True Image 2011 Home Plus Pak time to Backup Partition

Hello Mike,
In these instances, I would usually ask if something has been changed or added to your system? Large amount of data, iTunes library, etc. Or, maybe you've asked the program to back up sector by sector or use high compression? The change from 3.5 to 12hrs is excessive. Have you compared the size of a newly created .tib to one done previously? Is Acronis the only software which seems to run more slowly now?

Mike:

Check your disk for errors:
chkdsk c: /R
chkdsk d: /R
etc.

Do this from an elevated command prompt window and repeat for each partition on the disk. Let the machine reboot if it needs to, and be patient - if you have a large disk this could take a while. The /R on the check disk command will check and remap bad sectors (if any), and the command as a whole will repair any damage to the file system.

The reason for suggesting this is that if True Image detects any file system errors it will switch to sector-by-sector mode, which can take a lot longer to back up since it includes every single sector on the disk in the backup. Normally, TI only includes used sectors.

Thanks for yuor response. OK, I checked compression and it is normal and sector by sector is unchecked. The size of the backup isn't significantly different and yes Acronis is the only software that is working so slow. Not sure what else to check.

Thank you - I will try this but when I look at the backup the sector by sector is unchecked. Would it be checked if it encountered a problem?
Thanks Again to both of you for trying to help.

Trying again today, will see how it goes.

Guys,

I tried everything, including check disk and it still took 12-13 hours for the last backup, which was 227MG. Interestingly, when I use the built in Windows 7 backup and make a system image, it takes about 1.5 hours. I have a 64 bit system, and I even changed the priority level to high, hoping it would work faster. Any other suggestions?
Thanks.

Mike:

I'm puzzled by this. If Windows 7 system image proceeds at a normal pace, I can't think of a reason why a backup with TI would take a lot longer if all things are equal. Are they?

Is the TI backup made by the Windows version of TI or from the recovery version of TI?
Are you backing up to the same destination? What is the destination (network PC, internal hard disk, external hard disk, etc.)?
Do both backups (W7 system image and TI) include the same partitions? If not, what are the differences?
What has changed right before TI started taking an inordinately long time to back up?
Which version of TI and which build are you using?

Mark,

Thanks again, I'm very puzzled too. I'm using TI Home 2011 Plus Pack, Update 3 (build 6942). From the main menu I'm using Disk & Partition Backup, primarily just the C drive. All this is being backed up to the e drive, which is Western Digital 4000BEV (400MB0 USB connected external hard drive. There is plenty of free space on the EHD but your questions may have answered the question. I have another WD EHD that also is a USB, but has a 750 MB capacity. I think I remember that recently I had to switch the HD's because the Windows image had become too big for the smaller HD. Maybe it's a slower hard drive? Could it be that much slower?

Thanks

Mike:

The speed differential should not be that drastic.

I presume that you have tested the smaller external hard disk by running chkdsk /r on it to see if it has any bad sectors? Having bad sectors can really slow down disk access. One troubleshooting step that may help to pinpoint the problem is to create an image using TI to the faster external hard drive. See if the speed returns to normal.

For clarity, please confirm that you're creating the image from the Windows version of TI.

Yesterday I ran chkdsk on the EHD and it came out fine. Then I did an Acronis backup on the other EHD I have been using and it took "only" about 5-6 hours, so half as long. Maybe because it is a newer EHD. Finally I believe that I am using the Windows version.

Anything else I'm missing?

Thanks again,

Mike

Mike:

That's still way too long. I can understand that there may be a 2:1 difference between backing up to the smaller disk versus backing up to the larger disk. This can happen if the larger disk is almost empty and the smaller disk is almost full. As a disk fills up the inner tracks are used, which have approximately half the transfer rate as the outer tracks. In any event, none of this accounts for the fact that your backup times have increased by a factor of four, according to your original post.

You are using the exact same version and build of TI as I am, and you have the same 64-bit Windows 7 operating system. One additional item that you can check is to see if you have the same version of the Acronis snapshot filter driver. The version of this driver can affect operation of the disk drives during a backup. The file is located at C:\Windows\System32\Drivers\snapman.sys. Mine is shown below

If the driver version is the same and if you are positive that you have checked all of your disks with the /R parameter on Chkdsk, then I would suggest trying a repair install of TI 2011, or that you open a ticket with Acronis support.

Mark,

Everything for my driver is exactly the same except the Date Modified for me is 8/1/2012. How do I update this, I could not find anything?

