Will my old drive work with Windows 8?

Question : Will my old drive work with Windows 8?

Previously I used a Sony laptop that ran Windows Vista, backing up all my data on to a Maxtor OneTouch 4 external hard disk made by Seagate. I recently purchased a Samsung laptop with Windows 8. My problem is that I am unable to find backup software to download to my new laptop. Maxtor products are now seen as legacy kit by Seagate, so information is somewhat limited. Can you offer a solution or do I have to bite the bullet and buy a new external hard disk? Or perhaps I should use cloud software such as Dropbox?


Solution : Will my old drive work with Windows 8?

There’s no need to use Dropbox because Seagate told us that Maxtor OneTouch will work with Windows 8 as a normal hard disk. However, the OneTouch software is not compatible. The answer, then, is to connect the drive and then use some other backup software, such as the File History tool built into Windows 8. This keeps every version of backed-up files, so you can revert to any earlier version.

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File History is Windows 8’s built-in backup tool which keeps every version of previously backed-up files

To activate it, launch Control Panel (from the Start screen start typing ‘control panel’ and then click Control Panel). Then, under the ‘System and Security’ heading, click ‘Save backup copies of your files with File History’. Assuming your Maxtor drive is connected, it should be shown. If the wrong drive is shown, click ‘Select drive’, choose the correct one, then click OK. Now click ‘Turn on’. File History will start work right away, backing up all files stored in the Windows Libraries. To exclude particular folders, click ‘Exclude folders’, then click Add. To tweak how often backups are made, click Advanced settings’.

To restore files later, use File Explorer to navigate to the relevant file or folder, then click the History button in the Home tab. Use the arrows at the bottom of the window to skip backwards and forwards through time. To restore an item, select it, then click the round button at the bottom.