System backup question

[Varouj]

Hi all,

Please excuse my english, it is not my native language and my computer,
a Dell Studio 1747 with Win7 pro 64 is in french.
I have been following this forum for some time and I have learned a
lot. Thanks all for your very pertinent information.
I read a lot about the necessity to have a system backup. I had two
external usb HD 250 and 320 GB where I put my weekly files backup and
on the other one, old files and films and archives. I decided to buy a
third external drive (2TB), put all my archives there and dedicate one
of the smaller drives for weekly files backup and the other one for a
system backup in case my original drive had an accident.
I downloaded MAcrium Reflect free edition and used it to make the
backup.
When it asked me to choose between clone and image, I chose clone. (I
looked for the difference between clone and image but did not get any
answer neither in the Help section nor on the web : any explanation is
welcome).
I had three partitions on the OS HD first is a Dellutility partition in
FAT 16 then a Recovery partition (says "NTFS active") and an OS
partition (NTFS primary) and the three were ticked and I just went
ahead. Everything worked smoothly and I had a system backup.
Now when I attach (plug) this HD on the computer, it goes to a recovery
partition and I have a computer that does not work perfectly. I can get
mails and surf but there is no sound and my window games do not work.
I get "program not responding" messages on most of my programs.
What did I do wrong ? Can I fix ? or should I erase or reformat the
disk and do it all again ? all partitions or only the OS ?

TIA
Varouj

 

[mick]

Hi all,

Please excuse my english, it is not my native language and my computer, a
Dell Studio 1747 with Win7 pro 64 is in french.
I have been following this forum for some time and I have learned a lot.
Thanks all for your very pertinent information.
I read a lot about the necessity to have a system backup. I had two external
usb HD 250 and 320 GB where I put my weekly files backup and on the other
one, old files and films and archives. I decided to buy a third external
drive (2TB), put all my archives there and dedicate one of the smaller drives
for weekly files backup and the other one for a system backup in case my
original drive had an accident.
I downloaded MAcrium Reflect free edition and used it to make the backup.
When it asked me to choose between clone and image, I chose clone. (I looked
for the difference between clone and image but did not get any answer neither
in the Help section nor on the web : any explanation is welcome).
I had three partitions on the OS HD first is a Dellutility partition in FAT
16 then a Recovery partition (says "NTFS active") and an OS partition (NTFS
primary) and the three were ticked and I just went ahead. Everything worked
smoothly and I had a system backup.
Now when I attach (plug) this HD on the computer, it goes to a recovery
partition and I have a computer that does not work perfectly. I can get mails
and surf but there is no sound and my window games do not work.
I get "program not responding" messages on most of my programs.
What did I do wrong ? Can I fix ? or should I erase or reformat the disk and
do it all again ? all partitions or only the OS ?

TIA
Varouj

Have a look at this:
http://www.whatsabyte.com/P1/Image_or_Clone.html

On my computer I have C drive which has the OS and all programs and D
drive which is all personal data(music, pictures, documents, etc.)

I make an IMAGE of C drive but just normal file to file backup of the D
drive. If the C drive fails you just re-instate the IMAGE and the C
drive is bootable again.

I use Acronis 2013 for IMAGE and backup. You can download the User
Guide from here:
http://www.acronis.co.uk/homecomputing/products/trueimage/#resources
It will perhaps give you more information and understanding.

 

[mick]

Hi all,

Have a look at this:
http://www.whatsabyte.com/P1/Image_or_Clone.html

On my computer I have C drive which has the OS and all programs and D drive
which is all personal data(music, pictures, documents, etc.)

I make an IMAGE of C drive but just normal file to file backup of the D
drive. If the C drive fails you just re-instate the IMAGE and the C drive is
bootable again.

I use Acronis 2013 for IMAGE and backup. You can download the User Guide
from here:
http://www.acronis.co.uk/homecomputing/products/trueimage/#resources
It will perhaps give you more information and understanding.

this should help
http://www.acronis.fr/homecomputing/products/trueimage/index.html#overview

 

[Varouj]

Dans son message précédent, mick a écrit :

this should help
http://www.acronis.fr/homecomputing/products/trueimage/index.html#overview

Thank you Mick for this usefull information.
Should I image all partitions ? or only the OS partition?

 

[mick]

Dans son message précédent, mick a écrit :

Thank you Mick for this usefull information.
Should I image all partitions ? or only the OS partition?

