How to back up a Samsung Galaxy S2 via Kies

 With the newer Samsung phones you may have been advised to download a program called Samsung Kies from the Samsung website. Kies is a program in which you do things such as move files files, edit contacts and most usefully back up your phone. This guide, although based on backing up a Samsung Galaxy S2 will work for most newer Samsung phones, and can be very useful if you ever end up with any issues.

 Firstly you'll of course need to download Kies on to your PC or Laptop and then connect your phone by a USB cable to your computer device. After doing that you should open Kies and you'll see a screen like the one above. From this screen you'll notice 4 tabs along the top, the one you need to select is "Back up/Restore" which is the tab on the extreme right. After pressing on that your screen should look a bitt like the image on the left.

 On the"Back up/Restore" tab you need to select what options you actually want to back up. For example your texts and call log, or you photographs. Just note before selecting your options that if you have all your photographs or music on your laptop/PC you may be better off not backing these up as they can take some considerable time to back up and it can be a waste if you already have the tracks and images stored.

After selecting everything you want to back up click on "Back up" (under the list of items) and you should see your screen look like the shot to the left. This is the programming backing up your phone and can take a while depending on what you have chosen to actually back up. As said above backing up a large collection of music files CAN take a very long time, whilst a few tracks will be nice and quick.

After all the information has been backed up you'll see the a screen like the one to the right with a ticks over the things that you backed up. To find the backed up settings they will be stored in the folder directory that you can see under the list of items (in the example case it was C\Users\Scott\Documents\SamsungKies\GT-19100) and can be used for restore purposes if you need them (i.e. after a factory reset).

Samsung Kies Air

One of the most useful things on the Samsung phones is the "Kies" system that Samsung have been using over the past few years. In the past it has been relatively limited and flawed though Samsung have completely re-done the system and for the Samsung Galaxy S2 they've implemented a new version. The "Kies air" system completely re-writes the system and turns it into one of the most useful tools on any Smartphone today. If we open it by clicking on the icon we get to use a PC to play with the files on the phone.



After we open the app we see this screen here which basically tells us what we need to know about the app. It's a program that doesn't require any computer software, it doesn't require any cables and as long as you have a wifi network set up you can access you entire phone via your laptop or PC.

To start you click start at this screen then get given an IP address to type into your internet browser.

 When the app has been accessed and you've got the IP address from this screen here you need to type it into your browser. From here you will know whether your connection is active and what network you are connected to. To stop the app at anyone point you merely need to click on "Stop".






When you've typed your address into the internet browser you will see something like this come up which effectively allows you to access all the files you've put on the phone. This allows you to download files to the phone or upload them from the phone as well as deleting files, calls, documents and texts. It really is such an amazing piece of kit that you will find yourself using a lot especially if you lose your USB cable...


The system is amazing and once you get used to it you'll realise just how revolutionary and how slick it is.