POOR User Interface in True Image Home 2011

I agree and please could we have some reaction from Acronis. After buying many versions and upgrades, I feel frustrated with my last purchase.

I am now using build 6696 and this build has fixed the very sluggish interface problem (for me). This means that if I want to modify or add a backup that I can do it within a reasonable time. Acronis TIH 2011 build 6696 is actually working very well for me now. I have much less objection to the User Interface (UI) now than I did in post #12 of this thread. We are now 3 months on from then and I didn't take a refund like I threatened.

My comments now:

The product works for me. It does the job. I have set it up and and can forget it and it runs nicely and sends me emails on the results. In recent times it has not failed in a backup. This (for me) is better reliability than ATIH 2010.

I had to come back and modify (add and delete) some backups recently. I had to learn the UI all over again. It did not take long but for the defintions that I added I had to edit them several times because of the way the UI is arranged. Settings are hidden in all sorts of illogical places that are missed unless you know or recall. There is some ways of doing things that seem to be there just to annoy me. When you do a file backup it always ticks My Documents in addition to the file you wanted to backup. It can be unticked but why tick it in the first place? There are more crazy things but wont bother listing them. I am sure they are well known.

Now that I have the product I will continue to use it but I think that I wont be buying ATIH 2012. I am now looking elsewhere. I want backups to work without having to make major investments of my time but I will never use things like Continuous Backup or is it Non Stop Backup or whatever. I want to run my backups when I am not using the machine so that I dont see a performance hit.

The Acronis management could probably stop a lot of this comment by making a statement of what is intended to fix this product. By not commenting they are allowing people to develop their own ideas and they appear to be unresponsive to the customers. This is never good for an organisation.

This ends my latest rant.

I don't have TI2011 but I went over to help a friend who bought it on my recommendation - he was really having some HW issues and we decided to do a manual backup of the drive.

Sorry Acronis but the TI2011 interface is just plain dreadful. Granted I wasn't familiar with it but I should have been able to find the obvious backup/validate/inspect the log commands staring me in the face on the screen without any searching. I couldn't believe how confusing it was.

My impression is that there has been an all out effort to turn this thing into a MAC application where you just let it do what it does without attempting anything else. I have no problem with one-click functionality but don't remove a simple manual capability from those of us who don't want to do it "your way".

Hi All,

Thanks to all those who posted replies to my post.

Just for everyones' info., currently my system consists of :
Windows 7 Professional 64-bit & XP Pro SP3 32-bit with 8GB of RAM at 1,600MHz - obviously using two separate partitions which are on a RAID 0 setup using 2 x 150GB 10,000RPM WD VelociRaptor HDD's. The mobo & CPU are high power fast units.
Equally obviously, I do not have system hangups complicating/confusing the issue, & the backups & verification complete relatively quickly for 114GB of data on the system drive.
Backups are to an internal standard 7,200RPM HDD & via eSATA to an external top quality 7,200RPM HDD. The external is in case of fire or theft.

I do a lot of work investigating different drives & hardware, so I need a program which backs up reliably each time, verifies the backup, & can easily recover a whole system.

I actually think the Acronis system as such, together with its' options, is an excellent product. Further, although I have not as yet run actual tests on the 2011 release, subjectively it seems to run faster than earlier versions.
My argument is solely with the 2011 interface - I can see where the marketing people have tried to offer a simplified system, but the vast majority of posts have a common thread in that they have failed miserably, & arguments are pointless; the majority is always right or one either goes out of business or suffers a horrible decline in sales.

Colin, the comment by Marcepa is correct - I concur with you on the way most forums state the number of posts a person has made, but this gives no indication as to whether they are "beginner", "expert" or in between. It simply shows that the person has not previously posted, whether due to contentment with the system, lack of time, or sheer frustration. So the classification is meaningless - just put in the number of posts & have done. Let us remember the old marketing adage that for each complaint there will be ten who don't bother & just give a product the "flick". Perhaps this is something Acronis should also remember.

