Reserve Copy "Copy source files as is" glich and loss of free support on new purchase

Hello James, welcome to this user forum.

You have raised a question here that I personally cannot find any answer for - I can't find any reference to the Reserve Copy "Copy source files as is" option in any of the forum posts or in the KnowledgeBase documents.

I can see this option on my own computer and can see also that selecting this is not preserved after saving the task and going back in to check the settings.

All the documentation and posts with regard to Reserve Copy state that this will always make a Full backup image of the selected source data regardless of the particular backup scheme being used, i.e. incremental or differential, so I am a little puzzled by this 'Copy source files as is' options.  I haven't used the Reserve Copy function so haven't noticed that this option was even there.

Other posts in the forum tend to be disparaging of using Reserve Copy and recommend creating a second backup task with the reserve copy separate location selected for the destination location - the main reason being to allow the use of the different backup schemes and also automatic cleanup.

Out of interest, what type of backup were you making where chose to 'Copy source files as is'?

I cannot see how this can actually work for anything other than a files and folders backup - system files in a disks or partitions backup wouldn't be much use if copied as is, and to be honest, I would probably choose a different synchronisation utility to achieve the same, such as SyncFolders or similar.

Ditto for me - never used it.  All I can find is the user guide info which shows that it will always take a full backup in .tib format.  Perhaps it was possible to use an "as is" backup in the past, but doesn't look like it in the current version.

Backup reserve copy

Backup reserve copy is an independent full backup version created immediately after a normal backup. Even when you create an incremental or differential backup version containing only data changes, the reserve copy will contain all the data selected for the normal backup. You can save reserve copies of your backups on the file system, a network drive, or a USB flash drive.

Please, be aware that CD/DVDs are not supported as locations for reserve copies.

To make a reserve copy:

1. Select the Create a reserve copy of my backups check box.
2. Specify a location for the backup copies.

   You can protect the reserve copy with a password. All other backup options will be inherited from the source backup.

This is a 2011 KB Article, but probably no longer quite applies... https://kb.acronis.com/content/16241 

You are correct in the fact being that I am using this particular backup only for files and folders. I schedule both a TIB backup on other media and
a Reserve Copy locally.  I backup certain files and folders from spreadsheets etc. of which occasionally a file becomes corrupted or saved
incorrectly.  I save the Reserve Copy backup regularly on a 2nd hard drive on my computer and having it in a "as is" form is very convenient to
restore a file that has become bad during a computer session by a simple delete, then copy paste.  I did this on an Acronis True Image Home 2010
version on an older computer that is being replaced and on which the Reserve Copy worked fine "as is" for this purpose.

I hope this explains why I miss having the Reserve Copy "as is" and why I am disappointed that the "Copy as is" feature in the current 2016 version
does not stick nor work.

I am still hoping for a solution or fix for this problem so I can do what I am used to doing with Acronis True Image.  I also do system image backups
and do appreciate the functionality and improvements I see in the 2016 Acronis but hope for a resolution to this bug.

Thanks for your reply and I welcome any further insights or helps.

Hello James,

One of the options here is to simply double-click on your local reserve copy .tib image file and then use Windows Explorer to do a copy and paste from there, exactly as you would with the 'as is' files.  This will require perhaps a few more clicks as you navigate through the explorer view of your backup files & folders, but works very well, plus adds a layer of further protection because the files are held in a proprietary archive and thus less exposed to malware corruption.

The other approach would be to use the Feedback tool in the application GUI and send your comments to the Acronis developers about the lack of functionality in the 2016 product as compared to what you had with 2010.