Hi,
What is the best way of having my C drive (where win 7, programs and plugs are installed) so that I have a bootable exact copy in case my C dive one day fails???
 
Thank you
joni

Use something like Paragon or Acronis to make a complete image of your C drive

I use Macrium Reflect and I swear by it. Paragon, Acronis, etc, I think they all do basically the same thing.  It has saved the day on several occasions; I've also used it to clone to a larger C: drive as SSD prices have dropped.
I suspect they all have fully functional demos to compare interfaces before you buy.   Whichever product you use, 1) always add the "WinPE" option on the startup menu, and do it before you make your first image, 2) always make the WinPE rescue CD/DVD and 3) always image to a removable device and/or net drive. I do both and keep the removable drive off site.  If you can clone your OS after you customize it to your liking but before you add your DAW stuff, and then make another image/clone after all Sonar and plugins, then make scheduled incremental backups, you will never be more than an hour or so away from a fresh system even under catastrophic failure conditions.  I sleep much better now that I do the above.

I use clonezilla, which I made into a bootable USB thumbdrive. I pop the thumb drive in to boot into clonezilla, and image the drive to an external hard drive.
 
Easy peasy, and open souce ;)

Clonezilla
Easy to use, free.

If all you want is free and easy Windows will do the job itself out of the box.
 
http://www.howtogeek.com/...em-image-in-windows-7/

Interesting. I didn't think System Image did a complete backup of the whole hard drive.

I would check out xxclone. http://www.xxclone.com/ixclnfaq.htm
Be warned that several programs are likely to see a new boot disk as a new system, so you may need to reinstall or reregister products like addictive drums. I think the quickest and easiest thing to do is pick up a physical hard disk duplicator for 50 bucks or so. They're pretty quick.

swamptooth
I would check out xxclone. http://www.xxclone.com/ixclnfaq.htm
Be warned that several programs are likely to see a new boot disk as a new system, so you may need to reinstall or reregister products like addictive drums. I think the quickest and easiest thing to do is pick up a physical hard disk duplicator for 50 bucks or so. They're pretty quick.

Never had that issue with Clonezilla when I've upgraded to bigger HDDs.

I didn't think clonezilla made bootable clones. I thought you made an image then restored from a clonezilla USB thumb or CD.