Mike

Mike:

The Date Modified is the date that you installed TI on your PC. The important item is that you have the same file version.

A possibility.

Would you post a screen capture of your backup scheme. It is possible that the newer backups are involving a compression of multiple backups into a siingle backup; and this is occurring each backup plus possible validation.

As a test, do a new backup using a new task and without validation.

I checked and the file version is the same. I know ths is a dumb question but I can't paste pictures or anything else into th response.  How do I do that?

Mike,
Check link inside my signature below.

Here it is.

Mike,
Good job of posting picture.
Click on my link #2 below and look at the illustration labelled 11-Dif.
Cease to use the old task and create a new task adjusting the 6 and 4 to fit your own needs.
This new setup dos not involve consolidation (other one did) which can be very time consuming.
Point to the new task toward a new storage fub-folder. Use one folder per task or each task should have its own folder.

Another question - why is it that all I can see is a placeholder and not my actual screenshot that I posted?

Mike:

It's because of the forum software. What you need to do is to edit your reply #20 using the rich text editor, copy the path to the attachment, and paste it in the URL box for the picture. You can then uncheck the box that displays the picture as an attachment. Your reply #17 has the same issue.

Since I can't see your picture of the error message yet I'm going to hazard a guess. The Acronis unistaller does not do a complete job of removing the prior program, and it gets worse if you have more than one Acronis program installed (like Disk Director). I recently reinstalled TI 2011 successfully, so it can be done. Try this:

1. Use Add or Remove programs to remove both TI 2011 and the TI 2011 Plus Pack (if you have it). One is listed under "A" for Acronis and the other under "P" for Plus Pack, so it's easy to miss the latter.
2. If TI was the only Acronis program on your PC, delete any leftover folders named "Acronis" or "True Image" in the Program Files, Program Files(x86), ProgramData, and Users\YourUserName\AppData folders.
3. Delete the temporary files in C:\Users\YourUserName\AppData\Local\Temp
4. Reboot the PC
5. Reinstall TI 2011
6. Reinstall the PlusPack (if applicable)

I'll try this picture again.

still can't get the pix to show up. What do mean by uncheck the box? I didn't see that box.

Mike:

This picture shows the URL of the attachment and the box to uncheck:

This is the path to one of your posting
http://forum.acronis.com/system/files/forum/2013/02/40085/capture2.png

If you edit your posting and place a beginning syntax
<img src="
touching the beginning of the path
and add a ending syntax
" />
at the end of the path. That picture or any link of a picture should display.

If your edit or posting looks like this, it will display

<img src="http://forum.acronis.com/system/files/forum/2013/02/40085/capture2.png" />

As I have posted before above, my signature link #5 is an example of how to upload and display images.

MVP Mark is showing you one method and I am showing a different method. Which method you use depends upon what you want to display or how you want it displayed.

OK guys here's an update. I re-installed and it works. However, it took 14 hrs to make a new backup! I don't understand how this can be so slow, over 4.5x the amount of time it takes for windows to make an image backup. Any other ideas? It should not take so long.

Thanks again.

Mike:

Besides Grover's suggestion in reply #18 about consolidation, did you also confirm that validation is NOT enabled? This process can slow down the time needed to make a backup by at least a factor of 2.

I did check that and validation is OFF.

Check under the scheduler/advanced settings and make sure you do not have the option checked to do backups only when the computer is idle.

Thanks - I looked but couldn't find that option.

This option only shows when there is a schedule involved.

This is an extract from my backup guide. This is not specific to you but it does show the option I am discussing with you.

Figure 17: Schedule2 Advanced settings

My version doesn't have the scheduler. I'm looking at Disk Backup Options under Advanced.

The listing to the scheduler is about 1 inch from the bottom of the illustration below.

Figure 6: Select Destination1

OK, found it. The scheduler is off, and the box Run the backup only when the computer is idle is NOT checked. So now what?

Anybody have any suggestions? Thanks.

Mike,

This may have already been covered. Random thoughts.
The time estimate by the program of the time it will take to create a backup is grossly incorrect. Have you looked at the log file for confirmtionm of consumed time and any problems.

If your backup scheme uses consolidtion, this could cause a time issue. Have you tried creating a new task and check the time via the log

A backup task is created for a specific destination drive via the signatureof of disk at time of task creation.
If using a different storge disk on the same task, this could be issues.