Why Are My Backups Slower Than They Used to Be?
NovaBACKUP
Last Updated: Nov 19, 2014 10:20AM PST
How can I increase the speed of my backups to my local hard drive, as they seem to be taking longer to complete than the use to?
Over time hard drives will become fragmented and this is likely the cause of the reduced backup speeds you are experiencing. We recommend defragmenting your hard drive about once a month and to check your hard drive for errors. Windows has a built-in defrag utility to defragment drives and check for errors.
How to Run a Windows Defrag
Go to the Start menu and type in "defragment" to bring up the Windows defrag utility. You should see a utility called "Defragment and Optimize Drives" or "Disk Defragmenter" depending upon which version of the Windows operating system you are running. Select the drives that you would like to analyze to see if the drive needs to be defragmented. If you see a lot of red lines your drive is heavily fragmented and you will need to run a defrag. Just click the "Defragment" or "Optimize" button to start the Windows defrag. It's best to not try to use your computer while the defrag is running.
How to Run an Error Check on Your PC
Go to the Start menu and type in "CHKDSK" to check your disk for errors. The check-disk utility should give you the option to fix file system errors and scan for and attempt to recover bad sectors, check both of these options. In order for the CHKDSK to run, you will need to reboot your system. You can schedule it to run the next time you reboot your computer. You may have to run it as Administrator in order to run this utility.
Once you have completed both of these tasks, your backup speeds should return to what it once was.