A full computer backup is a backup of the System State data and most of the data on the hard drives of your computer. Having a full computer backup set available is essential if you want to recover a server using the restore the server method.
For more information about the restore the server recovery method, see Restoring the Server.

Having a full computer backup set available is also helpful if you want to ensure that you have a copy of all of the data on your server (for example, the contents of your drives on a specific date).

Important Although backing up most of the contents of the drives of your computer is the major component of your full computer backup set (when you use the Backup utility), it is also important to back up the Windows 2000 System State data as part of the same backup set. If you use disk-imaging software to create your full computer backup set, you do not need to back up your System State data as part of your backup set.
For more information about System State data, see Windows 2000 System State Data.

The following points about full computer backups need to be understood:

• Creating full computer backup sets using Backup
• Creating full computer backup sets or operating system backups using disk-imaging software utilities

Note To locate the Microsoft Information Store options that are referred to in this section,

1. In Backup, in the console tree, expand Microsoft Exchange Server,
2. Expand the server you want, and then expand Microsoft Information Store.

The information in this article applies to:

• Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 Enterprise Edition
• Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 Standard Edition
• Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2003, Premium Edition
• Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2003, Standard Edition
• Microsoft Exchange 2000 Server