In this case I have been driven to complain through sheer frustration, & I am not the complaining type!

As previously stated, the 2011 interface requires a whole new learning process, with ongoing surprises along the way. Nor is the information as easy to access as with 2010. For example, with a recovery on 2010, one can easily select the last increment, or any other increment to recover from in an incremental setup. In 2011, the interface simply shows the date of the first backup with no indication of following incrementals. Yes, one can go to the storage location, check the backups & recover from there to ensure the correct set is being recovered, but why all the extra work? And please don't argue that there is no need to do the check, I had several unhappy incidents where just clicking on "Recover" resulted in recovery from an earlier incremental than the latest. This meant that I had to recover all over again from the correct incremental - wasted time & effort.
Additionally, I am still trying to work out how to specify a particular folder for different OS backups - it seems to me that for each backup drive one is stuck with a single My Backups folder in which all backups go. Perhaps I am missing something?

Under 2010, one had a set of tabs & sub-tabs that one simply clicked on & the data came up instantly ready for a selected procedure. I could create/have different folders for each OS & easily select each.

To me it all smacks of a marketing exercise which has rebounded - there are previous cases of major players in different sections of the software market who tried this & ended up having to massively discount product in order to sell.

Ray,
Thanks for the detailed assessment. I wish I had read it before I updated to ATI2011 last week from 2010.

Can I ask some basic questions before I return it for a refund?
1.-What build of 2010 were you using? I have 4942, which is shown as the last build and don't remember seeing the calendar and log displays you posted.
2.-Did you also install the Scheduler Update 461 issued for 2010?
3.-When you uninstalled 2011 did you just use the Control Panel or did you also use the ATI Cleanup untility?

As far as my experience with 2011 goes, the issues I've seen so far are:
1. The initial Home screen was a shock and took hours to explore, even with the UserGuide to learn about.
2. The process of searching for previous *TIB files was curious. I have 4 internal HD's with various backup files on each. It found most, but not all. It wouldn't even add some that I pointed directly to.
3. My 2010 Task scripts are ignored. I have no clue how to recreate the backup jobs I was running regularly. I am trying to learn the Import Backup Settings tool, but the UserGuide is not much help.
4. In 2010 I had named folders on the backup HDs where I stored particular *TIB files when the tasks ran. 2011 won't let me address them at all.
5. The Notification issue drove me crazy until I came to the Forum and discovered the truth about it. I had an online chat session with Acronis yesterday but knew more about that issue than Support did. He finally admitted it was a bug that Development was working on for the next release, but had idea when that was coming.

I've been a loyal Acronis customer for many years now but sure am thinking about switching to another Imaging backup program today.
Thanks for the help.

Ray
I can see you have several difficulties there. I can help you with Notifications if you are able to use Gmail to send your emails. See my post here http://forum.acronis.com/forum/16478?page=1#comment-59649

Unfortunately Acronis caused confusion with their program names when they switched from a sequence number convention to a year convention. The sequence is True Image 10 Home, TI 11 Home, TI 2009 Home, TI 2010 Home, and the latest TI 2011 Home. You are using TI 10 Home with their latest Build #4942 released March 12, 2007. So I'm not surprised you don't see the images that I uploaded.

I am using Build #7154 of "TI 2010 Home" that was released Dec 24, 2010. Although I'm subscribed to receive update notices, I've never received notifications. I see they have Build #7160 released Feb 4, 2011 which I haven't installed. I did not install any scheduler.

I was using Windows Vista with 2011 and had so many issues that I uninstalled it with the Control Panel and followed it with their "tool." I then installed 2010 and had to recreate my tasks. A month later, I did a clean install of Windows 7 and installed 2010 so there should not be an residual Acronis files from previous versions.

As many others in this thread have done, I'd suggest you use 2010. I'd ask Acronis if they'll allow you to use your license for 2011 to install 2010 and use it instead of your TI 10 which is four years old.

If I could find a better backup software I'd switch too. I just want a simple, flexible, and stable backup program that I can configure and forget. Acronis backups are fast and reliable but their program is buggy and their ever-changing user interface is horrible.

I can't believe I didn't understand the change in naming convention for ATI... almost as bad as the GUI for 2011.
So, without ever having used ATI2010, I am assuming, from the comments in this thread that I should have little problem moving up from ATI10 - right?
For those who haven't looked at the release notes for Build 7160, I am appending them to this post.
So, now that I understand better the magnitude of the problems most of you here had with the 2011 GUI was the compare to ATI2010, that makes more sense. I've been blindly going along thinking my old ATI10 was just fine. Ray's posting pics really helped me see what you are talking about.
Would you all kindly review the release notes attachments and let me know if they address the issues you may be having with ATI2010?
If it looks good to you, I will definitely take Ray's suggestion and trade my ATI2011 license for an ATI2010 license, if Acronis agrees.
Thanks again for all your help.

I'm so disappointed with this new UI.
Specially about the thing where it thinks it's smarter and don't even let you log off without having to wait hours.
I know it's the validate but even shutting that off makes problems.
I want at least the 2010 UI back or the mobile (CD or USB)
Do I really have to install 2010 again?

T.

Hi All,
Sorry about the delay in replying to those querying/posting to me, but Northern v Southern hemisphere times added to other commitments conspired against me.
Although I was a recent initial critic on the forum, some of the posts are a bit harsh. Let me make it clear to all what my current thinking is. Some of these have been posted separately by others.

1. The real problem is that the UI for TI2011 is a huge change from the UI for TI2010. One has to learn it all over again, it is complex & many of the functions are not readily seen, indeed they are hidden away & do not appear until one opens a particular application. Acronis has apparently tried to simplify the UI by making it a “one-shot” application, & the majority of users do not wish that. They wish to retain the views instantly available in the UI for 2010, & make their own selections accordingly.

2. Acronis is in my mind without doubt the best value for money backup system one can currently get, particularly when one looks at the added utilities available.

3. TI2011 has some additional features to TI2010 –
· One in particular which appeals, is the ability to create simultaneous backups to different locations, (“Backup Reserve Copy”), rather than the TI2010 standard function where one needed to do two separate backups. So I can now backup to my internal disk while simultaneously creating the same backup on my external disk.

· Another is an “Update Backup List” which picks up all backups created by older versions of Acronis, or Acronis backups on another disk, & adds them to the list. This has caused much confusion among posters on the Forum, with some apparently trying to use the “Import Backups” function to do this job. This cannot work because that function is not intended for that purpose. I got caught myself on that, & in fact the “Update Backup List” function did not work the first time, but did the second. That glitch added to my confusion.

Having said all that, I believe the pros outweigh the cons & intend to battle on discovering more functions as I go.

I am having no trouble with backups, they & the validations are running much faster than 2010, the consolidations work perfectly in a ⅓ of the time or less taken by 2010, & unlike many of the “posters” I am not having any difficulty with deletions. One thing with deletions is that they must be done in Acronis & not directly via Windows Explorer, because Acronis stores the pathways as metadata which remains if a deletion is done via WE. Then it hits the fan, because Acronis keeps hunting for a non-existent backup. However, this was the same in 2010, it was just easier to see & rectify.

It also seems that many do not understand that in UI2011, if one clicks the “Delete” for a backup, the entire backup set consisting of the original full + all incrementals is deleted. To delete a single incremental one must go into the “recovery” option for that backup set, then right click on the tab designating the incremental backup & select the “Delete” option. This will delete only that incremental. However, deleting any incremental other than the last one will render the entire backup set useless & unrecoverable as the set is then missing data from the ongoing continuous stream. Again, this is no different to TI2010, it is simply done in a different fashion which has to be learned.