That is entirely up to you.
Definitely IMAGE the OS.
If you use Acronis, you can see each file in the IMAGE and you can
reinstate any file from the IMAGE.
If the original operating system fails to boot you must reinstall the
whole IMAGE.

 

[Val]

That is entirely up to you.
Definitely IMAGE the OS.
If you use Acronis, you can see each file in the IMAGE and you can
reinstate any file from the IMAGE.
If the original operating system fails to boot you must reinstall the
whole IMAGE.

Mick, Like Varouj, I have a network drive for backup (one desktop, one laptop).
Looking at the Acronis website, I need a 3 PCs purchase (£60) - can it be
installed on my NAS (3TB) to handle backups over my home network, Netgear
DGN 1000 router, PC and laptop (either by ethernet or WiFi)?

 

[mick]

Thank you Mick for this usefull information.

Mick, Like Varouj, I have a network drive for backup (one desktop, one
laptop). Looking at the Acronis website, I need a 3 PCs purchase (£60) - can
it be installed on my NAS (3TB) to handle backups over my home network,
Netgear DGN 1000 router, PC and laptop (either by ethernet or WiFi)?

I install it on each computer. I do not have a network drive, only
external USB drives.
I do not know about installation on a network drive.
You must be a very honest person

 

[Paul]

Mick, Like Varouj, I have a network drive for backup (one desktop, one
laptop). Looking at the Acronis website, I need a 3 PCs purchase (£60)
- can it be installed on my NAS (3TB) to handle backups over my home
network, Netgear DGN 1000 router, PC and laptop (either by ethernet or
WiFi)?

http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/products/trueimage/index.html#overview

"Simple network backup

True Image 2013 automatically detects and displays your NAS device
so you can backup multiple network PCs to a safe and reliable storage
site."

I think that means, you install the product on the desktop, and on the
laptop (two installs), and the NAS does not use a license. The NAS is
treated as an external storage device.

What you'd want to make sure of, in any case, is
that the NAS is visible from the restoration CD/DVD.
In cases where an owner uses an NDAS, the driver
for the NDAS needs to be loaded onto the restoration CD/DVD.
Whereas, with a NAS, that wouldn't be necessary (as a NAS
uses more standard protocols, than an NDAS does).

Paul

 

[Val]

Mick, Like Varouj, I have a network drive for backup (one desktop,

I install it on each computer. I do not have a network drive, only
external USB drives.
I do not know about installation on a network drive.
You must be a very honest person

I couldn't possibly disagree ;<)

 

[Val]

http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/products/trueimage/index.html#ove
rview

"Simple network backup

True Image 2013 automatically detects and displays your NAS
device
so you can backup multiple network PCs to a safe and reliable
storage
site."
I think that means, you install the product on the desktop, and on the
laptop (two installs), and the NAS does not use a license. The NAS is
treated as an external storage device.

What you'd want to make sure of, in any case, is
that the NAS is visible from the restoration CD/DVD.
In cases where an owner uses an NDAS, the driver
for the NDAS needs to be loaded onto the restoration CD/DVD.
Whereas, with a NAS, that wouldn't be necessary (as a NAS
uses more standard protocols, than an NDAS does).
Paul

That's the way it looks; just been reading the online docs, the BartPE making
process has (allegedly) options to add 'non-standard' drivers - RAID, SCSI...
'though Win7 has no problems 'seeing' the NAS (GoFlex) so all should be fine.
The Seagate GoFlex comes with Memeo backup, limited to, I think, three PCs,
which should be fine except it only appears to backup the laptop when connected
by wire or WiFi via the router/home network. Doesn't work via internet access,
which is restricted to read-only access. Only discovered this fact when trying
to backup photos whilst abroad.

 

[Don Phillipson]

Thank you Mick for this usefull information.
Should I image all partitions ? or only the OS partition?

1. Most people instal all applications on the OS partition
(as is Windows' default.) So if C: ever fails for some reason
its backup (Acronis image of C: with all OS and apps) can
be copied to a new drive quickly, and the PC is operable again.
2. Most users' data collections are more variable. So some
users find copying selected data partitions to an external
drive at standard intervals (1 to 30 days) provides effective
protection against unforeseen failures.
3. Drive failures are now rare. (I have not had a drive fail
since about 2008.) Damage by malware is also now rare.
(I had one case in five years, repaired by Malwarebytes in
less than 10 min.) Most users have no reason to fear
disasters as was normal and prudent in the 1980s.

