Making an image of Windows 7 64-bit

thedoc46

thedoc46

thedoc46

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Just spent 12hrs reformatting my pc after picking up a nasty virus. Time mostly spent on re-installing all my apps, games and game saves & cfg files..

Anyway, 12hrs was waaaaaaaay too long for my liking, and it's now prompted me to investigate using some kind of image tool, to make a backup of my entire o/s partition.

Any recommendations? Acronis, ghost? or even doesn't windows 7 now include an image creator? Not sure and just starting my investigations.

Interested in hearing pro's and cons of using such tools... Just need image to be exactly as it is today, clean everything on and configured to how i like.
 
Hard drive manufacturers free downloads - they'r usually cut down versions of commercial products.
 
I personally use Acronis True Image. Boot off a USB key and do it that way.
Just imaged 2 Windows 7 installs and 2 linux installs.
 
I use the built in windows 7 Backup tool, works a treat, very fast and has been reliable, can't fault it :)
Why pay for an app when a perfectly good free version comes Built into the OS?
 
From experiance I'd avoid Ghost (though I'm told it's got better in recent editions). True Image f t w. Imaging over gigabit to a nas is nice if you can. I picked up a Netgear ReadyNASDuo 2000 minus drives for £50 a while ago on that auction site. Steal!
 
Windows 7 has a built in image creation tool... Start Menu >> Control Panel >> System & Security >> Backup and Restore >> Create System Image. Alternatively you can use EASEUS Todo Backup which is free and will take an image of your HDD also http://www.easeus.com/disk-copy/
 
Last edited:
Admiral Huddy said:
As above, Windows 7 backup to image is fine :)
Click to expand...

Thanks all, i think i'm going to just try the Windows 7 image maker.. Can you specify just one partition to backup?

I'm at work at the mo' so i can't try.. Well ok i did, but i only have a c: drive on my work laptop, and it picked up c: and system reserved, with no option to not choose system reserve.

I don't want it to backup my WinXP partition or my data partition.

Will that be possible..

Also can you use the machine while it makes the image? What about open files?
 
Yes you can choose what partitons to backup, but if you do choose the C:, it will automatically select the reserved... which is on 100mb so no biggy.
 
Also, with the built in tool, you can mount the images as virtual drives, that way you can do individual file restores too... handy!
 
One last question..... I'm going to image about 300gig tonight... How long does it take to make an image of that size to an external USB 2.0... Approx
 
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