newbie confused again

let me get this straight , I download say Easeus Todo Backup on Win 7 and it will let me create a copy of my 2 operating systems to disc's which are bootable and will format the hdd and reinstall both systems?

I didn't see anything in your OP about formatting & reinstalling. I don't know of any backup program that does all that, although you do have the option to boot from a CD and reinstall from the backup.

I don't know that utility but I find that the best way to save and restore complete hard drive images is not to put them on removable media (CDs/DVDs) but on another hard drive. It can be an internal or external drive that's large enough to accommodate the image file. The program I use is one I paid for (Acronis True Image) and the image file created is about 40% as large as the total data size on the hard drive. You can keep the image on internal or external devices. I use both. To restore the image, you must use the same program that you used to create it. This means that if you suffer a hard drive failure, you cannot restore the image from an installed program on that dead hard drive. You will need to create a bootable CD of the imaging utility. The program I use does install on the hard drive but also creates a bootable disk which I can use if I need to replace a defective hard drive or move to a larger one. One nice feature of the program I use is that I can extract individual files or folders from image files if they've become corrupt, lost, etc. I've found HD images to be an important, if not essential, part of a backup plan. Good luck.

avoid new/clean installs in the event of corruption or drive failure.

VAPCMD

Digger asked 'How do I make an image of the whole hdd as one complete system and not as two separate systems?' ... Thanks,

VAPCMD response

Most any imaging SW should allow you to create an image of both partitions with different OSs especially if you boot from the imaging SW from a CD-DVD. It can be a single image (may consist of multiple files) that could be restored to the existing drive or a new drive should that be required. I've used Powerquest Drive Image, Norton Ghost and now Acronis and I've always run them from bootable media. The target/destination drive for the image would normally be another HDD or perhaps a large thumbdrive or flash drive.

Re HD images...I've been using imaging software like Powerquest's Drive image, Norton Ghost when they acquired Powerquest and now Acronis 'True Image'.

VAPCMD

Thanks

I started looking at external hdd's to do some of these back ups but I don't know a lot about them. I seem to remember hearing someone say to stay away from 3.0 usb and stick with 2.0. Is that correct? I,ve been looking at this one and wondered what you guy's thought before I took the plunge. If you wouldn't mind looking at for me I'd really appreciate it. Here it is->-> http://www.amazon.com/TRANSCEND-INFORMATION-STOREJET-25M2-SERIES/dp/B00755NT2E/ref=sr_1_25?ie=UTF8&qid=1374454063&sr=8-25&keywords=external+2.0+usb+hard+drive . Thanks for your time...Digger