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

Hi all,

Please excuse my english, it is not my native language and my computer,
a Dell Studio 1747 with Win7 pro 64 is in french.
I have been following this forum for some time and I have learned a
lot. Thanks all for your very pertinent information.
I read a lot about the necessity to have a system backup. I had two
external usb HD 250 and 320 GB where I put my weekly files backup and
on the other one, old files and films and archives. I decided to buy a
third external drive (2TB), put all my archives there and dedicate one
of the smaller drives for weekly files backup and the other one for a
system backup in case my original drive had an accident.
I downloaded MAcrium Reflect free edition and used it to make the
backup.
When it asked me to choose between clone and image, I chose clone. (I
looked for the difference between clone and image but did not get any
answer neither in the Help section nor on the web : any explanation is
welcome).
I had three partitions on the OS HD first is a Dellutility partition in
FAT 16 then a Recovery partition (says "NTFS active") and an OS
partition (NTFS primary) and the three were ticked and I just went
ahead. Everything worked smoothly and I had a system backup.
Now when I attach (plug) this HD on the computer, it goes to a recovery
partition and I have a computer that does not work perfectly. I can get
mails and surf but there is no sound and my window games do not work.
I get "program not responding" messages on most of my programs.
What did I do wrong ? Can I fix ? or should I erase or reformat the
disk and do it all again ? all partitions or only the OS ?

TIA
Varouj

This may be redundant, but I hope it's clearer than some descriptions
I've seen.

A clone is a literal or exact copy of one drive to another (a bit-by-bit
copy). It can be read directly with Windows Explorer or the equivalent,
just like the original drive, and it is (or can be flagged as) a
bootable drive if the original drive was bootable.

The only difference between the clone and the original drive would be if
they are different in size. Some cloning programs aren't equipped to
deal with that & won't do a clone to a drive of a different size.

An image (not an IMAGE!) is a file which contains a compressed version
of the hard drive or partition it came from. It can only be read by the
software that made it or compatible other software.

In the case of incremental or differential image backups, there will be
more than one file. The newest file will contain files that differ from
the previous file(s) and info about deleted files, and the software will
be able to mount[1] any image file as a copy of the entire drive at the
date that particular image file was made. It does this by coordinating
the information in the separate files, using its internal knowledge of
the way the incremental images are organized.

To make a real disk from an image, it must be restored to a drive. The
program reverses the compression and generates the equivalent of the
given drive as a drive that is readable by Explorer and is also bootable
if the original drive was.

I'm using "drive" to mean "drive or partition", as appropriate.

[1] "Mount" means to created the *effect* of a hard drive by software
that presents information from the image in a way that looks like you
are viewing a real drive. It's pretty nifty...

 

[Dave]

To make a real disk from an image, it must be restored to a drive. The
program reverses the compression and generates the equivalent of the
given drive as a drive that is readable by Explorer and is also bootable
if the original drive was.

I'm using "drive" to mean "drive or partition", as appropriate.

[1] "Mount" means to created the *effect* of a hard drive by software
that presents information from the image in a way that looks like you
are viewing a real drive. It's pretty nifty...

He should not have cloned the drive. It sounds like windows is possibly
somehow accessing that clone. Disconnect the drive and see if anything
changes.
I use macrium free version, on a Dell he should image what macrium
suggests, namely Dell utility, Dell Recovery (that's also the boot
partition) and drive c. This only makes one compressed file. He must also
be sure to create a macrium recovery cd (or flash drive).
Repeat same procedure on subsequent backups but you only need to make the
recovery media once.

I've never had a backup mess up windows while running, but I would
recommend closing all applications. Macrium has an option to turn off the
machine after a backup. The free version doesn't do file backup or
incrementals.

