Accessing an older version of an Acronis copy of your PC

Strummer, clone = an identical copy of one disk to another but as you are talking about recovering from a clone image, then assuming that the image file has the .TIB file extension, this is a backup image file.

You should be able to either browse the .TIB file via Windows/File Explorer and navigate within the backup to where your browser bookmarks are stored, or else you can mount the .TIB image to a drive letter.

There is no need to restore/recover the image file to another disk drive and access this as if you had a second copy of Windows available.

If you want to make a new backup of your current Windows 10 OS installation on your NAS, then create a new backup task with a unique name and store this in a new, empty folder on your NAS to be absolutely safe and not overwrite any previous backup image.

Thanks Steve. Pressed for time at the moment, so maybe you've already answered some of these following points:

   I can see on my "This PC" section that my "Local Disk (C:)" has 2 Acronis ".tib" files. Can they even be accessed or used by me? Or are they wasting space and need only be on my NAS? Anyway, notes to self (quoting you):

assuming that the image file has the .TIB file extension, this is a backup image file.

and

There is no need to restore/recover the image file to another disk drive and access this as if you had a second copy of Windows available.

   re your comment that: "You should be able to either browse the .TIB file via Windows/File Explorer and navigate within the backup to where your browser bookmarks are stored"..

   This is the bit where I'm pressed for time, as I plan on recovering the data in the next few days. Is there a guide on how to do what you are suggesting or a You Tube video (in case I have trouble doing what you suggest that I do)?

   The bookmarks that I'm after were in my TOR browser...and I have no idea how to look for them using Windows/File  Explorer (never really had a need to use this feature). Looking for clues on that front, really.

   Lastly, comparing the capacity of my two internal drives, which are both the same make and model, I see that my C drive has 407 GB free of 952 GB and my D drive has 802 GB free of 953 GB. Those two Acronis .tib files on my C drive account for most of that difference, apart from about 100 GB which I'm not really sure where that is going to. Also, not sure why the maximum capacity of my two drives has a 1 GB difference between them...C maybe has a hidden partition or something?

   Actually, what's the difference between "backup image files" and "clone images"? Why would you use one as opposed to the other? If I have to use that Acronis recovery USB, can I choose which one of those I want to use? If my entire drive has been wiped, which option do you use to recover?

Thanks.

Strummer, working backwards through your questions:

There is no such thing as a 'clone image' - when you clone a drive, then this produces an identical copy of the source drive on a second physical drive.

A 'backup image' is a compressed copy of the source data (disk, partition, files or folders) a little similar to making a zip file but unique to Acronis.

If your C: drive is your main Windows OS boot drive, then I would recommend moving the two .TIB files you see on that drive to a non OS drive, i.e. to your D: drive if this is a data drive.

If you recover a backup image to your C: drive then please understand that the action of doing the recovery will first wipe out the whole contents of the drive before restoring the contents from the backup image to recreate the drive and any partitions it contains.

With regards to your TOR browser bookmarks, you will need to remember what browser is being used in that TOR environment and then look at the default location used by that browser for storing the bookmarks.  It has been some time since I have played with TOR but I seem to remember that everything ran from the folder where TOR was invoked from, so I would expect the browser bookmarks to also be within that folder somewhere.  I would try just restoring the whole TOR folder(s) first off and see if the bookmarks are found when you launch the browser?

See forum topic: Great Acronis "How-To" videos and other Acronis Resources which was published in the 2016 forum by one of the MVP's (Bobbo) a little while back but should give you a place to start.

Hi Steve. Last night, I thought I was doing the right thing by creating a clone image of my drive to the other, spare drive. I had been reasonably happy with my current desktop, despite not having recovered my bookmarks yet.

   Today, I boot my PC up and instead of having my main drive (I mean, I was hoping to have the same drive running which I had "cloned" from, not the "cloned" drive), it looks like the drive that I am running has lost a lot of my desktop data. And I'm back to Acronis telling me that I have "exceeded" the number of activations it allows. Going through the boot options, they all give me this same desktop setup.

   I had backed-up my current desktop to my NAS, but when I try and access it from Acronis, it still only has the recovery option from a few months back to use. How do I restore the desktop that I had last night from Acronis if Acronis does't seem able to find it?

   Geez Steve, I thought that "clone" meant what it said! I.e. I'd have a COPY of the EXACT SAME desktop I cloned last night. Instead, I'm back into annoying recovery mode. This is an absolute nightmare. I don't see why the drive and desktop setup that I was using last night "needed" to be destroyed in order for me to "clone" it...I thought that "clone" could be like a secondary point you could revert to if disaster struck.

P.S. without really knowing what I'm doing, I managed to get Acronis in the Backup section to backup the .tib file I created yesterday of my desktop, to my C drive, and an icon for that has appeared on my desktop now. I'm not sure if that will help me recover my desktop and data from last night, but I'm trying things before I expect to see a reply from you, in the hope that I'm on the right track.

I'll quote your advice below, which I've just read now as a "note to self":

"If your C: drive is your main Windows OS boot drive, then I would recommend moving the two .TIB files you see on that drive to a non OS drive, i.e. to your D: drive if this is a data drive.

If you recover a backup image to your C: drive then please understand that the action of doing the recovery will first wipe out the whole contents of the drive before restoring the contents from the backup image to recreate the drive and any partitions it contains."

Strummer, when you created the clone of your OS drive to the spare drive, is that spare drive still installed / connected in your computer?  If so, this is one of the warnings when cloning, that you should only attempt to boot into Windows with one such drive connected, because both drives now are identical and have the same disk signature, so can cause confusion to Windows.

I would recommend shutting down the computer, disconnecting the spare / clone drive and then try booting into Windows normally again.

Thanks Steve. I've printed off your comments in my threads and will try and apply them the next time I attempt to fix this disaster. I had a crack at fixing this again this morning, with no luck. Details in a minute. Is there any good reason why my attempt to "clone" one drive to another should destroy my data on BOTH drives? What's that all about? More importantly, can my drive be restored to exactly the same state that it was in just before I "cloned" it? I mean, with the EXACT SAME desktop set up that I had at that time?

Today I attempted to recover my desktop, but this time I went with the "UEFI: USB Disk 3.0 PMAP, Partition 1" boot option. As I was (presumably) recovering my drive, my power went off and the process stopped. The next time I started my PC, I don't think that that same boot option worked. Has anything being wrecked due to that power outage? I went with the "USB Disk 3.0 PMAP" boot option the next time, using the "Acronis True Image 64 bit" option. I'm not sure if those options matter, re 64 bit or not. My PC is 64 bit, so I went with that.

This second attempt at recovery, I think I tried something different, "Recover > Files and folders > Refresh backups". It was this option that allowed me to at least think that I was making progress.

I'd say that I've got backups (right word?) on my C drive, D drive and portable USB drive. Acronis gives the information that my USB drive has a full backup .tib file. It lists my C drive as having two incremental .tib files. No doubt I've unsuccessfully tried to access my D drive for .tib files.

Anyway, I chose the "Full backup" option and it took me a while to work out that you need to right click the mouse button in order to proceed....when hitting Enter worked for everything beforehand! For the "New location", I chose my C drive and chose the "Recover absolute path" option, but I have no idea what I was doing there...it's not like Acronis give you any information about your choices in the process. When choosing my C drive, I didn't choose any particular file location...I just chose C, in general, if that makes sense.

Error message at the end of the process: "Failed to read data from the disk....If the error persists, check using Check Disk Utility and create a backup of the disk (how does that help?!)...Direct R/W operation has failed (0x590001)....Input/output error (0xFFF1)".

I tried the .tib file from the C drive, which I was presumably using at the time...that's a a mistake, right?

Am I going to be able to recover my desktop to exactly the same state that it was when I backed it up and before "cloning" it? The original state is MY idea of "clone"...not sure what Acronis' idea of "clone" is.

Thanks.

Strummer, there is no obvious reason why attempting to clone one drive to another should destroy the data on both drives.  I have never experienced such a problem but have only ever performed cloning when booted from the Acronis Rescue Media and with great care to ensure that the correct drives are selected as source and target, plus having a full disk backup made before starting such a process.

Do you have a full disk backup of your source drive that was made before your first clone actions were performed?  If you do, then it should be possible to restore that backup image and recover your source drive back to how it was when that backup was taken.

If your system uses UEFI to boot into Windows, then that is the correct mode to use to boot the Acronis Rescue Media on your USB stick.  You should be able to use either the 32-bit or 64-bit version of the ATI application, but the preference should be to match the capability of your CPU, so use the 64-bit ATI application.

Any power failure/outage during a recovery operation should be treated as a fatal condition and the whole process should be restarted as the state of the recovery is uncertain and data being written when power was lost could be corrupted.

If you are attempting to recover your Windows OS, then you cannot do this by using the Recover Files & Folders option - this will not result in a working copy of Windows!  You must recover the OS using the Recover Disks & Partitions option.

You should only store your backup .TIB files on your separate backup drive(s) - storing such files on any drive that you attempt to recover to will wipe out those files, as advised previously.  All disk & partition recoveries first wipe the drive before restoring the contents of the backup image, and .TIB files are excluded from backup images by default, so would not be present to be restored back again!

If you have any incremental .TIB files which do not also have a matching full .TIB file, then these are orphaned files and have no value for recovery or anything else - you should delete them!

If you are seeing any messages such as "Failed to read data from disk..." then you really should run CHKDSK /R for that disk drive as such errors can again be fatal if the data that cannot be read in inside a .TIB file that you are trying to recover.  Given your comments about having had a power outage - I would recommend running CHKDSK against all your disk drives / partitions to check that you have no latent issues waiting to trip you up further.

On a personal note: I would try to avoid using cloning where possible - there are just too many ways in which users can get it wrong that we see here in these forums.  Use Backup and Recover instead of doing cloning - it is a whole lot safer to use and gives the same end results.

" there is no obvious reason why attempting to clone one drive to another should destroy the data on both drives"

   Well, I used Acronis in the manner that it was intended to be used, I assume and...I've destroyed the data that I was trying to preserve. The nightmare continues.

   I had another attempt to use the recovery disk. I didn't have my USB with the a .tib file or whatever in my PC at the time, so there's still the possibility of the "confusion" you mentioned earlier, re having two internal drives with the "same" information on them, perhaps? I've never fiddled with the innards of my PC. There's locks on the front for the drives and I don't know where the key or keys are for that. I can access the drives from the side but would it be advisable to try and switch one drive off from that position? I'd hate to make things worse. You need to unplug the PC and wear gloves in order to troubleshoot which drive is which on PC?

   Here's what I tried today: Boot option > USB Disk 3.0 PMAP > Acronis True Image (64-bit) > Recover My disks and Files & folders > Refresh backups > my first NAS save appears here but the two options are in my D drive, a full backup dated months ago, which I don't want to recover, and one for today, which is incremental, but, again, I don't want this as I didn't make it myself...it's automated, I assume, and based on that earliest file which I don't want to restore > Browse > chose my last personally done backup in the NAS, which is listed as "incremental" for some reason...I was sure that it was a full type, at the time > Choose recovery method > I chose "Whole disks and partitions", I think > Select items to recover (two options: Disk 1, which is the D: drive and Disk 2, which is the C: drive > I go for the D drive...I'm not sure why the NAS source is being referenced here...THAT'S what I'm trying to recover! > Select destination of Disk 1 (two drives are displayed, Disk 1, which is the C: drive (NOTE: in the previous selection, Disk 1 was the D: drive!) and Disk 2, which is the D: drive (NOTE: again, the "Disk" numbers have swapped the drive to which they refer!)) > still on this page, I chose to tick the box for the "Recover disk signature" > Proceed (which I do, despite the warning about the contents of the drive being deleted).

   Since I chose to have the PC restart when Acronis had finished, when my PC restarts, NOTHING has changed. On "File explorer" > "This PC", Local disk C: has a Windows icon next to it (not sure if this relates to the "Recover disk signature" box I ticked), and it has 625GB of free space...it's got way too much data on it. I check to see what data that it does have, in 'Downloads", and it has two Acronis images of my first .tib file which I created, from months ago.

   Disk D: has 934GB of free space, which is nearly empty...it has some Windows files on it or something.

   Anyway, I suppose my question is (apart from how do I fix this?), will I be able to restore my recent Windows desktop to the same condition that it was? I.e. will I have ALL my data on it, and my desktop EXACTLY the same as it was then?

   Also, wondering if maybe instead of choosing the "Whole disks and partitions" option, I should try the option for "Chosen files and folders"...would that work to give me what I want?

Strummer, I have to confess to being a little confused as to the current status of your computer system at this point in time?

I understand that you have two drives that have previously both had a bootable Windows OS on, and that you had been able to boot to either of those copies of Windows by selecting the appropriate SATA configuration in BIOS.

Have I understood the above correctly?

What actual backup files do you have and what do those backup files relate to?

If you are wanting to restore any disk drive / partitions that contains a Windows OS, then only using Disks & Partitions for the Recovery type will work - as stated previously, you cannot just use Recover Files & Folders for Windows OS / system files etc.

I'm looking at attempting to do more work on this issue on the weekend, but I did a bit more in the meantime...

Hopefully I haven't done anything stupid, but I just formatted my D: drive, and I now know that the

D: Drive = SATA0 P0 on my Windows Boot options.

   I had used Acronis to put some data onto my D: drive, in order to safeguard my drive's contents...and that drive was bootable. Prior to formatting the D: drive, I had gone through all the different boot options to see how things stood.

   All the drives that I booted into, including portable drives, had Acronis content. They all, perhaps, seemed to have some sort of file which originates back to my original PC save, which is not what I want to return to now. They also appear to have been updated versions of that file since I had my problems cloning. On my portable drive, which I may want to format too (why keep it?), it has a file name ending in "_incb1_s5_v1.tib". Looks like I didn't make a note on the size or date of that.

   All the other internal drive boot options (x4, for two internal drives) had files with names like:

"SynologyAcronisSave27-05-2017" (that one was in my UEFI OS (P1...) boot selection)

Others included variants on it like:

SynologyAcronisSave27-05-2017_inc-b1_s4_v1".

The "s" part of those would increase in number, e.g. "s5", "s6". There are or were 4 such files. I'm not sure if they are .tib files.

   My GOAL is to recover the desktop which I had in place when I saved that to my NAS and before I attempted to clone it. Is that possible? I was wondering, maybe I don't have to reinstall an entire image (right word?) in order to achieve that? I.e. maybe just recover files and folders which allow me to recover all my downloads to that point and how my desktop looked.

   As far as how my "clone" attempt failed, is it possible that *somehow* Acronis decided that what I meant was to retrieve my earliest clone and unsuccessfully attempt to put that on both drives?

   IF I manage to fix this mess by other means, i.e. going through the hassle of redownloading all my apps and downloads etc, WHAT is the best method to PRESERVE your drive and the EXACT look of your desktop (and ALL of your downloads etc) using Acronis? (Does Acronis do that? If not, does ANY product do that? What on Earth do I need to do in order to ACHIEVE that outcome?) NOT cloning you say? To WHAT do I transfer that data? NOT my D: drive, you say? What about a portable USB? Does that need to be formatted and with no other data on it? There won't be a problem trying to restore my desired PC from my NAS to the C: drive which I shall be attempting to do it from? In which case, I have to use the Recovery Disk?

Okay, so what happens now?...no chance of me "confusing" Acronis now, with two bootable drives with the same OS on it, right? Should I format my portable USB? Seeing as I want to restore what I thought was a copy on my NAS of a more recent desktop, is there something that I should take from my NAS to another drive (portable?) to safeguard this data?

   Another concern...how will I know that in attempting to recover my desired PC desktop that something is wrong with the source (i.e. when I "successfully" access it and my desktop hasn't improved and most of my downloads are still missing), rather than me just not doing the right things in order to recover my desired PC? Because if I can't do that, I'll have to go through the hassle of redownloading everything that I need to, which would be annoying, and then I'd need to ask, again, how do I get Acronis to do what I WANT it to?

When it comes to booting, do you go with the Windows Boot Manager option or the UEFI OS option?

Just as an aside, it's pretty low of Acronis to have a default tick on the option to participate in the Customer Experience Programme...I didn't actually use their product within the 30 day free Support period...having an open ended timeframe to receive Support would have been better, I mean, so long as you are contacting them when you have started using the product.

Strummer, when you want to safeguard your OS drive's content, please use the Backup option to do this, not the Clone option.  Backup will save the content in an Acronis .TIB file on your backup drive that you select for that purpose but this will not be bootable, as it should not be.

Ideally, your computer should only have the one bootable drive, the one with your Windows OS installed and active, so when you say "All the drives I booted into, including portable drives, had Acronis content." do you actually mean, when you look at those drives from Windows Explorer rather than actually booting those drives?

Acronis file names follow a specific naming format as described in the ATIH 2017 User Guide: Backup file naming

A backup file name has the following attributes:

• Backup name
• Backup method (full, inc, diff: full, incremental, differential)
• Number of backup chain (in the form of b#)
• Number of backup version (in the form of s#)
• Number of volume (in the form of v#)

  For example this attribute changes when you split a backup into several files. Refer to Backup splitting for details.

Thus a backup name may look the following way:

1. my_documents_full_b1_s1_v1.tib
2. my_documents_full_b2_s1_v1.tib
3. my_documents_inc_b2_s2_v1.tib
4. my_documents_inc_b2_s3_v1.tib

If you are creating a new backup, and there is already a file with the same name, the program does not delete the old file, but adds to the new file the "-number" suffix, for example, my_documents_inc_b2_s2_v1-2.tib.

This means that if you have a file with the file name containing _inc_b1_s5_v1.tib then you also need other files for this backup chain, including _full_b1_s1_v1.tib along with _s2, s3, s4 files.

This applies equally to your "SynologyAcronisSave27-05-2017" files, assuming that these are all .TIB files.

As stated previously, to recover your desktop back to a specific date and time, you would need to restore an Acronis full disk & partitions backup that was created when the desktop was in the state that you want it to show.  You cannot just restore Files & Folders to do this other than perhaps recovering your Downloads folder contents.

On an UEFI system, you should be selecting Windows Boot Manager in the boot options rather than selecting a specific SATA drive designation.

   I'll change tack, if you don't mind, so I'll ask some basic questions about operations, but before I do, I'll just bring you up to speed with my current situation.

   I restored my first Acronis backup, from a few months back and updated the apps and the OS. Since I was asking about recovering browser bookmarks, maybe it's just smarter to have that as my default backup. I went into Acronis: "Backup" > "Add backup" and made a backup of my current desktop, which appears in the Acronis app under "This computer". I'm pretty sure that I tested this backup and restored it via the recovery disk. However, for some reason, my desktop icons were all organised in columns on the left-hand side of my monitor, unlike my desktop at the time. Why is that? Windows does that itself sometimes, for reasons that I can't explain. Seeing as the updated backup of my original seems to work properly, is it okay to delete the original backup from Acronis' "This computer" list AND my NAS?

   Seeing as how I couldn't access my 2nd backup from my NAS, what are some troubleshooting suggestions for that? There is a file in my NAS for that...so how do I get the Acronis app to recognise its existence and make it available when I use the recovery disk? When using the recovery disk, I can access my original backup by entering a password for my NAS, and I find it in the "Home" folder. My second backup is in the "Homes" folder, which is a separate, unrelated folder to "Home"...not sure if I created the "Homes" folder myself, but Acronis doesn't require me to enter a password to access it. If I have been able to access that backup, I haven't been able to restore it for some reason.

   Speaking of not doing anything stupid, as I did previously, I thought that I'd use the opportunity of having a temporary backup installed to try and install a Linux distro on my other, internal drive...the same distro which bricked my drives the last time. I bricked both my drives again...even though I installed it on a "different" drive using the vague descriptors of the distro. It might have been my Windows 10 backup (clone?) on a portable USB which saved my PC from requiring a tech to fix both my non-working drives.

   Just mentioning this because what I want a backup to do is to be able to recover and restore my entire OS and desktops to the state it was in when I made a backup. So, the advice that I'm seeking is on how to do that with Acronis...just imagine that I'm thinking of reinstalling a Linux distro onto my other drive...which I am.

   So, does a clone do that? If not, what does cloning do? A full backup does this, right? Can I CHOOSE to do a one off incremental backup of my PC anytime that I like? Does that "overwrite" my NAS backup or create a new backup? Again, if it overwrites my NAS backup, does it allow me to FULLY restore my OS and desktop? If it does, HOW do I do that?

   Another basic question...there are TWO kinds of backup, right? A "full" one which will backup and make bootable your .tib file, and one which will only backup certain files and folders, right? I think that my 2nd Acronis backup (which I can't restore), has a lot of games which I downloaded on it. I'd like to put those back on my desktop without having to redownload them all again. Can I access them from the 2nd, full backup and add them to my current desktop? My current desktop has a game store app and a folder with the games that I've purchased from them...so I'm not sure how recovering my downloaded games will affect that folder in my earlier, but updated desktop. If I just want to backup my folder with the downloaded games in the future, how does that affect my current desktop with the same folder but very few downloaded games? Basically, I'm looking for advice on how to restore files and or folders without messing with my current system or creating conflicts with earlier versions of those files or folders on my current system.

   Lastly, I downloaded Macrium Reflect free to try it out. My Acronis app is *somehow* showing "Entire PC 1.2 TB of data selected" for the source to back up...my drive does NOT have a TB of data on it! How is that happening? I successfully created a backup using Macrium, I think, but I haven't been able to test the recovery disk as I can't access my NAS contents from it for some reason.

P.S. I do find it quite telling that you said previously:

"I would try to avoid using cloning where possible - there are just too many ways in which users can get it wrong that we see here in these forums".

Users getting it wrong? Maybe it's Acronis getting it wrong if people don't find their product easy to use?

Strummer, to try to respond to some of your points / questions:

 ""I went into Acronis: "Backup" > "Add backup" and made a backup of my current desktop, which appears in the Acronis app under "This computer". I'm pretty sure that I tested this backup and restored it via the recovery disk. However, for some reason, my desktop icons were all organised in columns on the left-hand side of my monitor, unlike my desktop at the time. Why is that? Windows does that itself sometimes, for reasons that I can't explain. Seeing as the updated backup of my original seems to work properly, is it okay to delete the original backup from Acronis' "This computer" list AND my NAS?""

A backup of your 'Desktop' is just a files & folders backup of that particular folder taken in isolation from where Windows stores other settings related to how your desktop looks, i.e. within the Windows Registry settings.

If you want to preserve the full look & feel of how your computer looks, then you should be making a full disk backup of your Windows OS in order to capture all the information needed for this.

The decision about deleting your backup task and files from your NAS has to be yours to make as you know that you have other backup tasks and files that can be used for recovery if needed or not.

""Seeing as how I couldn't access my 2nd backup from my NAS, what are some troubleshooting suggestions for that? There is a file in my NAS for that...so how do I get the Acronis app to recognise its existence and make it available when I use the recovery disk? When using the recovery disk, I can access my original backup by entering a password for my NAS, and I find it in the "Home" folder. My second backup is in the "Homes" folder, which is a separate, unrelated folder to "Home"...not sure if I created the "Homes" folder myself, but Acronis doesn't require me to enter a password to access it. If I have been able to access that backup, I haven't been able to restore it for some reason.""

Sorry but you need to manage the storage locations on your NAS and ensure that any such locations are accessible when needed for recovery.  Some of this is about how you have configured your NAS and what credentials are needed to access the same.  I know from my own Synology NAS that it will try to default to a subfolder called Homes under some circumstances which is different to how I have it configured.

"" what I want a backup to do is to be able to recover and restore my entire OS and desktops to the state it was in when I made a backup. So, the advice that I'm seeking is on how to do that with Acronis...just imagine that I'm thinking of reinstalling a Linux distro onto my other drive...which I am.""

This is exactly what a full Disk & Partitions backup is capable of doing if all required (Hidden/System) partitions are included in the backup.  Installing a Linux OS as a dual-boot OS on your system is beyond the scope of this topic / discussion and is something that should be approached with a lot of care for all the reasons you have already mentioned, i.e. the ability to wipe out your other OS installation in the process..!

""So, does a clone do that? If not, what does cloning do? A full backup does this, right? Can I CHOOSE to do a one off incremental backup of my PC anytime that I like? Does that "overwrite" my NAS backup or create a new backup? Again, if it overwrites my NAS backup, does it allow me to FULLY restore my OS and desktop? If it does, HOW do I do that?""

A clone is not the same as a full Disk & Partitions backup and requires a spare disk drive of equal capacity to that of the source drive.

All backups must start with a Full backup image, but after that, depending on how you configure the Backup Scheme for the backup task, you can then create Incremental or Differential backup images that are based on that previous backup.

All backup images are created in addition to your existing backups, so they do not overwrite your previous backups.  Automatic cleanup will delete unwanted backups according to the rules that you configure for the backup task, but any deletions are only actioned after a new full backup has been created successfully (to avoid deleting a required backup and leaving none!).

""Another basic question...there are TWO kinds of backup, right? A "full" one which will backup and make bootable your .tib file, and one which will only backup certain files and folders, right? I think that my 2nd Acronis backup (which I can't restore), has a lot of games which I downloaded on it. I'd like to put those back on my desktop without having to redownload them all again. Can I access them from the 2nd, full backup and add them to my current desktop? My current desktop has a game store app and a folder with the games that I've purchased from them...so I'm not sure how recovering my downloaded games will affect that folder in my earlier, but updated desktop. If I just want to backup my folder with the downloaded games in the future, how does that affect my current desktop with the same folder but very few downloaded games? Basically, I'm looking for advice on how to restore files and or folders without messing with my current system or creating conflicts with earlier versions of those files or folders on my current system.""

No!  There are different Backup Schemes but only one real type of Backup, i.e. a .TIB file that is created by the backup process, and which can have further smaller .TIB files associated with it according to the type of backup being done, i.e. incremental or differential.  

You cannot make a .TIB file bootable - it is a container file holding the backup data that needs to be restored to a disk drive to be usable.

Within a Backup .TIB file you can store different types of data, i.e. a Disks & Partitions backup contains copies of the data required to recreate those types of file structures on a disk drive, whereas a Files & Folders backup contains only the information required to recreate those data structures.

Backup .TIB files can be accessed from within Windows using Explorer - just double-click on the .TIB file and provided ATIH is installed correctly, then the contents of the file will be shown and can be navigated, and data can be copied from the backup file.

""My Acronis app is *somehow* showing "Entire PC 1.2 TB of data selected" for the source to back up...my drive does NOT have a TB of data on it! How is that happening?""

'Entire PC' can include more that your OS disk drive, by definition, it includes any other disk drives that you may have connected at that time, so can include your other disk drives such as your backup drive too.  It is better to click on 'Entire PC' and then select the specific disk drive that you want to include in your backup rather than relying on this 'catch-all' source option. 

""Users getting it wrong? Maybe it's Acronis getting it wrong if people don't find their product easy to use?""

Acronis True Image is a very powerful product which operates at a very low level in the OS and if used without caution can seriously damage the health of the computer.  It can be used safely but cloning is one aspect of the product that some users seem to go blindly ahead and use without taking any precautions to safeguard their computer data and come unstuck when they make a mistake. 

Thanks for that. I've had more complications today for some reason. I was looking for the option to make an incremental backup on the Acronis app. I don't see it. An incremental is a "full backup" still, right (I mean in the sense that it has a .tib file and you can restore your PC by selecting it with the recovery disk)? I tried backing up my PC by clicking on one of the options for "This computer", which would be files that already in my NAS...should I assume that backing up doing this would overwrite that NAS backup? In any case, I had no success...maybe because you can't do what I was attempting to do? By choosing one of those files on my NAS, Acronis wouldn't be backing up that particular, older file onto my current PC if I tried to restore it, would it?

   Weirdly, I couldn't seem to get "Back up now" to work. I tried to create a new backup (i.e. not using one of the items already listed on "This computer", because I couldn't access or find the NAS...accessing the NAS' "Home" directory required a password, which worked, but for the first time today, accessing the "Homes" directory also required a password for some reason, and the details I gave for "Home" weren't accepted by the pop-up dialogue box...and I haven't even made any changes or done anything on that front. Before I attempted this action, I did move my 2nd ever Acronis backup from Homes, to Home, due to my previously stated problem of accessing Homes when trying to restore a file using Acronis.

   When I did try and "Back up now" my "Entire PC" from one of those items listed in "This computer", it wouldn't take. I'd get messages like "The last backup has been stopped. It will be restarted at...". This would happen continuously with my 1st ever file, 2nd file and "Add backup" when I tired to add a new one in the options in "This computer". Is this a Windows Network problem? How do you fix it? I don't get how I am seemingly randomly getting this work to sometimes and not others. I'm not changing Windows settings, I don't think.

   With these failures, I'd go to "This PC" and right click on the item in "This computer", I think, and choose "Validate". This would result in a red circle with an "X" in it, between "Entire PC" and "Network place".

   So, I had to whip out an unused 1 TB external USB to backup my current PC. I think that the Acronis app does say that the backup will be bootable (which is contrary to what you said, I think). When I try booting into the external USB, I got the message "Missing operating system", so I tested the backup using the recovery USB. The Acronis recovery USB WAS able to select the items in my NAS, i.e. .tib files. I'm not sure what it worked in recovery mode but not in the app on my PC as well. Anyway, the external USB did seem to work when used it to restore my PC (there was nothing wrong with my PC, I just wanted to test the recovery method).

