The reason why you should be manually setting your Android smartphone to automatically backup all your data is because by default, it’s not programmed to do so out of the box. It will most likely take you a while to get all the settings just how you want them on your new Android phone when you first purchase it, so it’s best to save them all.
If something ever happens to go wrong, and you’re wanting to reset it again, you’ll be out of luck as you’ll have to manually restore all of your favorite settings back again.
Android OS “Automatic Backup”
So what you’ll want to do is enable the “Automatic Backup” option on your phone. To do that, you’ll need to Press the Menu button on the Home screen, then tap Settings, and then tap the Privacy tab. Then enable the “Back Up My Data” tab as well as the “Automatic Restore” feature by tapping on the respective check boxes.
What the “Back Up My Data” function does is it will back up all the application data, the Wi-Fi passwords, all your bookmarks, and all other important settings to Google’s remote servers.
“Automatic Restore” allows the smartphone to restore all the backed up settings whenever you happen to reinstall an application.
Manual BackUp Of Files And Media
Backing up all your files as well as your media regularly is recommended. Although there are certain apps which are able to help you do this, but if they ever happen to fail in any way, then you’ll lose the settings.
To begin, plug your Android smartphone into your computer using the USB cable which should of been supplied in the box. If it’s the first time your doing this, your computer should automatically install a driver to recognize your device.
On the Android device, begin by waking it up and then swipe down to the notification bar. Tap on the USB Connection and then choose to either “Mount the SD card” or select the “USB Mass Storage” tab and then tap OK. You may then be prompted to “Turn On USB Storage,” if so, tap on that button to proceed.
On the computer, you should see the AutoPlay notification. Tap the “Click Open Folder To View Files,” and then Windows Explorer should display all of the contents of the smartphones SD card.
Once there, although you’re not able to back up your apps, but any of the data which your apps create, download or store should be stored there. You should also be able to find all of your photos stored in the DCIM folder, while all your music files should be found in the Music folder. You should also be able to find your ringtones as well as your notification tones located in the Media folder.
You’ll be able to drag and drop any of the folders to a brand new folder on your computer, or you can just back up the entire data. If you’re wanting to backup your data, then right click on any open space on your Desktop and then select “New,” and then click “Folder.”
Type a name for the newly created folder, which can be any name that you choose, but for the purposes of these instructions, name it “Phone Backup” and then press ENTER.
Next, double click on your newly created folder to open it. Bring up the Android phone’s SD card folder to the forefront by clicking on it directly from the taskbar, then click Edit, (You may need to press the ALT key first to see the Edit tab as a folder option.) Next, click “Select All,” and then right-click the new highlighted folder contents, then click the Copy tab.
Click on the “Phone Backup” folder which you’ve just created. Right click on any empty space while inside the folder window, and then click Paste. Once all of the pasting is completed, you can then wake up the Android phone again.
Tap the Turn Off USB Storage, unmount, or turn off the switch from the USB Mass Storage mode to the Charge Only mode. Remember that as long as your Android smartphone is connected to your computer and your SD card is still mounted, any of the files which is on the SD card, including the audio files, ringtones, and all the documents will be inaccessible.
For instance, if you happen to get a call on the smartphone while the SD card is mounted, then your phone by will use the default ringtone instead of the custom ringtone which you may have downloaded.
Clearing Your Data And Cache
All of the Android-based devices will give you several app specific controls which are accessible only from the Settings menu, and not from the app itself.
So to be able to access any of these mainly memory centric functions, begin by pressing the Home key, then press the Menu key, tap on the Settings, Applications, and then the Manage Applications tabs.
From here, tap on the “All” tab which should display a list of all the apps which are installed on the device. The Application Info screen should appear when you tap on one of the apps from the list.
It should display the name of the app and its current version, the storage data, and any additional details such as listing the permissions that the app has when it’s accessing the various aspects of your smartphone.
Not all of the apps will allow you to perform the functions which are listed below, but the ones which can do so will benefit from the stated operation.
Uninstall
This is pretty much straightforward. Press this tab to uninstall the app along with all its associated data as well as settings.
Clear Cache
This button will allow you to delete any data which the app creates into a temporary portion of the smartphone’s internal memory.
Clear Defaults
While in the Launch By Default area, click on this button to clear all the settings of any app which you’ve configured to use on certain file types.
Clearing Data
Tap on this button to delete any app settings along with other data.
Move To Phone
If the app is already installed on a SD card, then the button you should see here allows you to “remove it” & “install it” directly to the phone’s memory.
Move To SD Card
Tapping on this button will remove the app from the internal phone’s memory to a SD card.
Share Button
The Share button allows you send an email or a text message along with the link to the particular applications Android Market page.
Force Stop
What the Force Stop button does is it will close an app along with any background services which are associated with it.