My PC crashed and I am trying to move files from my external HD onto the new computer. I installed the WD software on the spare computerand the program runs fine, but when I click on the “restore” tab it shows nothing there to be moved to the PC, like the My Book was empty.
When I go to My Computer and look at the external drive there you can see the backup that was done yesterday, so I know its there, but the WD SmartWare program can’t see it so I can’t back it up to the new computer.
After I did that it shows only the files backed up from the spare computer, not the files previously backed up from my broken computer.
Since the files show up when I double-click the “My Book” icon in My Computer, how to I get them onto the spare computer from there?
I’m very frustrated because I thought I was safe by backing up onto an external hard drive, but if I can’t load my data then I might as well not have backed up at all.
After I did that it shows only the files backed up from the spare computer, not the files previously backed up from my broken computer.
Since the files show up when I double-click the “My Book” icon in My Computer, how to I get them onto the spare computer from there?
I’m very frustrated because I thought I was safe by backing up onto an external hard drive, but if I can’t load my data then I might as well not have backed up at all.
I’m confused. when you say that you can see the backed up files when you open your external drive, are you talking about both sets of backed up files? if you set up two backups, then you should see two backup folders on your external hard drive. if you do, then you should have both backups.
now, if you are trying to move the files from a “broken” computer to your spare computer, then you won’t be able to do it through the software. and it won’t even see the original backup. you will have to go into the backup folder and manually copy and paste the data to your spare computer.
Thanks for your help. What I mean is that when I use the WD SmartWare program on my spare computer, the backups done previously on my now broken computer do not show up, only the backup I did on the spare machine after connecting the My Book external hard drive.
When I go to My Computer on the spare computer and see the external hard drive, I open it, and there are the backups I did on the now broken computer. Therefore, I know they are there (dated the day prior to my power supply failure) but the SmartWare program does not “see” it. when I try to use the software to retrieve it.
I tried to move the backup files from the My Book going through My Computer, but I don’t know where to put them manually on my spare computer. What I need access to is my Normal template from Word, my embedded dictionary in Word, and other things that are not just simple documents, and I’m not sure where they go.
Once I get my original computer repaired I will need help configuring my backups so this does not happen again (i.e. backups performed but not accessible on a different machine).
1) what version of smartware were you running on the broke pc? if it was the old version, then yeah you may have a problem seeing it.
2) How are you looking for the backup, through the retrieve tab, or through the backup tab?
3) what operating systems are on the two computers?
Finally, no matter how you do it, retrieving the data to your spare computer from your broken pc will most likely be done by a data dump, probably on the root of the c: drive. You might be better off, just copying the data out of the swstor folder, of the old pc backup, and then reorganizing it.
I actually did not use the smartware software on the broken PC. When I plugged it in for the first time my computer recognized it as a mass storage device and asked me if I wanted to use it to perform my backup, and I scheduled the backups from there through Windows. Maybe this is my problem. My windows backup program showed the backups have been successful, so I went blissfully on with my life.
On the spare computer it did not know what to do with the device when I plugged it in, so I saw the smartware software and installed it. I am looking for the backup in the retrieve tab when using the software (it is not visible there) but it is visible in the My Computer area of windows.
The broken computer is Windows 7 and the spare computer is XP.
Once my broken computer is repaired I will use the smartware software and perhaps that will be all I need to do to ensure access to the backups, but I am skeptical at this point, after suffering with a massive loss of data, or at least no access to it.
well, that explains everthing. If you did it through windows backup, then you will need to go through windows backup to read the data. did you use an encrypted backup, or did you do an unencrypted backup. If you used encrypted backup, then you won’t be able to access your data until after you reinstall Windows on the broken pc. At least as far as I remember.
