# innobackupex backup process? **URL:** \ **Category:** Percona XtraBackup\ **Created:** [November 9, 2011, 2:51am UTC](https://forums.percona.com/t/innobackupex-backup-process/2182 "2011-11-09T02:51:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 3\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![klabacita](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ce73a5/32.png) [@klabacita](https://forums.percona.com/u/klabacita)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2011, 2:51am UTC](https://forums.percona.com/t/innobackupex-backup-process/2182/1 "2011-11-09T02:51:47Z")
Hi. Just wondering, I have been working with this beautiful piece of software, the doc is clear in how to do full backups for innodb tables. I can follow the manual without issue, but my question is this one: 1; We create the backup. 2; Prepare the full backup. Here, once u run the first step, u have to run the second one right away? The answer will apply to differential && incremental to? Thanks. Centos 5.7 x86 v 1.6.3. ---
**Author:** ![xaprb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/49beb7/32.png) [@xaprb](https://forums.percona.com/u/xaprb)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2011, 9:47am UTC](https://forums.percona.com/t/innobackupex-backup-process/2182/2 "2011-11-14T09:47:13Z")
You can delay the second (prepare) step, but it’s not a good idea. It makes your backup slower to restore because you have to do more work when you need the backup. And if something is wrong with it (or if there is a bug in xtrabackup) you want to find that out NOW, not when you need the backup. ---
**Author:** ![klabacita](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ce73a5/32.png) [@klabacita](https://forums.percona.com/u/klabacita)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2011, 10:36am UTC](https://forums.percona.com/t/innobackupex-backup-process/2182/3 "2011-11-14T10:36:09Z")
Hi xaprb. Good, if is better to run the 2nd step but will be slower I prefer to do it, at night we are not using the DB is went I run my backups I can wait. Thanks xaprb.