Checking Backups

Step 1: Open your Backblaze control panel and check to the date to make sure Backup is up to date, it should say something along the lines of “You are backed up as of: Today, HH:MM AM/PM”. As long as the backup was done recently such as the same day or night before that’s a good sign!

From the Backblaze control panel you can now click on the link where it says “Manage Backblaze Account” or simply navigate to Backblaze.com from your web browser!

Step 2: Sign into your Backblaze using your associated Backblaze email and password. (If you use KeePass you should have this info in your KeePass Database!)

Step 3: Once logged into your Backblaze account you should see a section under where it says overview, please click on where it says “View/Restore my Files”.

EXTRA STEP: If your files are encrypted it will ask you for your private key, please input it.

Step 4: You should now see a page where all your files and folders are located. You should see an area where it says “Files uploaded from: and a box to the right of it, click on the box and a calendar should pop up, input the date that is two weeks earlier than today. Then next you should a box to the right of where it says “to”, select todays date then click on the “Go” button. All your files uploaded between those two dates will now be listed.

Step 5: On the right side of your screen, you should now see all your files listed. Please select a recent file, a new window will pop up with big “Download” button . Click on the download button. That file should be downloaded to your downloads folder.

Step 6: Next open the file you just downloaded and check to make sure all the information looks up-to-date and correct. If everything checks out, your Backblaze backup will be up-to-date, safe and secure. Be sure to do frequent backup checks and never assume everything is working properly! (Things to look for: What’s the date on the file? Are you recent changes there?)

Step 1: Open the external drive you use for backups in File Explorer. If you are swapping/rotating between backup drives, note down which one is plugged in.

Step 2: You should have 3 recent Macrium Image files. Check to see if their size is what you expect.

Step 3: Double click on the most recent Macrium file to open it.

Step 4: Select the drive you want to open. For most people this will be the C: drive.

Step 5: Select a drive letter from the dropdown to name the virtual drive.(If you encrypted the backup this is when you’ll have to put in your password.)

Once the drive is selected make sure to click the box labeled “Enable access to restricted folders” and click “OK”.

Step 6: Your Macrium backup will have been assigned the drive letter you gave it and show up on your computer as if it were an external hard drive.
From there you can check the contents to make sure they match with what should be on your computer.

Make sure to open a recent file on the backup to check if it got saved properly.

Step 6: Once you’re done checking the backup, go back to “This PC” menu on File Explorer. Right-click the new Macrium drive and select “Macrium Reflect > Unmount”. If you are on Windows 11 you will first have to click show more options.

If you have multiple drives, this is the point where you’ll want to swap them out for the week. Make sure both drives got the same letter assigned.

Step 1: Plug in your external drive, if you encrypted it, this is when you have to put in your password.

Step 2: Open the time machine backup on the drive.

Step 3: Navigate through Macintosh HD > Users >”Your Username”>Either Documents or Downloads or any other folder that may have something recent.

Step 4: Check if a recent file there is accurate to your computer.

Step 5: If you use multiple drives, swap them out at this point.

(CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD CHECKLIST FOR TIME MACHINE)