We back up our macOS installations all the time, so why not do the same for Boot Camp Windows partition?
Whenever you want to reinstall Windows, the configuration process includes initial setup, installing drivers, and downloading needed applications- can take a significant amount of time. Backing up your Bootcamp Boot Camp installation after you have it configured to your liking can help you easily restore a snapshot of Windows in mere minutes. Luckily, with Twocanoes’s Winclone software, it’s extremely easy to get this done. In this article, we will provide you a guide on how to use Winclone to back up and restore a Boot Camp partition on your Mac.
How does Winclone Work?
Winclone makes it easy to create a full image backup of your entire Boot Camp partition. This includes files, apps, and including files, programs, and the Windows Operating System itself. So whenever you want to go back to that exact state, you can just restore the image and your Boot Camp partition will be exactly the same as when you create the backup.
By creating a Winclone image before a major Windows upgrade or program installation, you will save a significant amount of time when reinstalling Windows or setting up the portion again. This is very convenient for people who use Boot Camp for business, education, gaming, or casual use.
Winclone costs $49.99 for a lifetime license. There is also another version of Winclone available – Winclone Pro that comes with additional features geared towards power users. However, if you tend to use this software just for backing up and restoring Boot Camp partition, the standard version is good enough. You can learn more about this tool here.
Create a Boot Camp Back up with Winclone
Note: In this tutorial, we will assume that you are already familiar with how to use Boot Camp Assistant to install and run a copy of Windows on your Mac. If you are not, please check out our complete guide for Boot Camp here.
To create a Boot Camp image with Winclone, you need to:
- Install Windows via Boot Camp Assistant, and configure the Windows installation to your liking.
- Boot back into macOS and download Winclone
- Open Winclone
- Click Clone Bootcamp Partition.
- Select Save Image.
- Choose where you want to save the image and type a name for it in the Save As box.
- Click Save.
- You should see an ‘Imaging’ window with a progress pie chart to indicate how far the image creation process has progressed.
- Once the chart reaches 100%, your Boot Camp image should be saved to the selected location in the form of a .winclone file.
And that’s basically it! Now you can move the image to a safe place where it can be easily retrieved later.
How to restore a Boot Camp partition with Winclone
Here is what you need to do when you want to restore the Windows back up that you’ve made with Winclone:
- Create a new Boot Camp partition. Make sure that it is large enough to accommodate the Winclone image.
- Start Winclone.
- Select the Restore Image icon.
- Click the Restore Image button in the bottom-right corner.
- Browse and locate the image that you created.
- Click Open.
- On the Restore Image to Volume? pop up box, click Restore to proceed with the image restoration.
( Please note that that restoring the image will erase everything on the Boot Camp partition. The time it takes the restore to complete will vary depending on how large the back up is)
- Once the restore is complete, click OK on the completed pop-up alert.
- Restart your Mac while holding the Option key to invoke Startup Manager.
- Select your Window partition to boot into it instead of macOS.
Now you should be back to the same configuration that you had after making the backup image.
And that’s how to back up and restore a Boot Camp partition with Winclone. We hope that our guide will be useful to you. If you have any questions, please let us know in the comments!
