Fix for "operations are in progress" during PC shutdown in Win Vista, 7, 8, and 8.1
Hello Everyone,
in Acronis True Image 2014 and earlier versions it was default behavior to show "Operations are in progress, please wait. The machine will be turned off automatically after the operations are complete." message if the machine gets shut down or restarted while Acronis task is running. In this article you can find more details.
Please note, that this message is not unique to Acronis, it can also be shown by operating system when any other process cannot be stopped in similar circumstances.
In Acronis True Image 2015 we changed program design so that all Acronis tasks running at the moment when machine is restarted or shut down are immediately aborted and have after that "cancelled by user" status.
If you use Acronis True Image 2015 and still face "Operations are in progress, please wait" message, please send me a system report gathered on the machine in question.
Anna,
Thank you for responding to the concerns of this forum.
Great news fixing this issue....BUT 2015 no longer offers Local Sync?? Must Sync to the cloud only....Glad i never bought it then found that out.....link here
https://kb.acronis.com/content/48614
The simplest solution I found, without having to write scripts, or uninstall Acronis, is this:
Reboot into "Safe Mode".
Start button -> run "System Configuration".
Under the "Startup" tab, uncheck these: Acronis Schedule Helper, Acronis TIB Monitor, and Acronis True Image. Click Save.
Reboot into normal mode.
The "Operations in progress" won't reappear, and you can run everything as before, including the ability to run True Image again manually.
Yes, this is a bug. All software has them. This one was a pain, but it's not fatal.
Since I use Acronis 2015, I have the same problem. At 9 from 10 shutdowns there is the message "Operations are in progress...".
And there are no backups in the background. It's only a problem with the service "AcrSch2Svc".
Acronis is not in a position to resolve the problem. So I write only a little script to stop this service and shutdown the PC.
@echo off
net stop "AcrSch2Svc"
c:\windows\system32\shutdown -s -f -t 00
If I shutdown the PC with this script, the message never appear and the shutdown works fine. OK, you have to be sure, that there is no backup in the background. :-)
If a full back up is terminated by the shut down then it appears to leave a partial or corrupted tib file which causes all subsequent backups to fail. The subsequent backups are (in my case) differentials which depend upon a good full backup. As these all fail, it never reaches the number I set to cause the next full back up. I have to intervene manually.
Although preventing shutdown might be undesirable, at least warning the user would be good? Does anyone have a shutdown script with a check for running backup that I could use?
That's exactly why Operations In Progress is such a terrible idea. Computers crash. The software needs to account for that whether the user does a shutdown or whether the OS simply blows up. If they decide that the way to deal with that is to give an Operations in Progress message, they aren't really dealing with it at all, and putting users at risk. Regardless of why a computer shut down, if they were in the middle of a backup or validation, they need to know it and rectify any problems. Instead, they sweep the problems under the rug and make it worse, creating a problem that backups were supposed to prevent in the first place.
It shouldn't matter how or why your computer shuts down. Backups are supposed to exist precisely because computers crash. Acronis is actually increasing the possibility that computers will crash, both with the risk created by a user doing this sort of shutdown, or by a user rebooting a computer after seeing the message for minutes or hours and having no clue that it's even related to Acronis or any backup. All a user is likely to know is that the computer was hung up, and rebooting in with a hard reset fixed the problem. Had the user seen the standard Windows warning at shutdown that the following processes were running, and had the user been given the option of aborting the shutdown, then at least the user would know what's going on. Microsoft figured that part out a long time ago, and Acronis really screwed things up with their arrogance to think they improved things, that everybody else got it wrong, and with their belief that they got it right. They are the only one in the world that got it wrong.
To make matters worse, by not giving a user the option to abort a shutdown, a user might be forced to do a hard reset, when a shutdown wasn't absolutely necessary in the first place. If I reboot because some changes need to be applied, but I don't really care if it happens today or tomorrow, I can postpone it. But if I do it now, thinking everything will be back up in a few minutes, find out that it's not coming back up, and my computer needs to do something in a few minutes, then there's no choice but to do a hard reboot. It could be anything from an upcoming meeting to a work project to using your computer as a DVR, which is something that cannot be postponed. In other words, you lose data by not having the computer running.
Their "solution" is forcing people to do hard reboots all the time, not giving users a clue why their computer is hung up, causing backups to be corrupted and not giving users a clue that their backups even have a problem. I can't think of a single worse thing that any backup software can do than that.
