In a prior article, we created a system image backup using the free version of EaseUS Todo. That’s by far the most important first step.
Now it’s time to prepare for the day we might need to restore that image.
It’s time to create an “Emergency Disk”, as EaseUS calls it.
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When and why you need an Emergency Disk
There are two common scenarios that require an emergency disk.
The first is the most obvious: your hard disk fails, and you need to restore your backup to a replacement hard disk. Since that replacement drive is empty, you don’t have EaseUS Todo installed to process the recovery. In fact, your machine won’t even boot; Windows isn’t on that empty hard drive!
Backing Up In Windows 10
This article is excerpted from Backing Up In Windows 10, available now. Top-to-bottom, end-to-end, Backing Up In Windows 10 will walk you through all the steps you need to keep your data safe, using Windows 10's built-in tools, as well as a free alternative.
The second scenario is malware, and you want to restore your system to an image backup taken prior to the malware’s arrival. You can’t boot into Windows, since you wouldn’t be able to restore it to its prior state while it’s running; you can’t overwrite a file while it’s being used, and that especially true if the file is part of the operating system itself.
In both cases, as well as a few others, the solution is to boot from something else.
That “something else” is the EaseUS Todo Emergency disk. When you boot from it, it automatically runs a copy of EaseUS Todo you use to locate your backup image and restore that image to your computer’s hard drive.
You can create the emergency disk at the time you need it, but only if you have a separate working system on which to do that. More commonly, you’ll want to create the disk prior to needing it, while your system is working normally. I’ll expand on this below.
Creating an Emergency Disk
Run EaseUS Todo. Click on Tools in the toolbar, and then Create Emergency Disk in the resulting drop-down menu.
You’ll then be shown a dialog box containing several choices.
There are two selections to make.
Boot disk type determines whether the Emergency Disk should be based on Windows or Linux. In general, choose Windows (with “Compatibility mode” checked) unless your testing determines that this boot disk doesn’t work for some reason, or you’ve been otherwise instructed by customer support. In general, since your system is already running Windows, the Windows Emergency Disk has the highest probability of just working.
Boot disk location determines what media your disk will be created on.
- Choose USB if you have a USB thumb drive you can dedicate to this purpose (it’ll be completely erased), and you can configure your machine to boot from USB.
- Choose CD/DVD if your machine is capable of burning a CD or DVD, and you can configure your machine to boot from CD.
- Choose Create ISO if your machine can boot from CD or DVD, but doesn’t have the ability to actually burn a CD or DVD. In this case, you need to specify the location into which an “iso” file will be created. You then take this ISO to another machine that has a CD or DVD burner to actually create the media.
Once you’ve made selections appropriate to your situation, click on Proceed.
After a short period of time, the process completes and the emergency disk is ready.
When to create your emergency disk, or …
There are two schools of thought as to when you need to actually create your Emergency disk.
Create it before you need it. This is important if you have no other computer available from which to make the emergency disk in an actual emergency. You’ll need to have it ready to go so you can simply boot from it and deal with whatever the crisis happens to be.
Technically, you should only need to create the emergency disk once. However, there are strong arguments for creating a new one each time EaseUS Todo is updated. I recommend doing so at least for major version updates, to ensure compatibility with the backup software, as well as to address any issues that are updated in the emergency disk itself.
Only create it when you need it. This works if you have another working machine from which to create the emergency disk. The emergency disk does not need to be created on the same machine you’ve been backing up, or on the machine to which you plan to restore — any Windows PC will do.
If you plan to create it when needed, I do recommend that when that time comes, you download the latest version of EaseUS Todo Free, so as to get the latest version of the emergency disk.
My actual recommendation is that you do both: create one now, test it, and then save it in a safe location in case you need it. Then, when the time comes, you have the option of using that, or, if you can, download the latest and burn a new, more up-to-date emergency disk.
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Creating Rescue Media Using Easeus To Do Free
So how do you compare EaseUS Todo to Macrium Reflect when it comes to system image backups?
They each have strengths and weaknesses but overall I consider them roughly equivalent. I have seen each fail on some machines so I generally choose whichever one works. :-)
Read all about Ease Todo and image making, including making a recovery disk.
Question: will this disk be equivalent to the rescue disk as made by W10
using current W10 back-up and recovery and may both disk be used by either system?
Thanks for your attention to my question.
Bob.
Each software backup makes, and requires it’s own rescue disc. You couldn’t use the Win10 disc with Easus Todo, and vise versa.
No, They are very different and serve different purposes. The Windows recovery disk will let you restore a Windows-created image back up (not an EaseUS created one), or possibly even reinstall Windows from scratch as well as having Windows diagnostic tools. The EaseUS Emergency disk is only for restoring EaseUS-created image backups (or making them).
Hi .. Thanks for this info. I use Macrium Reflect (heard about from Leo).
Do I need an emergency disk for that? How to create?
THANKS … Joe
Yes, if you ever want to be able to restore an image backup to your computer. You do it from within Macrium Reflect. I don’t have it in front of me right now, but I believe the Tools menu.
Happy New Year… I’m writing at the end of the year 2018. This article and its comments are over a year old–I do realize that these topics are in continual flux! I am not a tech guy, just a home-business person with computers…
For precautionary purposes, I made a Windows 10 Recovery Drive per your article (2017) but did not see any later articles about *using* the Recover Drive. I’m confused by the talk of UEFI and BIOS… I don’t see clear steps to ensure my Win 10 Recovery Drive is operational…. I’m in a 2016 model Dell PC running Win 10 Pro.
Also, from what I read, my understanding is that WIn 10 backup tools are sort of being demoted and that MS recommends using 3rd party tools… now what? Do I bother with Win 10 Recovery Drive? Or just stay with EaseUs ToDo tools, all the way ???
I’m not in an urgent situation– just setting up precautions for 2019 ! Thank you… Brad
Yes. Microsoft is removing the native backup program, so EaseUS Todo is a good alternative. As for using the recovery drive, there are two articles in the Related Posts section of this article on that – “Restoring an Image Using EaseUS Todo” and “Restoring a File from an EaseUS Todo Image Backup“.
To test the integrity of your backup, you can use “Restoring a File from an EaseUS Todo Image Backup” and copy a couple of files from the backup.
How Do I Test My Backups
The BIOS/UEFI is only an issue if it doesn’t allow you to boot from external media.
How Do I Boot from CD/DVD/USB in Windows 8 & 10?
Thanks for the article. Great! for users that do not usually get involved in saving their own systems (DIY), One major piece of data needed however; what SIZE (minimum) cd/dvd or USB drive is needed to create the “Rescue Disk”
No need for me to specify: the smallest available is big enough.
Hi .. Thanks for this info…How to remove this WinPE Emergency from the hard disk after creation if we don’t like it anymore
I’m confused. The EaseUS Todo Emergency disk (what this article is about) is not something on your hard disk — it’s a separate disk. If you don’t like it, discard or overwrite that separate disk.
What am I missing?
Maybe he means the ISO file?
Hi
Using EaseUS ToDo Backup on new Windows 11 PC
When I try to make a USB Emergency Disk,( 32Gb) it fails with error 0XD7554001[?] each time
Also tried with 16Gb usb
It gets to your usb needs to be formatted, then seems to try to make it, but fails.
With no real reason, seem to think it may erase the USB disk then windows cannot see it, so EaseUS does not see it
Any Ideas be appreciated
Thank you
Try formatting the USB stick using Windows prior to creating the Emergency Disk.