Windows 10: Windows 10 Backup without backing up files

Is it possible to backup the windows 10 OS without backing up the files?

I tried creating a system image to my external HDD 2 TB with 275 GB unused space, but it won't allow me saying it should at least be 460 GB free. I already backed up the files separately. I just want to have windows 10 backed up because my PC (laptop) was originally with Windows 8 built-in on it then I updated it to Windows 10 for free. I was told in my recent inquiry that if I reset my PC it would go back to the original Windows 8 version of my OS and I don't want to pay for another upgrade to Windows 10. I want to reset my PC or even reformat the whole thing. Because I encountered a problem where in Windows 10 failing to boot and just showing the blue screen luckily I fixed it with going to safe mode. Thanks in advance.

:)

 

Windows 10 Tweaks

Pressing “Windows+Pause Break” (it’s up there next to scroll lock) opens the “System” Window.

Windows 10: In the new version of Windows, Explorer has a section called Quick Access. This includes your frequent folders and recent files. Explorer defaults to opening this page when you open a new window. If you’d rather open the usual This PC, with links to your drives and library folders, follow these steps:

• Open a new Explorer window.
• Click View in the ribbon.
• Click Options.
• Under General, next to “Open File Explorer to:” choose “This PC.”
• Click OK

credit to Lifehacker.

 

Windows 10

no, you can't go back..
I suggest creating a backup image of your os drive

 

Using network hard drive for backup

It depends what sort of backup you want to do. If you're happy just backing up regular files, then there are a bazillion (really, that many!) different bits of freeware to do that. There is a good list here:

http://www.majorgeeks.com/mg/sortname/back_up.html

and pretty much all of them can do network backups. Some even have fancy options like encryption. Really, the most useful thing is just being able to schedule them and know they ran OK.

You may also want to make a system image backup too, and you'll find that software in the very same list.

I don't have Windows 8 as yet, so I'm afraid I can't suggest any for that platform. Personally, I use Clonezilla for image backups.