 

[John Williamson]

Hi all,

Please excuse my english, it is not my native language and my computer,
a Dell Studio 1747 with Win7 pro 64 is in french.
I have been following this forum for some time and I have learned a lot.
Thanks all for your very pertinent information.
I read a lot about the necessity to have a system backup. I had two
external usb HD 250 and 320 GB where I put my weekly files backup and on
the other one, old files and films and archives. I decided to buy a
third external drive (2TB), put all my archives there and dedicate one
of the smaller drives for weekly files backup and the other one for a
system backup in case my original drive had an accident.
I downloaded MAcrium Reflect free edition and used it to make the backup.
When it asked me to choose between clone and image, I chose clone. (I
looked for the difference between clone and image but did not get any
answer neither in the Help section nor on the web : any explanation is
welcome).
I had three partitions on the OS HD first is a Dellutility partition in
FAT 16 then a Recovery partition (says "NTFS active") and an OS
partition (NTFS primary) and the three were ticked and I just went
ahead. Everything worked smoothly and I had a system backup.
Now when I attach (plug) this HD on the computer, it goes to a recovery
partition and I have a computer that does not work perfectly. I can get
mails and surf but there is no sound and my window games do not work.
I get "program not responding" messages on most of my programs.
What did I do wrong ? Can I fix ? or should I erase or reformat the disk
and do it all again ? all partitions or only the OS ?

It's possible that the computer is booting to the recovery partition, as
that is the one flagged as "active" in the boot record.

Try using Windows disc management or another utility to change the flag
on the recovery partition to "primary", and the OS partition to
"active". The system should then boot from the OS partition. If not,
there may be a problem with the boot sequence in the boot loader.

 

[Varouj]

Dave a formulé ce jeudi :

To make a real disk from an image, it must be restored to a drive. The
program reverses the compression and generates the equivalent of the
given drive as a drive that is readable by Explorer and is also bootable
if the original drive was.

I'm using "drive" to mean "drive or partition", as appropriate.

[1] "Mount" means to created the *effect* of a hard drive by software
that presents information from the image in a way that looks like you
are viewing a real drive. It's pretty nifty...

He should not have cloned the drive. It sounds like windows is possibly
somehow accessing that clone. Disconnect the drive and see if anything
changes.
I use macrium free version, on a Dell he should image what macrium
suggests, namely Dell utility, Dell Recovery (that's also the boot
partition) and drive c. This only makes one compressed file. He must also
be sure to create a macrium recovery cd (or flash drive).
Repeat same procedure on subsequent backups but you only need to make the
recovery media once.

I've never had a backup mess up windows while running, but I would
recommend closing all applications. Macrium has an option to turn off the
machine after a backup. The free version doesn't do file backup or
incrementals.

Thank you Dave. Your input has been very usefull. I have erased the
disc and made an image instead of the clone. Everything is fine now.
As for the recovery media, I have the Windows' one ; is this enough or
should I do the Macrium one too ?
Can I use a small usb flash drive ?
TIA
Varouj

 

[Varouj]

Gene E. Bloch a formulé ce mercredi :

Hi all,

Please excuse my english, it is not my native language and my computer,
a Dell Studio 1747 with Win7 pro 64 is in french.
I have been following this forum for some time and I have learned a
lot. Thanks all for your very pertinent information.
I read a lot about the necessity to have a system backup. I had two
external usb HD 250 and 320 GB where I put my weekly files backup and
on the other one, old files and films and archives. I decided to buy a
third external drive (2TB), put all my archives there and dedicate one
of the smaller drives for weekly files backup and the other one for a
system backup in case my original drive had an accident.
I downloaded MAcrium Reflect free edition and used it to make the
backup.
When it asked me to choose between clone and image, I chose clone. (I
looked for the difference between clone and image but did not get any
answer neither in the Help section nor on the web : any explanation is
welcome).
I had three partitions on the OS HD first is a Dellutility partition in
FAT 16 then a Recovery partition (says "NTFS active") and an OS
partition (NTFS primary) and the three were ticked and I just went
ahead. Everything worked smoothly and I had a system backup.
Now when I attach (plug) this HD on the computer, it goes to a recovery
partition and I have a computer that does not work perfectly. I can get
mails and surf but there is no sound and my window games do not work.
I get "program not responding" messages on most of my programs.
What did I do wrong ? Can I fix ? or should I erase or reformat the
disk and do it all again ? all partitions or only the OS ?

TIA
Varouj

This may be redundant, but I hope it's clearer than some descriptions
I've seen.

A clone is a literal or exact copy of one drive to another (a bit-by-bit
copy). It can be read directly with Windows Explorer or the equivalent,
just like the original drive, and it is (or can be flagged as) a
bootable drive if the original drive was bootable.

The only difference between the clone and the original drive would be if
they are different in size. Some cloning programs aren't equipped to
deal with that & won't do a clone to a drive of a different size.

An image (not an IMAGE!) is a file which contains a compressed version
of the hard drive or partition it came from. It can only be read by the
software that made it or compatible other software.

