system state

Here is how to do it from the command line.

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/Cc753201.aspx

To create a system state backup by using Wbadmin start systemstatebackup

1.To open a command prompt with elevated privileges, click Start , right-click Command Prompt , and then click Run as administrator .

2.At the prompt, type:

wbadmin start systemstatebackup -backupTarget:<VolumeName> [-quiet]

This also works for Server 2012.

In addition, any decent up to date 3rd party backup software should give you the option as well.

If I wanted this backup to copy to the backup target of x:\DC01 how the above line be typed out?

Thanks Will.  That worked.  Here is another question.  If I take the bare metal backup and I have a total server failure will I be able to restore from this full backup?

Yes, that is exactly what a bare metal backup is for...total disaster.

Have you ever gone through one before?  If so, how did it go?

Forgot to ask.  If I schedule a system state backup for every day at 3am will it overwrite the previous backup or will it keep adding backups?  I want it to delete the previous backup and only keep 1.

I did and it was years ago.  We were using BackupExec and I had bootable media that could access the tape drive and it worked just fine.

One word of advice I would give, don't wait to try this when you HAVE to, try it when you WANT to.

Way back then we didn't have virtual machines and it was  a non-profit so there was no lab.

Take your backup and do a restore on a test system to make sure you have everything you need if/when you have to implement this.

The process will go much smoother and your users will be down much less time.

Give me a few minutes.  I'm spinning up a lab and will test it out.

The backup program creates a folder that has a date time stamp on it, so I don't think it will overwrite.