I have an old 1TB My Book Essential external hard drive. Model WDBAAF0010HBK-01.
I do not back up my laptop very often and have mainly pictures/videos and a few music files on there which I back up to my MyBook every couple of months or so.
When I perform a back up does my MyBook just backup new files or everything again?
For example if I’ve already backed up 250gb of data off my laptop and then 2 months later I now have 275gb of data on my laptop, does the back up only copy the new files? Or does the whole 275gb get backed up, meaning there’s now 525gb of data on my MyBook?
Sorry if this seems a really dumb question, but the back up process takes hours and I want to be sure that I’m doing it correctly.
This is quite an old MyBook so probably I need to be looking at probably a newer model with USB 3.00, but at the moment it will have to do.
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The main question is what software you use to do the backup? This drive came with Smartware. If you are using that software then the backups are incremental. Just the new or modified files are backed up since the last backup was ran. to make the backup take less time, I would suggest running the backup in shorter intervals until you get a faster drive. Just remember, buying a 3.0 drive will not transfer any faster unless you plug into a 3.0 port on the laptop. The 3.0 drive will only transfer as fast as the port it is plugged into. Another thing to remember is that any files deleted from the laptop will NOT be deleted from the backup so you will always have more data in the backup than on the laptop.
Thanks for taking the time to answer my question.
I am using WD Smartware so you have reassured me. Also, I am aware that I only have a USB 2.0 ports on my laptop but am in the process of looking at a new model as my old HP G62 is getting on a bit now, so once that is sorted a new faster WD external HDD is on the shopping list!
