Acronis DriveCleanser (1 of 2-Wiping Partition) Stuck at estimated time left: Less than 1 minute for hours
I have tried twice now to use Drive Cleanser on a 1tb ssd drive, and after hours of Cleaning Disk.... it says, estimated time left: Less than 1 minute. And it stays at that for hours, and if I hit the x at the top corner, or hit cancel it's as if I hadn't even started the process. This is very frustrating. I have Acronis 2020 and Windows 10Pro 64bit. What I am trying to do ultimately is to put this new drive back to original. I had cloned it but got errors toward the end of the cloning, but it seemed to boot ok. Windows Disk Management won't allow me to just format it because of the MBR, so I decided to try to just start from scratch if you will and just reinstall Windows, but it won't allow me to use the drive as it already has the MBR on it. Any ideas or suggestions would be appreciated. Thank you


- Log in to post comments

Steven, the simplest approach to achieve your end aim would be to use the Acronis >> Tools >> Add new disk option and let this prepare the SSD by reinitialising it to your chosen partition scheme (GPT or MBR), then restore your backup to the SSD to put it back to how you want it.
Drive Cleanser is more intended to be a forensic data cleaning tool for when you are either wanting to dispose of or pass on a drive that may have had sensitive data stored on it. It takes a very long time to perform as it is doing multiple passes of writing random data etc to the drive, which is probably not a great idea for SSD type drives.
- Log in to post comments

I have had the occasion to use the DriveCleanser utility recently to wipe two different drives. In one case I ran the utility from the Windows start menu. In this instance the utility ran however there was no indication the app was running at all due to the fact, at least in my mind, that True Image itself was not Open. Fortunately the disk being cleaned was attached externally via a USB to SATA adapter cable that sports an activity light. I simply kept an eye on that light to determine progress. Once that light stopped flashing and remained steady I knew the operation had completed.
In the second case I ran the utility from an Open instance of True Image. In this case the utility did show a progress screen which remained visible throughout the process. At the end of the process this screen did remain at a less than one minute status even though the activity light on my adapter was steady. This condition only lasted a few seconds however at which time the utility displayed a Success message.
In both cases the result of the wipe was a drive that showed in Disk Management as Unallocated. That indicates that all data and formatting has been removed. If any data remains at this point recovery of it would be impossible.
As for conversion to GPT, Disk Management will accomplish that easily by right click on the drive and select Simple Volume
- Log in to post comments

I am having exactly the same issue...very annoying and disappointing that there is no solution after three months.
- Log in to post comments

Charles, have you raised a support case direct with Acronis for this issue as that is the only way you would possibly get a solution if there are issues with the Drive Cleanser tool?
Any drive wipe utility that employs multiple passes working against a large drive is going to take a significant time to complete in hours or possibly days!
Personally, I have never needed to use Drive Cleanser as have nothing that needed that level of forensic formatting to prevent data recovery by law enforement etc.
If you are using this on a drive that you are going to reuse then it is overkill. If you are intending to dispose of the drive, then hitting it will a decent ballpein hammer is a whole lot quicker and more satisfying too!
- Log in to post comments

I'm aware of the time it takes - it took 2 days to get to the first "less than 1 minute" message which stood for hours. My intention is to wipe and sell a batch of unused drives after upgrading all of the storage in my two RAID enclosures.
If I can figure out where the support request submission page is, I may just do that, but I've learned to trust user communities to be faster and more knowledgeable than support staff.
- Log in to post comments

- Log in to post comments

Same problem. I'm trying to clean some old external drives, and it hangs for hours/days on "one minute left."
- Log in to post comments

Yes, I have exactly the same problem as Steven C - running Acronis True Image 2020, Build 38600, on Win 10 X64.
- Log in to post comments

Martin Beta wrote:Yes, I have exactly the same problem as Steven C - running Acronis True Image 2020, Build 38600, on Win 10 X64.
Copy of the previous comment:
Dear customers,
We recommend installing a trial version of the latest update of the product, where we have implemented a lot of enhancements and fixes Acronis Cyber Protect Home Office. If the issue reproduces please contact our support for help: https://www.acronis.com/support/
- Log in to post comments

operaflute wrote:Same problem. I'm trying to clean some old external drives, and it hangs for hours/days on "one minute left."
Dear customers,
We recommend installing a trial version of the latest update of the product Acronis Cyber Protect Home Office, where we have implemented a lot of enhancements and fixes. If the issue reproduces please contact our support for help: https://www.acronis.com/support/
- Log in to post comments

Not only does a core feature of the product I purchased not work (ATI 2020), the same feature and symptom occurs in their "updated" (and renamed, but the same) product/version. Same error, same symptom. Over 24 hours just sitting at "less than 1 minute" for a drive wipe.
Key bugs never addressed. Cancellation of "support" less than two years after purchase. Never buying another Acronis product. Ever.
- Log in to post comments