Forum Discussion
Is OneDrive Deleting Newer Files After Backup Restore?
If using Acronis True Image for image backups
The following strategy is best for avoiding unexpected OneDrive data loss when restoring from image backups.
Do not back up the OneDrive folder with Acronis True Image (for various reasons).
OneDrive has very high reliability, and backup should not be required. However, if you do wish to keep an off-line backup of OneDrive, use a separate utility such as FreeFileSync to copy the contents of OneDrive to another location such as an external hard drive or a network share.
Exclude OneDrive from any backup by selecting your Backup strategy, then click Options -> Exclusions, and add your OneDrive path:
C:\Users\username\OneDrive
Tick Save as default and click OK
- this will ensure that it will be excluded by default from any new Backup Strategy you create.
What happens with OneDrive when you do a restore?
When you restore from your backup the restored computer will be missing the OneDrive folder, and when it boots up will come up with an error:
We couldn't find your OneDrive folder...
Simply click on Set up OneDrive to re-initialize OneDrive
- enter your email address and click Sign in (to your Microsoft account)
- enter your password and click Sign in
- confirm the OneDrive folder location is correct and click Next
- click Continue, Next, Next, Next, Later, X to close the Window
- OneDrive will sync for a few minutes, then you will be able to list all your OneDrive files again (they will be Cloud-only until accessed).
- [click Use this folder if prompted to combine folders]
This will ensure your get your current OneDrive state restored from the cloud, and not an outdated version of OneDrive restored from a hard drive image. I've tested this restore strategy several times on Windows 10, and it works well for me. Hope that helps you guys too.
David Rollinson Simply? I can't follow your directions. There's too much that needs to be done in order to get back the lost files during that last 3 posts. I really like onedrive it's my favorite, but in windows 11, I'm forced to keep my documents in users one drive documents, and I'm sure to lose all files. that were created after the restore! This is why I do back ups, to prevent loss of anything. These document files are guarnteed to be lost, unless I jump through a bunch of hoops. I've purposely kept document files off of C drive and moved them to another drive to avoid this using XP and beyond
What makes this problem evren worse, is that i'm not allowed to now move my documetnts from the users one drive documents any longer, so now I'm stuck. I'm ready to return this and just go back to windows 7
I'm not PC savy in the least, and I'm scratching my head.
At first I saw, "oh cool,, Docs are now going to onedrive, I won't have to move my documents folder to another drive any longe. It's actually worse now. There has to be millions and millions of people using imaging besides internal system restore, That are so much smarter than I am. What are they doing?
What is the Microsoft Image restore doing. It has to be losing the newer onedrive files like every other imaging backups.
I don't get this. This should be front line news, unless I'm missing something.
Tony_Vangel Hi Tony. If my description doesn't work or is too complicated for you, another option would be - after you do your image restore, log in to OneDrive on-line in a browser and revert to an earlier OneDrive state, presumably the date of the day before your image restore. This should roll-back OneDrive and undo all the file changes that resulted from your image restore.
Cheers, David