I can now say that Acronis are listening & watching, indeed I have received two emails from them in the past 24 hours requesting clarification & an Acronis System report on issues that others & I have raised, together with a particular error notification which sometimes occurs & seems to be incorrect in itself. This is pleasing because it shows that contrary to the opinion many of us have, Acronis are in fact monitoring & working to rectify some matters. As to whether that is enough must be left to the individuals to decide.

I am waiting for the next update before jumping back to TI2010, because I believe that many of the issues will be fixed, but it will take time & unfortunately one must be prepared to learn all about the functionality of the new UI. I doubt that Acronis will introduce such dramatic changes in one hit in the future; the outcry has been too large & too vehement on this occasion.

Regards,
Graham.

Tim Selec
you may need to install the latest version of Acronis (build 6696). That will probably speed up the UI for you. There was a bug in the earlier versions.

I am using release 6696 and the problem of an extremely slow backup and horrible interface are trulty awful.
I have now had an email from Acronis and am waiting to see if they can offer advice and hopefilly an improved interface to reverse my decision to look elsewhere and revert back to 2010 for now.

I started with True Image back at version 8 (2005); I agree, the UI is the worst I've seen from Acronis so far.

I'll probably go back to 2009, it has some weird bugs, but I know how to navigate them.

It may be time to find another backup vendor.

Hi Kable,
I am working with Acronis on speed & error report problems. Attached is an extract from my latest email to them which may be of interest to you. Please note that this is only a small part of the email &information sent to Acronis in reply to their emails.

"I have noted that if I perform an incremental backup with TI2011 on an existing TI2010 backup, the backup completes & validates within 10 minutes for 65GB of data & without any error reports.
If I attempt a new backup with TI2011, to either the default folder or a specified folder, two things occur.
1. The new backup will not go to either the default or a specified folder, only to the backup disk partition.
2. The backup semi-freezes at the “Validate” point & continues at an extremely slow rate, (validation taking between 30 & 45 minutes for 65GB of data), until it finishes with a “Completed with errors” message. Viewing the log shows a string of separate & differing error messages.
A new independent validation of the backup completes successfully within about 5 minutes without any errors.
Using Windows explorer, I can manually move the new backup to any required folder, then use the TI2011 UI to remove the original backup listing from the UI. Then running “Update Backup List” from the UI will find & insert the new backup location to the backup list.
Using the UI for TI2011, I can successfully recover the system from the new backup & location. Time taken from initiation to completion of recovery is about 15 minutes including validation".

I like others have been using Acronis since around v6 or v7. v11 was the best but doesn't work with Windows 7. I tired of fighting v2011 - the lame UI and the not backed up yet BS. Basically Arconis has gone downhill since they started using the year to identify the version. I have been imaging since Win95, used a program called HD95, then I used PQ Drive Image up thru v6. Tried Ghost and others. I just uninstalled v2011 and installed v2010. I really don't like v2010 UI either, but at least it works.

I'm now looking for another imaging software other than Acronis.

Sorry, but I don't feel like testing another beta and learning a new interface. Why don't they just put the previous UI back? And why should I pay to ugrade once more to a beta? At least TIH 2012 should be free for TIH 2011 existing users

marcepa wrote:

Sorry, but I don't feel like testing another beta and learning a new interface. Why don't they just put the previous UI back? And why should I pay to ugrade once more to a beta? At least TIH 2012 should be free for TIH 2011 existing users

I don't want to learn a new interface either. Acronis is a backup utility; something I want to set and forget.

For 2012, just put back the 2010 user interface. It has a calendar showing status for all backups and a logical and easy to use workflow to create and edits tasks. The disasterous 2011 design is an illogical scrambled mess of status, backups, and tasks which is why many of us have gone back to 2010.

I'd recommend that Acronis offer those who've purchased 2011 either a free upgrade to 2012 (assuming it's useable) or a full refund.

i absolutely agree with the comments on the ABSOLUTELY HORRIBLE UI interface of 2011. its ridiculous that i have a 6core AMD processor and i still have to wait for "My backups" to show up on startup where in previous versions on even less efficient hardware, i had all my backups display almost instantly! what were Acronis engineers thinking when they designed this UI?!?!?! if 2012 still maintains this UI, i'm abandoning Acronis.

