Upgrade StorageBefore reinstalling a hard drive
Hi! I have a problem with my computer and I need to get the whole Windows reinstalled. Before that I would like to create a back up for my Zotero content I have inside Zotero as well as the pdf files linked to those. The pdf files are all over my C drive in many different subdirectories. I use Zotero 5.0.85. Could you kindly assist me in creating the back up and get back to normal? I am NOT a well experienced/knowledgeable IT person. Regards, Tamas
https://www.zotero.org/support/zotero_data
But, unrelated to Zotero, this isn't really how you should be thinking of this. You should make a backup of your entire hard drive, and restore from that, rather than try to back up individual programs. (I'm not sure what Windows provides for this. On a Mac you would just have a Time Machine backup of the entire disk, and then on your new computer it would automatically restore all your user data from the backup, while leaving the system files alone.)
We can't help with the linked files elsewhere on your computer — the point of the default stored files is that Zotero keeps them in its own directory and manages them for you — but if those all remain in the same places on the new computer then they'll still work. (If they're all within a given folder, you'd want to set that as your Linked Attachment Base Directory on the old computer, in case that folder ends up at a different place on the new computer.)