Supercharge File History backups in Windows with these tweaks

File history is a useful backup tool in Windows 10, which means you'll never lose a file again, even if a hard drive disaster occurs. Make it even better with these simple Windows tweaks.

A USB drive, which can be enabled in the Control Panel, is required to store File History backups. Once enabled, File History first backs up everything in your personal C:Usersyourname folder, such as B. Documents, Pictures, Videos, Music and some others. All changed files are then backed up every hour.

If files are lost on the PC hard drive, you can find them on the USB hard drive in the "File History" folder. It even saves multiple versions of files as they change. No special software is required to access the backed up files, although the Recover personal files Link in File History in Control Panel is best.

File History has already been covered, and I've shown how you can recover gigabytes of disk space by cleaning File History. I also showed how to use a NAS drive with Windows 8 File History backup.

Windows updates and file history

Microsoft updates Windows up to twice a year and is constantly changing old features and adding new ones. Sometimes you discover new features by accident and wonder when they were added or if they were always there. It's hard to keep track.

Take File History for example. It was originally only in the Control Panel and had a limited set of features. You can choose the drive to use for backups, exclude specific folders, and turn it on or off. That's it already.

Windows 10 introduced the Settings app, and since launch, Microsoft has slowly moved settings from the Control Panel to the Settings app. Now File History is configurable in Settings and has features that weren't in the original File History.

File history in the Windows 10 Settings app

To see the new features in File History:

1. Press Windows+I to open the Settings app
2. click Updates & Security
3. click fuse
4. click More options

I'm assuming you already have File History enabled and backing up your files. You can see the size of the backup and the total space on the backup disk. (Wouldn't free disk space be more useful?)

Most of what's in the Control Panel is here and you can manually start a backup, change the frequency of backups from every 10 minutes to once a day, and how long to keep backups (i.e. multiple versions of files backed up).

You should check if File History is backed up automatically, as some people found that it stopped occasionally. Booting up the PC without the USB backup drive plugged in or turned on may cause it to halt. If necessary, start it manually.

I'm sure earlier you couldn't see a list of folders being backed up. Well now you can. In addition, a folder in the backup set can be clicked and excluded.

For example, if you don't care about backing up saved games, click the folder in the list of folders to back up, and then click the Remove Button.

Add folders to file history

Another new feature, or at least one that I can't remember, is an option to add a folder to back up. Look at the list of folders to back up, and if you have files elsewhere that aren't backed up (subfolders of folders are included), click the plus button at the top and add the folder.

The ability to add folders on disk to the backup set makes File History much more useful. Previously, you had to use a third-party backup program like Backupper to create custom backup sets. Now you can do this in File History by adding the folders you want.

Exclude folders from file history backups

Scroll to the bottom of the list of folders to back up and there is an option to exclude one or more folders. They can be subfolders of other folders.

For example, I exclude the Downloads folder as it is more of a temporary storage. I download software, install it, and then delete the download, and I don't need the file history that backs up every download I make.

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