Macrium Reflect Free is being retired.

Murphy · 27 Nov 2022 at 17:30

I'm sure lots of people make use of the free version of Reflect so it's disappointing to hear they're not going to be releasing free versions after 1st January 2024.

But i wanted to canvas opinions on what people intend to do after that time, carry on using the last free version?

Find an alternative and if so what?

Or fork over the £50 (£25 currently) to carry on using it?

AthlonXP1800 · 28 Nov 2022 at 06:43

I am shocked and disappointed to found out Macrium Reflect will be no longer free after 1st January 2024.

I found Macrium Reflect Free the best disk clone software I been used it many time for about 5 years. Before Macrium Reflect Free, I been used Acronis True Image Home trial versions but now Acronis killed off True Image in 2020 and replaced it with Cyber Protect Home Office.

I may carry on using the last free version 8.0 or 9.0 if it will clone disk correctly and boot successfully but the last time I cloned disk and it failed to boot then I updated to latest patch version then cloned disk 2nd time and boot successfully. Version 8 after January 2024 will not support future Windows 10 and 11 feature updates and the next Windows 12.

I will not fork over £50 for version 10. I have to find free alternatives probably will use Samsung Magician's Data Migration to clone disk on Samsung SSDs or use AOMEI Backupper Standard and Hasleo Backup Suite to clone HDDs and SSDs. I rather pay £50 for gas or electricity instead! :mad:

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Bubo · 28 Nov 2022 at 08:49

After some initial gnashings of teeth on seeing the "end of free" popup when Macrium updated itself this weekend, I will probably just fork out the money, especially if there as a £25 deal on the go at the moment. It is just too useful, and I personally can't be bothered trying to find another free alternative, for the sake of 25 quid.

AthlonXP1800 · 28 Nov 2022 at 22:06

Bubo said:
After some initial gnashings of teeth on seeing the "end of free" popup when Macrium updated itself this weekend, I will probably just fork out the money, especially if there as a £25 deal on the go at the moment. It is just too useful, and I personally can't be bothered trying to find another free alternative, for the sake of 25 quid.

It not worthy for the sake of £25, it is scandalous waste of money on a software you will never use in 12 month if you not bought a new HDD or SSD and disk clone it.

If you and people are smart and wise enough like me in 2023 and 2024 I would click that 30 day trial button to download Macrium Reflect 9.0 and 10 and use it once on 1 disk to clone to new bigger 8TB HDD or 4TB SSD PCIE 5.0 NVMe then after 30 days I will delete all trace of Macrium Reflect trial from registry so I can reinstall Macrium Reflect trial again and again like I did with Acronis True Image trial versions long time ago, no need to pay £50 every year for new version I will never used it.

malachi · 28 Nov 2022 at 22:16

Shame, still plenty of time left.

mrk · 29 Nov 2022 at 10:17

Windows has a built in System Image creator that creates a VHD image you can restore onto any drive and then boot from it. The VHD can also be browsed like any folder in File Explorer. I use it for my C drive cloned backups onto external disk. It can also be used to image any other drive or partition but I just use it to clone image the OS drive.

For all other backup tasks for sync (source > destination) I use FreeFileSync.

andy_mk3 · 29 Nov 2022 at 10:37

It is a shame. It’s not something I’ll pay for either, I use it a couple of times a year at the most. If I used it every week I’d happily pay but it’s just not worth it otherwise.

Cyber-Mav · 3 Dec 2022 at 19:32

There is a lot of options out there. Aomei, acronis, etc but regardless of being free or paid whats the best one? Which one offers the most compression etc?

Aomei I find is decent but sometimes when restoring and image it ends up analyzing it first which slows the task down too much.

john_smith · 3 Dec 2022 at 19:42

WinRAR next?

Cyber-Mav · 3 Dec 2022 at 21:19

Murphy said:
I'm sure lots of people make use of the free version of Reflect so it's disappointing to hear they're not going to be releasing free versions after 1st January 2024.

But i wanted to canvas opinions on what people intend to do after that time, carry on using the last free version?

Find an alternative and if so what?

Or fork over the £50 (£25 currently) to carry on using it?

just carry on using the last version of the free build they have?

Murphy · 3 Dec 2022 at 23:19

Cyber-Mav said:
just carry on using the last version of the free build they have?

Yea i pretty much settled on doing that as all the alternatives I've looked at all seem a bit naff and don't seem to play well with the WinRE image that gets installed in the hidden partition Windows insists on creating these days.

Cyber-Mav · 3 Dec 2022 at 23:25

from my testing macrium doesnt offer as much compression as aomei does. still looking around for more backup software to test. need to give that easeus one a try.

Murphy · 3 Dec 2022 at 23:46

I'm not too fussed about the compression, as long as it doesn't just clone the disk so you end up with a 1TB image full of empty space, it's more the recovery USB/CD/ISO being compatible with WinRE as then it can be added to the Windows recovery environment using REAgentC.

Eddie99 · 4 Dec 2022 at 00:05

I'll just keep using the free version, it copies and compresses data so it's not like it will ever stop working. For recovery I have macrium reflect installed on a portable Windows 10 USB stick that I created using rufus.

Hotwired · 4 Dec 2022 at 04:27

If you have any Western Digital (inc Sandisk) drive you can get a free 5 year Acronis True Image licence.

WD Software

List of all WD firmware and software available for download.

support.wdc.com

Got a m.2 drive the other day and cloned my previous ssd over.

I used to have paid acronis software but there's no point when what I need is free.

bimbleuk · 4 Dec 2022 at 06:23

For a once in a while tool I downloaded HDClone X3 but it's slow in the free version but another alternative to try.

sunn · 4 Dec 2022 at 10:03

Hotwired said:
If you have any Western Digital (inc Sandisk) drive you can get a free 5 year Acronis True Image licence.

WD Software

List of all WD firmware and software available for download.

support.wdc.com

Got a m.2 drive the other day and cloned my previous ssd over.

I used to have paid acronis software but there's no point when what I need is free.

Does the WD version only close drives? or can it do increments etc?

Hotwired · 4 Dec 2022 at 12:50

sunn said:
Does the WD version only close drives? or can it do increments etc?

Does backups, cloning, erasing, some kind of "protection" and mostly what you get from upgrading to full True Image 2021 is cloud stuff.

Cyber-Mav · 4 Dec 2022 at 13:07

I thought the free acronis with wd drives was only for cloning.

Acronis boot media is very slow and badly implemented. Macrium boot media is better but still bad with network shares. Aomei boot media is very good , still need to test the easus one later today

Hotwired · 4 Dec 2022 at 13:30

Cyber-Mav said:
I thought the free acronis with wd drives was only for cloning.

I think it was more limited in the past.

Wonder what WD will ship in 5 years time when the licence runs out. Acronis redid its software and wants you to yearly subscribe for disk cloning and backups :cry: