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Reorg of old backups (including incremental)

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Dear Acronis lovers,

after I was helped so nicely in another matter, I dare to post another question that bugs me for quite long:

How to best reorg old backups (including incremental steps) ?

I would like to decide in kind of a UI on kind of a list showing existing backups including incremental inbetween version. Then I e.g. would like to be able to delete anything older than x weeks.

What is not possible/nice to have - I think is to delete incremental 'inbetween versions' and only keep e.g. the first or last of an incremental.

I did find something where it was proposed to go by file name etc. in Explorer but I am hoping that it can be done smarter and more elegant.

Thank you in advance.

Regards
   Christian

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Christian, Acronis works on the principle of 'Backup version chains' where for Incremental backups, these chains must be kept fully intact or else the chain will be broken.

You cannot have a version chain where you kept only the first and last incremental backup files as each file is dependent on the one before it.  An incremental backup contains only the changes identified since the previous backup was created.

Within the ATIH GUI, when you select either of the Restore options (files or disks), then there is a drop-down list shown at the top right of the restore window which has a selection of dates / times which are taken directly from your backup files, i.e. for each incremental backup file, the date/time of that file will be shown as a possible recovery point to choose in the drop-down list.

Steve,
sorry for my late reply. Was in US and now back in Germany ... jet lag ... trillions of emails ...

GUI: May I kindly ask you a blonde question where this restore option hides ? Did not find it in backup nor extras menu. I must be obviously blind.
Is there an online manual that you propose ? So where I can search for restore ... tried to search in Acronis Knowledge Base.

I have a backup 'chain' on my NAS (several full+incremental each, full after 5 incrementals). As I needed to reinstall Acronis my old settings got lost. HOW do I touch/reorg those chains ? By File + name + date or can the GUI also handle those ? Double click works like a charm (as you helped me in the other thread)

Thank you and regards
    Christian

 

Christian, welcome back from your travels, hope the jet lag is only minor!  (Been there & done the same!).

For the GUI question: this is only shown when a backup task has been selected as shown below

Recovery Options.png

For the existing backup chain of files on your NAS, then you should click on the v (carat) icon to the right of the + Add backup option (shown above) then take the further option to Add existing backup then navigate to the NAS location where the latest backup file is held.  You only need to select the newest file for the backup chain and this will add a task entry to the GUI list using the stem part of the backup file name.  After it is added, then you will see a new option in place of the normal Backup now which will be to Reconfigure the added task.

Add existing backup.png