Read post #102 from Acronis Support. You can always PM Anna and provide information requested. Good Luck.
Read post #102 from Acronis Support. You can always PM Anna and provide information requested. Good Luck.
Wow, that's an incredible post. It has a link to an arrogant article saying it's supposed to work that way, followed by something that says they fixed it. The article claims that other software works that way, even though the truth is that 100% of references to the "Operations in Progress" problem lead users to Acronis, where users find out what has been causing their problem.
Now they say that after countless users complained that unless Acronis fixes this, they would never use it again, Acronis decides not to fix the versions that this thread is about but tell users that if they want the identical functionality without the problem, they need to pay Acronis by buying a new copy for every machine they have. No thanks. I already paid Acronis time and time again. They had their chance. If Acronis wants to earn back its customers, let them fix what we already paid for, and we will buy new versions when Acronis shows us that they are giving us new functionality that we need. They seem to be missing the point that people like us would have been telling all our friends, coworkers and everybody we know that they should be using Acronis to protect themselves, but instead we did the opposite.
If you recently purchased it contact them and see if they'll give you the new version for free, it doesn't hurt to ask.
If you recently purchased it contact them and see if they'll give you the new version for free, it doesn't hurt to ask.
The newest version of the software (Acronis TrueImage 2015) still has the same problem.
I have contacted Acronis and the answer was that it works as designed.
If a backup is running Acronis softwarewill stop the backup and the PC will shutdown.
If the Acronis process crushed before during a backup the PC will not shutdown (never).
Since my first post over a year ago about this problem and no solution I've uninstalled Acronis and won't use it again. I tried the free version of Macrium Reflect and have been satisfied with it.
I just bought the newest version, and can attest that this ridiculous shutdown situation has not been fixed. In fact, as far as I can tell, all Acronis did in the new version was design an unnecessary new interface, which is what software companies do when they run out of technological steam. The new interface involved little more than changing the colors, font sizes, and moving things various around, yet Acronis hailed it as one of the major reasons to buy the upgrade. What a joke! The new interface is no more intuitive than old one, but at least I had learned to live with the old one. However, the new interface required me to invest learning time that had no payoff whatsoever. Acronis still does what it always has done: provide frustrating, buggy, barely satisfactory backup of my data. Buying the upgrade was a total waste of money.
I have spent my entire 25-year career in and around Silicon Valley, including 10 years as partner in a venture capital fund, and am now CEO of a technology company that, among other things, designs software. Having worked with and/or been involved in the creation of hundreds of software applications, I can say with confidence that Acronis is the ONLY application I have every used that hijacks Windows' shutdown process. I can also say with confidence that this incredible behavior it is the result of bad software design and coding. Acronis can arrogantly assert all day long that this is the way it is supposed to work, but they are dead wrong -- and probably know it. Very few users of Acronis have the technical knowledge to dispute Acronis' claim, but I do. Their application is brain dead in many design and technical ways, and I taken time to inform Acronis of many of these deficiencies, but they don't seem to care.
Why don't they care? They started out as an impressive technology company many years ago. I know because I was one of their earliest customers. So what happened? The answer is simple: success. Having achieved a virtual monopoly in the backup business, they have now become nothing more than a marketing company. I can't say for sure what they have done on the corporate side of their business because my firm doesn't use them for our company backups. But having used Acronis on my various personal PCs for more than a decade, I am well aware that, despite pushing me into yearly upgrades, virtually nothing has changed under the application's hood in many years.
Although I don't know specifically what is going inside Acronis, I have a good idea based on my many years in the industry. Backup is not sexy and has a limited business upside, so Acronis is simply unable to attract today's talented developers and technical managers who want to work for companies working on the leading edge of technology. Acronis' limited technical capabilities are clearly demonstrated by the amateur way they have made their move into the cloud, but that is a whole other story.
Creating a middling, good-enough-for-most-people backup application is not much of a challenge, but creating a world-class, rock solid, backup application is incredibly difficult. Unfortunately, most users can't recognize world-class software or even need it. Those of us who frequent this forum are far more technically astute than the vast majority of Acronis' customers, but we are a small minority and Acronis' knows they can happily ignore us and continue to sell their inferior product because most of their users don't know any better and are satisfied with "good enough". Acronis is now a "cash cow" business, not a technology company, and is whistling all the way to the bank.