I also find the 2011 interface to be worse. I just spent quit a bit of time trying to figure out where I could view the entire comment line(s) I have made on each backup to tell me what was contained in the backup. It appears there is no easy way to see this and I have dozens of backups. I want to prune the ones I no longer want and I have to open each one to see what is in it? I seem to recall one of my previous versions let me see this information much more easily, but it seems that the earlier versions won't read my 2011 backups either, so I can't use one of them to get this info. What are you guys at Acronis thinking? Don't you actually test your product with real users? I use your product to save time and it is taking more of it than it used to! That does not sell me on buying it again.

I certainly can't be as eloquent as the previous posters so I will simply say +1 to the 2010 GUI.

Perry

I can simply not recommend 2011 to any of my customers - the lack of a simple task and log screen to immediately see any issues is unforgiveable..

I tell people to ONLY install ATI Home 2010 build 7046 - it may not be perfect - but it works and logically too. I wish that Acronis would sack the development team that convinced them the "new look 2011" was hip, trendy and innovative........

You get what you deserve if you employ amateurs.

I'm fed up with waiting for a revised updated version of 2011 that is actually an improvement over 2010 and am re-installing 2010.
The only way that I would ever go back to Acronis for any future versions is via a free update to at least match 2010 for speed and UI.

As slow as ever and they try to tell us all that it is something to do with other programs when the only change was to install the newer, much slower, 2011.

Some jerk has for sure designed the graphics user interface of Acronis home 2011.
Even their support sucks which is sending some automated answers, while at the same time, same question gets answer in this forum that "it's due to some bug.."

OK, I see an email on 6-15 from Acronis that ABR 11 has been released.
Could someone please help me understand if this product is an update to ATIH 2011?
If so, have they solved the problems we have discussed here?
If not, does anyone have a clue when they will release a "fixed" version of 2011?
Thanks,
Ron

I believe ABR is Acronis Backup and Recovery and is a business product, not a home product, so it is not an update for TI2011.

If you are referring to the poor UI as a problem to be fixed, my experience with TI9, TI10, TI11, TI2009 and TI2010 updates says no, it won't be fixed in this version but one would think there will be a major effort to fix the UI for TI2012. Updates will be for more technical bug fixes and experience says not all of them will be fixed before the next version release. If the pattern is followed, TI2012 will be announced/out early in the fall and you won't be getting any special deal because you didn't like TI2011 other than the standard upgrade price deal.

I just backed off to the 2010 version. The user interface is the worst I have ever seen in the product. It is User Hostile. Makes no sense and the manual is no better.

I just backed off to the 2010 version. The user interface is the worst I have ever seen in the product. It is User Hostile. Makes no sense and the manual is no better.

I just backed off to the 2010 version. The 2011 interface is user hostile. It makes no sense. You cant find anything and the user manual is just as bad.

It is so frustrating that a reasonably good interface in 2010 was destroyed in 2011. The product makes no sense and is Soooooo frustrating to use right now. I will no longer upgrade until Acronis gets its act together.

Quite a Catch-22.

You will not get the new improved UI unless you upgrade and buy 2012.

So they may be as crazy as foxes. Come out with some improvements for 2011 and destroy the UI at the same time, knowing full well we would have to buy 2012 to avoid this horrible mess as soon as possible.

Machiavellian but effective.

Perry

Me to, I did the downgrade to 2010 last week.
Now the world is okay again

Anton How to downgrade it? Which is the 2010 version did you download?

Uninstall Version 2011
Install Version 2010, Build 7046 (I think this was the last Build) with Serial form Version 2010

I can't comment on previous UI design but I can say that the UI is unpleasantly slow. For backups that might just be my server since it's an eco device and has a lot on its plate. But I have twice now booted off a recovery stick into the Aronis console and that's awful. Over half an hour to actually get to the point where the restore was running. It took longer to navigate the UI than it did to actually restore 25GB of data.