In the case of incremental or differential image backups, there will be
more than one file. The newest file will contain files that differ from
the previous file(s) and info about deleted files, and the software will
be able to mount[1] any image file as a copy of the entire drive at the
date that particular image file was made. It does this by coordinating
the information in the separate files, using its internal knowledge of
the way the incremental images are organized.

To make a real disk from an image, it must be restored to a drive. The
program reverses the compression and generates the equivalent of the
given drive as a drive that is readable by Explorer and is also bootable
if the original drive was.

I'm using "drive" to mean "drive or partition", as appropriate.

[1] "Mount" means to created the *effect* of a hard drive by software
that presents information from the image in a way that looks like you
are viewing a real drive. It's pretty nifty...

Thank you for your explanation of the difference between a clone and an
image : very usefull.
Varouj

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

He should not have cloned the drive. It sounds like windows is possibly
somehow accessing that clone. Disconnect the drive and see if anything
changes.

I've never had the problem when cloning with Macrium or with EaseUS,
which I have sometimes used. I wonder what caused Varouj's problem.

Back in the mists of time, I recall cloning programs that changed the
boot flag of the clone and/or the original, so that only the clone was
bootable (or some similar - but fixable - change that messed me up
temporarily). Unfortunately, the memory is too vague for me to make any
really useful comments at this time, sorry.

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

Dave a formulé ce jeudi :

To make a real disk from an image, it must be restored to a drive. The
program reverses the compression and generates the equivalent of the
given drive as a drive that is readable by Explorer and is also bootable
if the original drive was.

I'm using "drive" to mean "drive or partition", as appropriate.

[1] "Mount" means to created the *effect* of a hard drive by software
that presents information from the image in a way that looks like you
are viewing a real drive. It's pretty nifty...

He should not have cloned the drive. It sounds like windows is possibly
somehow accessing that clone. Disconnect the drive and see if anything
changes.
I use macrium free version, on a Dell he should image what macrium
suggests, namely Dell utility, Dell Recovery (that's also the boot
partition) and drive c. This only makes one compressed file. He must also
be sure to create a macrium recovery cd (or flash drive).
Repeat same procedure on subsequent backups but you only need to make the
recovery media once.

I've never had a backup mess up windows while running, but I would
recommend closing all applications. Macrium has an option to turn off the
machine after a backup. The free version doesn't do file backup or
incrementals.

Thank you Dave. Your input has been very usefull. I have erased the
disc and made an image instead of the clone. Everything is fine now.
As for the recovery media, I have the Windows' one ; is this enough or
should I do the Macrium one too ?
Can I use a small usb flash drive ?
TIA
Varouj

You should create the Macrium one too, so that if necessary you can run
Macrium if your installed drive happens to fail.

You'd boot from the Macrium CD and restore the Macrium image to a new
hard drive, which you could then boot from. A Macrium - or other - clone
could just be booted directly, and become your new main drive.

 

[Stan Brown]

This may be redundant, but I hope it's clearer than some descriptions
I've seen.

A clone is ...

An image ...

Great explanation, Gene!

 

[Val]

To make a real disk from an image, it must be restored to a drive.
The program reverses the compression and generates the equivalent of
the given drive as a drive that is readable by Explorer and is also
bootable if the original drive was.

I'm using "drive" to mean "drive or partition", as appropriate.

[1] "Mount" means to created the *effect* of a hard drive by software
that presents information from the image in a way that looks like you
are viewing a real drive. It's pretty nifty...

He should not have cloned the drive. It sounds like windows is
possibly
somehow accessing that clone. Disconnect the drive and see if anything
changes.
I use macrium free version, on a Dell he should image what macrium
suggests, namely Dell utility, Dell Recovery (that's also the boot
partition) and drive c. This only makes one compressed file. He must
also
be sure to create a macrium recovery cd (or flash drive).
Repeat same procedure on subsequent backups but you only need to make
the
recovery media once.
I've never had a backup mess up windows while running, but I would
recommend closing all applications. Macrium has an option to turn off
the machine after a backup. The free version doesn't do file backup or
incrementals.

I've just backed up, using free Macrium, my laptop wired to router which
is wired to Seagate GoFlex. Although I selected the c: (and D drives not
all the folders were copied to the Seagate; some sub folders are missing
from MyDocs, MyPics. Any ideas?