Windows 10: File History: Want to be able to choose custom folder on target drive

I'm frustrated by the lack of fine tuning available in File History when it comes to choosing the target for File History backups. On an attached drive it only lets you choose the drive letter and then creates a standard folder, "FileHistory," on the root directory of the drive where it deposits the backups.


I have a large USB drive attached to my desktop that serves this purpose but the drive is also mapped as a network drive and used for backup by another computer on the home, peer to peer network. I'd like to be able to separate the File History backups from each machine by putting each inside custom folders on the backup drive. I actually am able to do this for the machine the backup drive is not physically attached to by creating a shared network drive but File History won't let me do this on the machine the drive is physically attached to. It only shows the drive letter when choosing the backup drive so "FileHistory" goes on the root directory.


Am I missing something or is this just a limitation of the File History app? Running Windows 10 Pro on the machine the backup drive is physically attached to and Windows Home on the other machine.

:)

 

Win 10 File History "No Usable Drives Found", not able to select the Internal drive for File History.

I've solved this problem, for me anyway. You do have to be able to use the network share trick, tho. But it may be possible if you can get it to work with an external drive first, instead. I haven't tried. Also probably a good idea to start with a blank
drive just to make sure you don't have anything in use hiding on it. I'm backing up to a pair of 1 TB drives in RAID-1. Here's what I did... after trying every single suggestion I found over the past few hours (MS suggestions were especially useless):

Create a restore point. If anything goes wrong, you will probably need to restore. Apparently once File History stops cooperating it stays that way.

Set up a network share for the target drive's ROOT (D:\ in my case).

Add that share in File History.

Let it start backing up a little bit. It will create its own file structure.

In Settings (gear icon), not via Control Panel, select More Options.

In the list of backed up folders, check if it's trying to back up anything FROM the desired target drive. Mine was trying to back up all of D:\ ! This naturally creates a conflict but you can't resolve it unless File History is already working first.

If found, remove them.

Now go back through the Control Panel backup settings, File History, and Add Drive. At this point, my physical drive finally appeared. Select it and let it move the files over. It then will start backing up as desired.

BOOM!

You can now go back and delete the folder it created for the network share (it was my username). \FileHistory is what it's using now. You can still use the drive for other data. It does not need to be dedicated to File History. This is what worked for me.
I hope it works for someone else.

 

How to remove folders from File History

• I had the same problem, and I solved in this way:
  Control Panel -> System and Security-> File History -> Turn off
  Settings -> Update & Security -> Backup -> More options -> Stop using this drive
  Delete the File History folder in your external drive.
  Start using File History again.
  After performing these steps, I can easily add folders to "Excluded Folders" and they remain excluded. I checked in the actual files and folders saved on the external disk, and it works.
  I did not modify the default settings about how often and how long backup is saved, File History is working ok now. So I guess it is important to click "Stop using this drive" in order to reset File History.
  Hope this will be helpful

 

File History restart

Hi Jim,



Thank you for writing to Microsoft Community forums.



To change the backup drive for File History, the current process should be stopped. I suggest you to try the steps listed below to stop file history on an older drive and restart it on a new drive:



Change File History backup drive:

• Open Settings and navigate to Update & Security > Backup.
  
• Click on More Options, scroll down to locate
  Backup to a different drive section, and choose Stop Using Drive.
  
• Plug in the new storage drive, navigate to Settings > Update & Security > Backup,
  and choose Add a Drive.
  
• Restart File History and configure it by referring to the article
  
  File History in Windows.
  

Hope it helps.

Regards,