Andrue, what you describe may be a bug that was present in the earlier versions. The UI was very slow when you had defined a network share but it was inactive or disconnected.

Time to see if you need an update. ATIH 2011 is now up to Update 2 Build 6857. Check your system by opening ATIH 2011, clicking on Help then Help About and all will be revealed. You can also select Check for Updates in the Help menu.

I'm on the latest version (it updated a few weeks ago) and the poor speed was observed while using the Acronis bootable media not Windows.

I won't go into a long rant,but I got the new version(TI 2011) and within a week reloaded TI 2010.Now I can at least tell what happened and what is supposed to happen in the future as far as my backup scheduling goes.The new interface is scattered and complicated and has this long /large learning curve.

I'd just like to add my voice to those hating the new UI. The problem I have for one of my clients is that he can't go back to 2010 as that version doesn't see NAS devices to back up FROM. 2011 does (but it took a while to work out how to run incremental backups from it). To say the new UI is an utter mess is like saying that the News Of The World/News International have a slight problem at the moment.

I've been a user and avid fan of Acronis since version 7 and have recently tried 2011 coming from v12 (2009) and find this product has "snatched defeat from the jaws of victory".

The underlying engine seems as good as ever and updated for recent chipsets, but the interface is awful in practice. It's sad as I can imagine much money, and endless committee time has been wasted to produce a veritable camel of an interface. It's a beautiful looking camel to some I'm sure, but I doubt I'm alone in wanting a workhorse, not a camel.

I've tried using it for a while to "get over the newness", and I’ve tried to get used to what others have referred to as its un-intuitive nature, but there are just too many functional deficiencies. As one who likes to assign meaningful titles (and notes) to backups stored in a dedicated partition, the new interface makes for a complete mess. To have to use "My Backup" as a folder is not good, but not being able to remember a preferred partition is unacceptable (it defaults to the wrong drive) and results in confusion and wasted time. Essential data is just not well presented. Windows explorer offers a clearer view of your backups than this interface. Managing backups from Acronis’ interface is a horrible experience.

Also the product itself has been growing “features” over the years which I’m just not interested in adding more confusion. I want a functional backup program to make a full backup when I want where I want it and be 100% reliable. Period. Pity the engineers having to maintain all that superfluous code. Acronis need to refocus on the basics of a good backup program.

I shan’t be buying this program, it’s sadly time to look around for another reliable workhorse until Acronis gets its act together.

I raised free customer supported for a confirmed bug recently for v2011 which I purchased around 2 months back. But I got misdirected answer that I should look in so and so link in documentation. It took me some time to learn that I'd better go back to 2010 stable version but for that I'll need to pay $20!

I'm using only File backup( only 1% of it's features may be) and it is already ridden with many issues. But Acronis support personnel has asked me to use one earlier version of 2011 which does not have this bug.
But Acronis should first answer how many other bugs will then I need to deal with if I revert to 2011 initial version?

Well folks, True Image Home 2012 is out on the market. Did the folks at Acronis listen to users' complaints about TI 2011, particularly with regard to the user interface?

Well, yes and no.

I really had to laugh today when I was testing the 2012 Boot Media Disk to restore a partition. Many users in the forums were yearning for the GUI of TI 2010 and I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw it back again, in 2012, but - get this - only in the Boot Media version of True Image 2012! (As it was in TI 2011 I suppose too.) Nice to see an old "friend-by-comparison" again, but what a bizarre development decision. Imagine someone used to the 2012/2011 interface rebooting from the Boot CD and having to deal with a 2010 GUI. Not difficult, I suppose, but certainly enough to elicite an initial "what the...?!" reaction

Anyways, Acronis remained pretty much stubborn otherwise and has refused to give up its love for white space, moving it from the left and right margins in TI 2011 into the middle between backup info and buttons which magically appear and disappear, depending on the status of a backup and where you direct your mouse cursor (see image at bottom of report).

