I know what you may be thinking…. “Why would I want to exclude my PC or laptop from being backed up by Windows Home Server? Isn’t that the main reason to have a Home Server?” Yeah, you’re right, it is a big reason. However, there may be reasons why you would want to turn off the backup for one or more computers. My example: I have a test PC here at home that, as you can guess, I use for testing. I can play around with settings, applications, whatever, without fear of “hosing” my everyday PC. I don’t really need to back anything up. Granted, this is not a “typical” reason that would likely apply for Average Joe PC User.

A more common reason could be if you already save all your files on the Windows Home Server. If you work strictly off the server and save everything to your personal folder in instead of My Documents or another local folder, there may not be a real reason to backup to the server.

So here’s how we get started. Open the Windows Home Server Console and log into Windows Home Server. Click on the Computers and Backup tab along the top.

Simply right-click on the computer you don’t want to backup, and select Turn Off Backups.

You may have to wait a few moments for the “Status” to change, but before long you will see the status turn to Off.

That’s all there is to it. Pretty simple. You can always turn it back on of course, if you ever decide you’d like to start backing up again.

To configure backup, check out my article on Configuring PC Backup for Windows Home Server.