to corrupted system files.

Things You'll Need

• Windows installation DVD
• USB hard drive backup

Instructions

1. Insert your Windows 7 installation DVD into the drive. Reboot the computer. When prompted, press "Enter" to boot to the installation DVD's recovery center.

2. Choose your language, timezone and keyboard settings on the first window, Click "Next" to open the installation window. Instead of clicking "Install," click "Recover Your Computer" to start the system recovery console.

3. Click the option labeled "Restore your computer using a system image you created earlier" and click "Next." Click "Select a system image" on the next window. Click "Next."

4. Point to the location of your external USB hard drive's backup. Click "OK." Click "Next" to move to the final summary window. On the last window, click "Finish" to start the recovery process. Files copy from the USB drive to your local C drive.

References

• How to Geek: How To Restore Windows 7 from a System Image