   To your reply now...since I am using these .tib files to restore my PC, these are then, by definition, "full backup", right? In which case, why does my desktop's look keep getting rearranged? What do you need to do in order to restore your desktop's icon arrangement? Currently I'm just manually moving the app icons to where they were before they were rearranged.

   Would a home user have any need of the clone feature? For what reason would you use it? I'm assuming that it would be good for people not working with Windows? I.e. assuming that Acronis works with Linux, people could make a lot of clones of their Linux setup to give to friends etc.

   I did start using the Clone Disk Wizard to see what was involved...I didn't understand what the meaning of "Files and masks for exclusion: C:\" etc. was.

   Via the Acronis app, I had a look at "Recover PC", the message: "All current data, including documents and applications, will be deleted". Is that to day that you can restore your PC via the app on your PC, without requiring the recovery USB?

Strummer, I'm sorry but we appear to be going round in circles with your questions and my answers without seeming to be making any real progress here.

I would recommend at this point that you should become familiar with the Acronis Knowledgebase and read through some of the How To articles that are published there, these may also include a video tutorial to further illustrate the point being made.

How-tos

Acronis True Image 2018: how to restore your computer with WinPE-based or WinRE-based media

Acronis True Image 2018: how to back up entire computer

Acronis True Image 2018: how to restore files from a backup (Windows)

Acronis True Image 2018: how to back up your computer or mobile device to NAS  

1540: Difference between Backup and Disk Clone  

An older forum topic but still useful:  

Great Acronis "How-To" videos and other Acronis Resources

Plus of course, the ATIH 2018 User Guide where I would suggest reading through the Basic concepts section at the very minimum but also read about Backing up data and Recovering data in the user guide.

   Okay. I'll have to look at those later. I'm really hating this and am avoiding dealing with it as much as possible (currently I'm backing up to an external USB drive as I'm having trouble accessing my NAS for some reason). Actually, I'm feeling more helpless as I go on. I was using the Acronis app, and, like I said, it started throwing up logins and passwords for my Synology NAS which it wasn't before.

   Since you have Synology yourself, do you think that might have occured because I moved one .tib file from Homes to Home? Are Homes and Home both default Synology folders? I think that Home may have had a password required when I used Acronis before, iirc, but I don't think that Homes did. For some reason I now seem to be having trouble with Synology as well...I couldn't seem to access files, so I mapped the drive to my PC, again. Then it game me this message: "Failed to map a network drive...the specified username is invalid. (2201)". I have no idea why this is happening now. Bizarre.

   On the Acronis app, under This PC, there is a list of saves...are they required to restore .tib files? What happens if you delete them? Can I add an older .tib file to that list, if it is required for access?

   Can you Recover Files from the app (as opposed to the recovery disk)? I didn't see an option for it...it's annoying if Acronis have to make you work to find basic functions of its software.

   Lastly, I created a new folder on my desktop which is where I keep downloaded games. If I wanted to restore an earlier version of that folder using Recover Files, would I have to recover individual games, or could I just grab the entire folder? Do you need to do this via the recovery disk?

   Sorry if I've been a pain, but I haven't found this process at all intuitive. It would have been good if Acronis didn't have a time limit on when you get your free support...i.e. you get your free support from the moment that you contact them, not from when you purchase their product.

Strummer, please see KB 6031: List of support options for Acronis products with regard to your final comments about free support.  You get up to 2 years free support from date of purchase plus there are options on the Acronis Support pages for providing PreSales support to potential customers.

With regard to Synology NAS folders, I have both Home and Homes shown in the File Manager listing for my Synology NAS but I do not use either - I have created my own folders to reflect how I want to use the NAS, i.e. a folder called Backups for that purpose etc.

Moving backup file locations can cause problems with ATI as it keeps track of such locations in its internal database, but you can normally resolve such problems by doing a Validation for the backup task that created the moved backup file - this process will give a prompt where one of the options is to browse to the new location for the backup file(s).

See KB 58004: Acronis True Image 2016: Troubleshooting Issues Related to NAS Credentials for advice on how to resolve NAS credentials (Username & password) issues which still applies to 2017 and 2018 versions.

Yes, you can recover files from the main ATI GUI provided that the task that created those files is shown in the list of tasks.  You can also recover files and/or folders by using Windows Explorer and double-clicking on your backup .TIB file which will open the file and allow you to browse the contents, or to copy & paste files or folders to another location.