After giving Acronis one last chance by buying their latest version, I have now given up. Acronis' inability or refusal to fix their unique, farcical, massively embarrassing and technologically hideous shutdown malfunction is the final straw. I have downloaded Macrium and will give it a try this weekend. Unfortunately, Acronis has been highly successful at rolling over most of its competitors using sheer marketing force, so they now own so much of the market that few viable backup alternatives remain. I don't even count the "all cloud" backup services. They have their place as a backup backup, but I would never trust the entirety of my data to them. Local backup is the first and most essential line of defense.
One last note: If there are any software entrepreneurs reading this comment, as a former venture capitalist I urge you to consider taking Acronis on because it has grown fat and happy and, therefore, is extremely vulnerable. I'll be your first customer!
Well William H I think you'll be more than happy with Macrium Reflect - it works superbly well.
I used Acronis for most of the last 7 or 8 years but this was fault was the last straw for me also.
I couldn't agree more with all of your comments.
I switched to Reflect Pro 5 about 6 months ago and it has worked flawlessly.
Acronis seem determined to pursue this commercial suicide.
It still makes me angry that I've never got any compensation from them - it's just not fit for purpose - don't know how this industry gets away with it !
I agree. I've been in the software industry since the punch card days, and have worked for or headed companies in SV that have done Windows development since the Windows 2.x (Windows 286, Windows 386, Windows for Workgroups) days. It wasn't until Windows 3.x that Windows started to become mainstream, and there were certainly no applications that would have hijacked Windows before that, because Windows didn't technically shut down back then. It got closed, and wasn't even an OS yet. If there are any others that work this way, then a web search on "operations in progress" would find them.
On the other hand, what started out as a good product still exists at its core. Things have changed in some respects, and Acronis has chosen to keep up in many cases, but sometimes taking basic things such as supporting standard size hard drives and treating them as if they were something out of the ordinary requiring a different product. GPT is a good example. An early feature of other backup software was support for multiple machines, so people could back up their laptops to their desktops. Again, Acronis decided to see that as a way to sell licenses by requiring one per device if you ever might need to restore rather than increasing sales by having a product that can work for a person's household.
Acronis didn't invent backup software by any means, and I can still think of advantages to what we did in the mainframe days, when we had monthly (full), weekly (differential) and daily (incremental) backups as an integrated scheme. In theory, most files or typical virtual disks could be recovered by mounting three tapes at most, except for very large ones. It was also incredibly simple to find out on a disk or file basis which backups existed or what versions of any given file existed by date. That should have been the starting point for Acronis, and I didn't even begin to touch on many aspects of what was already supported. What I liked about Acronis early on was that it did a good bit of, but far from all of, what I expected backup software to do. Other packages did far less.
Even if they have run out of ideas, they could still try to increase market share by going after the extremely large percentage of the PC market that doesn't use their products at all instead of going to their existing customer base and trying to sell a new version (historically, what would have been called a new release) of the product each year. The trick is to stop getting such low average reviews at places like Amazon by actually fixing the product rather than simply adding new features.
It had the same interface for a long time, and although it had a learning curve, it wasn't all that difficult. My biggest complaint back then was that it didn't strike me as professional for a backup software company not to know when to use "backup" and when to use "back up." They finally figured that part out a number of years ago, but still couldn't see fit to hire a tech writer who could review it so the messages made sense. Hint: If you don't know the difference between the present progressive tense and the past tense, you shouldn't be the one deciding what messages to display.
Thanks, Hagrinas, for adding your voice of experience to the debate. I have a feeling we could drain several bottles of vino rosso discussing the fatal mistakes made by all the technology companies that lost their way in the last three decades. :-) Acronis is merely one of a long line of half successful companies that only half get it. Unfortunately, that means its customer only get half a product.
Thanks, kgee, for letting me know that you are happy with Macrium. There is no better endorsement than a satisfied customer.
Has anyone used Acronis's business solution: Acronis Backup
http://www.acronis.com/en-us/business/backup/
If so, do you find this solution much better?
I have to post this again, I think I posted it a year or so ago. I too had the "Operations are in Progress" issue several days in a row about 1-2 years ago. Was not good and shutting down the PC was certainly not a good plan and luckily, I didn't break anything in the process, when i had to do it several days in a row.
I may have been on version 13 then, not sure. However, when I talked with Acronis tech support they suggested I replace my backup schemes with new ones. I did that and have not had an "Operations are in Progress" situation in well over a 1-2 years. I don't know if this is somehow specific to my situation, my backup scheme's, my backup device or any number of other things. I eventually upgraded to v14 and kept going with no issues.
