Keep your computer contents safe by cloning your hard disk

We’re always exhorting PCW readers to back up files.

But even though there’s no shortage of backup applications available, they can be difficult to use, and it can be time-consuming choosing which files and folders to back up and which to ignore. Choose to clone a hard disk instead and it’s possible to safeguard its entire contents with very little effort and for no cost, as we’ll show you in this back-to-basics feature.

Clonezilla is a free but powerful program that can create an exact copy of one hard disk and copy it to another. This image can be used to back up data, or to transfer to a new disk if one with a larger capacity has been installed.