acronis true image best way to do it

adbp1

adbp1

adbp1

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sas title says, ive just got myself acronis true image and want to make a backup, but is it worth reinstalling again !!! or just do as it is now?
 
unless you have an unstable install or youre getting errors/ BSOD i would image now.
the whole point of acronis is, even with sp3 (im assuming youre on winxp) its easier to restore an image, than to reinstall and repatch - plus you save all your data of course.
 
best way to use it..

use the program to make a bootable acronis cd (get the latest version from their site)
disable system restore
run 'ccleaner slim'
^these two to remove files you don't need

then put the cd in an run it

save to a 2nd hard drive or network location
 
hi, im running vista 64bit prem, i have acronis 11,so let me make sure i get this right, clean pc and defrag etc then just make back up as it is now.
 
How exactly does acronis true image work?

Can I install it, create the backup image and then uninstall it and it would be like the software was never on my system?

If I then put the image onto a USB hard drive (with a load of other stuff), how would I then restore it outside of Windows?
 
best way to use it is the bootable cd

to get that though.. you have to install it, then within the program, 'create bootable media', can either have it on usbstick or a cd

then remove acronis from pc (i tend to use a temporary pc to do the above, so it doesn't clog it up at all)

then use the cd/usb to create the image, and to restore them



you can save the image to... another drive, another partition, a usb stick, multiple dvd/cd's, network location, hidden partition on same drive.
 
Woah, thats confusing...I've read through it a few times and still don't really understand it.....

.....I guess its one of those "you have to use it to understand this" programs.

====

Ok - basically what you are saying is I can have the restore image stored on my external harddrive (a lot with other crap if I want). To restore the image I put in the bootable cd, navigate onto the harddrive and select the image to restore and it restores it?

For 50GB of data, roughly how big of an image would that be? I understand that it will be a complete guess.

EDIT:

Also, what do you mean by this:

(i tend to use a temporary pc to do the above, so it doesn't clog it up at all)
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Last edited:
It depends on what kind of data you have on the drive. Usually acronis has a pretty good compression and if you use maximum compression it should be able to squeeze it down pretty good.

Yes you can have the image stored with other crap how ever if it's on a drive that you use live on your system I wouldn't really class it as a backup as its on your live system.

I like to keep acronis installed so I can do backups without having to exit windows.
 
Jumping said:
It depends on what kind of data you have on the drive. Usually acronis has a pretty good compression and if you use maximum compression it should be able to squeeze it down pretty good.
Click to expand...

Its just Vista install + software + settings.

Yes you can have the image stored with other crap how ever if it's on a drive that you use live on your system I wouldn't really class it as a backup as its on your live system.
Click to expand...

True...lol....its just an external hard drive which is where I store all my ISOs, Movies & Music.

I like to keep acronis installed so I can do backups without having to exit windows.
Click to expand...

Well I only want to create one backup just after I have installed all my applications and setup windows etc...
 
what i mean is, i install acronis (to create the bootable disc) on a temporary install -by crap i mean about 1mb of 'possible leftovers', just being fussy..



i tend to just make backups of basic installs, ie a basic xp install's image would be around 700mb ish (with drivers) -this takes about 3 mins to make, and 2 mins to restore



if it's 50gb of programfiles etc, then i'd imagine the image would be roughly 35gb (with compression)

i never include media or documents in my backups, things like videos and media would have very poor compression... (since they're already compressed)


-edit, conrad after reading your last comment, what you wanna do is what i'm suggesting :)
 
As long has you have the rescue boot cd from acronis you can use it to
create a backup of your system. You reboot PC with disc in it loads up
the acronis prog and you can create a backup.

If acronis is installed on your system it just means you can create new backup images WITHOUT having to reboot the PC.( Handy)
 
Conrad11 said:
But surely you have to install acronis to make the backup image anyways?
Click to expand...

No, but you do have to install Acronis to make the "bootable backup cd". If you think about it properly, the main reason for imaging your O/S is for those occassions when it is "fubbered". If you can't boot to a "fubbered" O/S, then you would use the bootable cd to image your backup, back again.
 
I'm really not following some of this...

Let me get this straight:

You can create a backup image of a partition WITHOUT having acronis installed, but it can ONLY be done by running the booting the acronis os (program) from the bootable cd and creating the backup image from there. The only thing you need acronis installed for, in my situation, is to create the bootable CD.

To restore the image, you boot the acronis os (program) from the bootable cd and restore the image that was saved onto an external usb hardrive or CD/DVDs

Correct?
 
why cant the backup be bootable and self restoring ?
a bit like windows disk...it boots and installs itself.

would it not be more simple to just stick a disk in and let it install itself onto the selected partition?
 
i'm not really sure what the confusion is about...

i bought two copies of this software the other week because i needed to backup 20 machine before doing a migration...

i just went around each machine with a 500gb usb drive, booted off the cd, told it i wanted to take an image and left it to it...

if i wanted to restore the image i would just tell it ito restore, point at the file and again i i would leave it to do it...

you only have to install it on windows if you want to do all the fancy bits and pieces, and also if you want to browse the image file, but if you literally just want an image then just use the bootable cd...

i ordered mine as a proper media set so i didnt have to fanny about burning it etc.

it's extremely straightforward?!
 
Ah right i understand now.

It's just the terms people use to explain things, like people have different meanings for create,backup,image,restore....etc.....
 
I don't understand why a bootable cd has to be made. On mine I boot from the original Acronis CD then restore a previously saved backup from an external drive. Am I missing something?
 
mick4545 said:
I don't understand why a bootable cd has to be made. On mine I boot from the original Acronis CD then restore a previously saved backup from an external drive. Am I missing something?
Click to expand...

Some people may buy it online and not pay the extra to have the CD's sent to them.
 
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