

How to fix? Here is the solution: create a folder on your USB drive and share the folder with Sharing properties. And even it’s formmated with NTFS, there is a chance to get the error the drive is not a valid backup location. How to Fix The USB Drive is Not A Valid Backup LocationĪs a matter of fact, you can use Windows 10 built-in tool Backup and Restore (Windows 7) to create a system image backup for Windows 10.īut if you choose the USB drive as destination, you will very likely get the error: This drive cannot be used to store a system image because it is not formatted with NTFS (if your USB is formated with FAT32). Best Way to Create System Image Windows 10 on USB.How to Fix The Drive is Not A Valid Backup Location.The same is true for other OS, such as the latest Windows 11. To prepare a more reliable system recovery option, it's always a good idea to create Windows 10 system image on USB drive. This seems to be convenient, but first it takes up a considerable amount of space, and sometimes you may find Windows 10 recovery environment missing. Also, some brand-name computers are shipped with a more space-consuming OEM recovery partition which can help you restore system to factory settings without installation disk. When you install Windows on a hard drive, a system reserved partition or recovery partition is created to store WinRE, and it takes up about 450MB of space. Usually, you have two ways to restore Windows 10 back to normal if system failure: Recovery Partition, and the Windows 10 system image. To learn more about recovery, see Recovery options in Windows 10.Why Create Windows 10 System Image on USB Flash Drive? If you've used Backup and Restore in Windows 7, consider moving your content to a cloud-based backup. We recommend you consider modern backup options like the ones listed above, as they're easier to manage and non-destructive. Learn how to use File History to back up your files. In these situations, the files generally take longer to upload, and it might cost more to store files. When you need to store large files or a large number of files. It may be best to use an external storage device or network drive backup in these cases: Learn more about the built-in cloud-storage solution that comes with your device.Įxternal hard drive or network drive backups You can easily access your content across multiple devices

Want to back up your content so it's safe and easy to access? We recommend using a cloud-based backup solution. Use the following table to decide which backup solution is best for you. Protect your files and photos by making sure they're safely backed up.