I recently added a NAS as my main backup device and wanted to also backup my wife's laptop, so I bought v14 for her laptop and started a backup scheme for her as well. So far everything is running perfectly.
Now, I heard that possible the verification process is really where the problem might be? I had turned verification off which I also know is not the best thing because a backup that is not verified is just slightly better than no backup at all.
Is the verification process the source of these issues? Otherwise, I am backing up my C:drive 1x weekly as a incremental image and backup my K: data drive as an incremental data drive every day at 4 p.m. I am doing something similar on my wife's laptop. C: drive 3 times a week as an incremental image. And have setup to keep two chains at all times on both systems.
Am I nuts to not verify manually at least every once in a while? Any thoughts or comments?
Thx DD
dd1509: I am glad that you haven't recently been experiencing the "Operations in Progress" insanity, but remember, in order to achieve this inner peace you had to do the handstands recommended by Acronis and seriously compromise your backups by avoiding verification (yes, you should definitely be verifying your data regularly). But the key point is, you should never, ever have experienced this situation in the first place!!! If the application worked as advertised, you would not have had to ask for Acronis' help and Acronis would not have had to tell you to do handstands to do your backups.
It's simple: You paid for a backup application and you should it expect it to backup your data. It should work flawlessly with every possible backup scheme, not just the ones that Acronis tells you to do in order to avoid running into the bugs in their application. If the application provides the option to verify data, it should verify your data, flawlessly, whenever you want to verify it, every time. That's what you paid for and that's the performance Acronis should deliver. No ifs, ands, buts, or excuses.
The "Operations in Progress" bug is particularly galling because it seems that Acronis is the only application in the history of Windows applications to hijack the Windows shutdown process in a way that requires the user to do a hard shutdown that risks the loss of critical data. Imagine! A backup application that actually puts your data in danger!! Hagrinas and I, between us, have more than 50 years of experience in computers and software development, and neither of us has ever seen this totally indefensible behavior in any Windows applications we have ever used. Yet Acronis continues to claim it is a feature not a bug.
I don't have the time or desire to debug the application for Acronis, but I suspect -- like you -- that the "Operations in Progress" bug is the result of some serious design or coding flaw in either the scheduling component of the application (which, by the way, uses 100x the CPU time of any other scheduler I have loaded in my my PCs memory) or the verification component. But it is irrelevant where or why the bug occurs because it should never happen at all! A backup application that has a defective scheduler or a defective verification process is no backup application at all. Backup is all about data security, but if you can't trust your backup application to perform these basic and essential backup tasks (scheduling and verification), how can trust any aspect of the application? Having to turn off verification to avoid a bug is a damning indictment of entire application. If the user has to jump through hoops and do crazy workarounds just to get an application do what it claims it can do and to perform the services you paid for, there is something seriously wrong not only with the application but also with the company that produces and sells it.
William H,
Thanks for the comments. I have heard these before from some of the other users who are not happy with the process and the verification process. I have read most of the bad comments for at least 1-2 years now. I have tried other backup software such as Macrium, Windows and many of the cloud-based systems and others and I didn't really like any of them nor did I think it had the features such as multiple chains and when to stop and delete chains, etc., unless I didn't understand their process and truthfully I didn't want to spend hours understanding their processes.
Most lacked features I thought were important to me. I happen to be happy with Acronis, despite these apparent shortcomings, which seem to be limited to the verification process because it is so long and the likelihood that the PC is shut off seems to cause a problem. And no, I do not work for them. So, I am just doing my verifications on a separate basis. Yes, I would prefer the whole thing worked perfectly and in a timely manner and maybe someday it will but for the meantime, I much prefer their gui and backup scheme selection process. So far have not found another package which has the same features and the same easy to use gui. And I am referring to v14. It looks like they totally killed v15 and I am not going there.
So, I am staying with it for the time being and doing my verifications manually. I have tried at at least 6 other backups systems over a few months and it was nightmare and a giant time sink hole trying to learn what works and what does not. NONE do everything perfectly. Nature of the backup business I guess. I just don't want to invest many more hours with crappy trials and all of that to find a perfect package which I suspect does not really exist.
