Backing Up a BESR Repository Computer

[JFGcanes]

I have designated a computer on my network which has a large (500 GB) hard drive to be the "Repository" for all of the BESR backup files from my servers.  I would like to run BESR on this computer, but only to "Backup" the OS files and not all of the files in the "Repository".  Since the "Backup My Computer" option does not allow me to "exclude" folders, my only choice is to use the "Backup Selected Files and Folders" option.  My question is: If I include all the files and folders except for the "Repository" folder and "Backup" these files to another Network Share, will I be able to run the BESR Recovery Operation and use these files to restore the OS on this computer?  If this method will not allow for an OS Restore, is there any other way to accomplish this?

Thanks,
John 

[criley]

The file and folder backup option is designed purely for individual file/folder recovery - it's not designed to be used as a complete volume/server recovery tool.

The obvious question is: is the operating system and 'data' (i.e. the recovery points) stored on different volumes? If yes, you can just backup the system drive and use that for disaster recovery purposes.

[JWK]

I thought you could mount a folder in Windows so it appears like it is a drive. You could try mounting the folder and then maybe you could exclude it from the backup because it would be considered a drive?

[JFGcanes]

How do you "Mount" a Folder?

[JWK]

My mistake. I was thinking and it's the other way around. You can mount a drive as a folder in Windows.

[JFGcanes]

Unfortunately No, it's all on the C Drive.

[JFGcanes]

I guess one possible solution would be to delete the "Repository" folder, run BESR to backup the current C Drive, reformat the Hard Drive with a smaller System Partition, then run BESR to Restore the original C Drive onto the smaller partition and then add a new "Repository" partition with the remaining space on the drive after restarting the computer.

Anyone see a problem with this?  Is it true that BESR is flexible with the size of the "Restore" partition as long as it can hold the contents of the "Recovery Point"?

Thanks in advance,
John