• There is still unfortunately no menu bar (for easy access to virtually all features and commandos, potentially via keyboard shortcut - more about that shortly!), the address bar and browser-like navigation buttons have vanished (good decision!) and static tabs (not the dynamic ones familiar in modern browsers) have appeared in their place. (One has to wonder just how often a user is going to click on the "Get Started" tab, which could have just easily been parked in the Help menu.)
• In the "Backup and Recovery" section there is a pseudo toolbar displaying NOT the more frequently needed File-/Email-/Non-Stop-Backup functions (these are buried in a drop-down list "Other Backups"), but again (as in TI 2011) the once- or twice-needed "Create bootable media", which should have gone into "Get Started" or "Tools and Utilities" and be offered as an option to be created upon completion of the initial installation.
• Then there are a series of smaller symbols allowing users to collapse/expand the backup list. If it could be said that Acronis listened to users at all, it would be here, however minimally. With a vertical resolution of 768 pixels, you have access to 4 backup tasks in expanded mode without having to scroll; 9 backup tasks in collapsed mode. (No, there are no versions listed underneath the backup tasks, as in 2010, staying true to the 2011 interface.) TI 2012 saves (thankfully!) the last setting upon being closed. Interestingly enough, the only useful information gain in expanded mode is the number of versions a backup has. The rest of the information contained in text form in the expanded mode can be seen in the nice color-coding and symbols (for backup type). Aside from the text buttons turning into symbols upon collapse, that's it.
  

What a shame, to put it mildly. Acronis could have used the screen real estate much more efficiently and not forced the user to click the mouse unnecessarily (I'm still exhausted from TI 2011). Any or all of the items in the context menu, for example, have ample space to be displayed even in collapsed mode, especially "Remove from list", which is buried again in a sub-context menu, which means instead of a single click to remove an entry, you have to right-click, point to "More", point to "Remove from list" and finally click. (See image at bottom of report.) Ridiculously time consuming for such a simple and commonly used function.

You can pretty much throw out the keyboard using TI 2012, because even if you try to use it, you will often not know where you are. Try hitting the tab key and guess where you are in the Backup and Recovery list. Likewise, you can forget about shortcut key combinations, but hey, who the hell uses a keyboard these days anyway, much less shortcuts, right? (Great advertising potential here: "Acronis True Image Home 2012: The No. 1 keyboardless Backup and Recovery solution!")

Is an "upgrade" to TI 2012 from 2011 worth it?
If you are interested in syncing files (the only really new feature in TI 2012) via the Acronis servers, perhaps, but I'm personally not interested in that feature (and couldn't get it to work satisfactorily anyway) and am not inclined to "upgrade" from 2011. The Backup List can be collapsed to show more backup tasks, the colors and symbols are somewhat helpful and the logging information per Email is more comprehensive than in TI 2011 and 2010. If that is reason enough for you, go for it! But I resist the temptation to buy TI 2012 simply because Acronis made a lousy GUI in 2011 and improved it only trivially in 2012. That could be said to be an interesting but mean marketing strategy, if it were intentional.. The only reason I prefer 2011/2012 over 2010 is the versioning funtion introduced in TI 2011 and kept in TI 2012. I have customers who are still running TI 2010 and see no reason for them to change at this point.

Alfred,

Good points. I agree with all of them.

A couple of nice UI improvements in 2012:
- the calendar-based log view, reminiscent of 2010's task manager,
- the ability to name and save custom backup schemes.

