Best way to backup files?

So, I want to reload my OS- XP Pro. What is the best way to save everything so that I can get my system back to the way it is now? The Files and Settings Transfer wizard needs 4GB to do its backup, whereas Nero BackItUp basically needs an amount of space pretty much equal to the contents of my C: drive(s), which in this case is about 60GB.

So, I'm guessing that Nero is imaging my drive, whereas FnS Xfer wizard is just backing up my Desktop settings and saved e-mail, etc, but won't save the stuff like pictures, movies, etc.

Going on that assumption...I have all of my "important" stuff backed up on my external drive. My real concern is losing my IE and FF bookmarks and my e-mail stuff.

OK, with that said, I would like to expand my question(s) a little bit...When I get XP reinstalled I want to start making automatic regular backups of my C: drive. There are 2 ways that I can think of to do this-
1- Get 2 more Raptors and put them in RAID 1 with my current RAID 0 drives. This is an expensive, but awesome, solution.

2- Get another drive that is equal to the size of my RAIDed Raptors (150 GB) and use some type of software to do the backups. This is where I run into the problem. Nero BackItUp, for example, has different types of backups. I want to do a backup where only the files that are added or changed during that day are actually backed up. Nero has two options that will do that- one option flags the file as backed up, the other option does not. I have no idea what difference it makes as to how the file is flagged. And, as I mentioned, I want it to be automated every day so that I don't have to remember to do it.

BTW- When I said that I have all of my important stuff backed up to my external drive, I didn't use a program to do that. I just copied pics, docs, movies, etc. over to the other drive as a long-term storage solution. I have never done an actual backup of a drive- at least not on a home PC. I have done it for my job, but they use specialized proprietary software to do backups.

TIA for any suggestions/advice.

I store all my docs, music, videos and stuff on a seperate hdd.

Use acronis true image. After a fresh install and configuring everything how I like it. Including reg tweaks hacked files custom themes set size of pagefile at 1500min and max to prevent fragmenting in the future. Blah blah blah. Then I do a /access defragmenting with o&o defrag. Then I make an image on ultra compression. all that stuff makes about 3.5GB on ultra compression. Pop that on the second harddrive make a bootable rescue disk and now when things get screwwy it takes about 15 minutes to return to au natural

Also you have the option to do incremental backups which only adds what has changed.

There is also an option for file and folder backups which is good if transferring to another PC I suppose.. .but I have never done it...


EDIT: Also make saved game backups to second drive as I usually do my images before installing games... I did one after. With 2 new games installed and 4GB of music my image size was like 10GB!! So alot of stuff just goes on DVD to keep the images reasonable


Opera backups are easy too... just copy opera6.dat, wand.dat and cookies.dat to a new computer and you have all your bookmarks cookies and login information

If you want to backup the diffrence betwee teh files tehn use windows backup software. In teh advance options you'll get all teh option. first normal backup then incrimental backups. the bad part if your data lsot you'll have to put the normal backup first adn run teh incimental backups one by one. Acronis is the best soultion for you.Because it also do the file verifications and then make th images. so what you can do is install windows freshly with all your software and settings then make a backup image and write it dvd or dvd's. After that use that software to backup your machine so every night (if you set itup) it will do the backup of your entire machine. Pretty cool ha? Only think is usea hard diskt o backup instead of anythign else because it'll much much more faster.