A step backward? 2012 seems to have trouble indicating the date of the last backup in a series. It seems to indicate the last full backup of the series, not the last differential (or incremental?) done. The email backup in 2011 never was able to do much for me. It always seemed to have permissions problems with the PST file (Outlook 2010). 2012 has no such problems and lists every single email it backs up. Yesterday was the first email backup and this verbosity extended to some 4 or 5 thousand emails. Since I do a differential series, today should be a little less but I have this to look forward to every 7 days? It's a good thing I suppose but the sheer verbosity breaks my (very rough) automated checking by Gmail. Gmail truncates the display of the notification email and the checking ends at the truncation. I happen to be looking for a statement near the end. So even though it actually works, Gmail indicates a failure. Such is the price of progress or is it regress? Oh another minor (I hope) problem is that I do a file backup of the Outlook PST file. I have used a NTFS Junction Point to relocate the PST file and 2012 seems to have developed a problem with a shadow copy. I dont recall this in 2011. I may have to stop using the Junction Point mechanism and tell Outlook exactly where the PST file is. When I did it I just couldn't be f...ed massaging Outlook. For those who may not know about Junction Points and Symbolic Links have a read of wikipedia here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NTFS_symbolic_link .

I installed 2012 over the top of 2011 and it appears to have identified all of the existing backups. Because I used the keys from ATIH 11 as an upgrade qualifier I had to install as a trial and then do the real activation later. The installer cant handle the 25 digit keys from earlier products. I also upgraded a 2010 version to 2012. All of you 2011 haters ( I was one, lol) out there are wondering why. Because 2011, for me, was always more reliable than 2010. Yes 2011 had that bloody awful GUI but I learned to love it, roflmfao. You can only hold back progress for so long before the tide comes in. I am sure that with a couple of quick succession releases that 2012 will have all its irritations fixed up and then it will be time for 2013.

It's now 6:30am (in eastern Australia) and my backups are running. I can see I am still getting faux failure notifications. Looks like I have some work to do. groan.

I, for one, will not be buying any further products from Acronis. The 2012 upgrade should have been free to all 2011 users.
Even if it was free, without changing back to the friendly usable interafce of 2010, I would not want to use it.

Acronis will not be getting any further business from me.

Are you listening at all Acronis? I thought you might get the hint before you released 2012 but I guess not. So here is the to do list:

1) FIRE those responsible for the 2011/2012 GUI. I honestly believe that you may have some moles from Norton working for you.

2) BRING BACK the old interface. I love the new features you are adding but the new interface is absolute garbage.

Meanwhile, I'm off to find another imaging product for my customers and myself or create one myself as it seems you have

opened up a new niche in the market.

Jeff et al.

you might like to give EaseUS ToDo Backup Free and/or EaseUS® Todo Backup Workstation 3.0 a try, which is, aside from its better and scrictly English UI, suspiciously similar to Acronis' Backup products! Check out the version comparisons!

I've actually talked with some of the UI developers (nice folks) and really just can not understand why Acronis insists on pushing this bulky, slow, click-frenzy interface for such an otherwise fine product.

Excellent suggestion Alfred and that's exactly what I did after I made my previous post. The interface is perfectly simple and curiously similar to that of earlier versions of ATI. I have already tested the backup procedure on my multi-boot system having Windows 7 Pro 64bit as the main operating system and XP Pro 32bit, Vista 32bit, and Apple OS X on other partitions of a 1TB hard drive. The backup seemed to go flawlessly but I have yet to test the recovery function which I think I'll whip out a blank drive and do that right now.

I operate a small computer repair business and having a reliable and non-confusing drive imaging solution is essential considering I need to plug virus ridden hard drives into my system on a regular basis. Also, my home user clients are often curious about how to keep things backed up. Imagine trying to explain how to use Acronis 11 or 12 to a person who can hardly grasp the concept of drive imaging.

I have been a devoted user and reseller of Acronis for years and one thing it has always been is reliable. I cant even count the number of times it has saved myself and my clients from certain doom. But reliability goes hand in hand with usability. One thing that has always terrified me is the possibility of restoring and wiping out the wrong partition or hard drive and with this new interface I believe you are just asking for it.

I will keep my eye on Acronis for the time being as a some of the new features look very interesting to me.

Thank you for your reply and suggestions Alfred.

Jeff