DD
Thanks, dd1509, for your comment and for sharing your considerable due diligence on other backup applications. Not having done any such comparisons, I was optimistic that there was a better product out there, so it is disappointing to learn that Acronis' competitors are similarly deficient. Frankly, it's a shame. I have spent decades in and around software development, and it seems to me that, compared to most sophisticated PC applications, it should be relatively easy to create a good, reliable backup app -- and the market should be huge. Ah, well.
A quick question: What do you mean when you write that "they totally killed V15"? Are you referring only to the GUI or to issues with the applications functionality? I just purchased it and haven't discovered any new technical issues yet. I find the new GUI annoying and nothing more than a step sideways, and I haven't discovered any new features or new bugs, just the same old features and same old bugs. Have you had a different experience? In any case, it is definitely not worth the upgrade cost.
I have 2015 and I was delighted with how much better that microsoft it is - but that is not a big challenge. 2015 does not prevent shutdown it simply terminates it if in progress. A user warning/option would have been better. However there is a BIG problem with this change. The terminated backup leaves a partial tib file which prevents any further attempts at scheduled backups. You have to manually sort it out.
Also while attempting to sort this out I got the backup stuck in some sort of loop and so tried to shutdown to end it - then I got the operation in progress message and had to hard reset. So the "operation in progress" behaviour is still in there for some situations.
Can't believe there are still folks willing to keep using this software after reading the above !
As has been said so many times, hijacking the operating system is just completely unacceptable, and I know from bitter experience can lead to catastrophic results after a forced shutdown.
And also beware of many other shortcomings of the latest versions of Acronis - just take a look at this forum.
Early versions like TI11 were great, worked day in day out then Acronis started this annual upgrade to higher and higher levels of bug ridden rubbish.
Cut your losses and switch now.
Thankfully I am no longer an Acronis user but it still makes me so angry I follow this forum to warn others.
Can't believe there are still folks willing to keep using this software after reading the above !
As has been said so many times, hijacking the operating system is just completely unacceptable, and I know from bitter experience can lead to catastrophic results after a forced shutdown.
And also beware of many other shortcomings of the latest versions of Acronis - just take a look at this forum.
Early versions like TI11 were great, worked day in day out then Acronis started this annual upgrade to higher and higher levels of bug ridden rubbish.
Cut your losses and switch now.
Thankfully I am no longer an Acronis user but it still makes me so angry I follow this forum to warn others.
The quoted post nails it. I follow this forum only because I was a satisfied Acronis user for many years. Early versions saved me on a couple of occasions. Then when they started their annual money grabbing releases they dropped the ball on performance and reliability. If Acronis saw a drop in sales they may go back to a user friendly and reliably product. It's time to cut your losses and find another backup solution. As you read through the posts it shows that Acronis doesn't care about its customers anymore. It's time to take your business elsewhere.
I just experienced this on my PC. I unplugged the USB cable to the external backup device and Windows Updates completed and rebooted.
(Yes, tonight's backup is scragged. Last night's is fine.)
I recommend disconnecting the USB cable over pressing the power button.
I have no idea what percentage of users use external USB drives as opposed to anything else, but that could work for those who do. Just make sure to run a checkdisk on the drive once you plug it back in.
Have read all of this thread. Have same issue Windows Update "Operations are in progress...." stuck there.
Found solution that worked for me on HP Probook with Win8.1 Acronis 2014 installed and in use: After processing Windows Update manually I arrived at the blue screen that remained for 24 hours. No indication that update failed or succeeded.
Starting with blue screen "operations are in progress....", HOLD DOWN POWER BUTTON UNTIL COMPUTER SHUTS DOWN COMPLETELY, IE NOT "SLEEPING"
ADJUST BIOS IF NECESSARY TO GET SYSTEM TO BOOT FROM CD
INSERT WINDOWS INSTALLATION CD
PRESS POWER BUTTON TO INITIATE BOOT
SYSTEM SAYS "PRESS ANY KEY TO BOOT FROM CD". SO PRESS ANY KEY RIGHT AWAY.
BOOT PROCEEDS FROM CD
AFTER A FEW MINUTES OF WIN LOGO AND SPINNER, SCREEN APPEARS ASKING FOR LANGUAGE SELECTION, LOCATION AND INPUT METHOD. DO NOT MAKE SELECTIONS. INSTEAD, CANCEL THE INSTALLATION BY CLICKING THE X OR THE CANCEL BUTTON.
SYSTEM BEGINS BOOT PROCESS AGAIN BOOTING FROM CD
SYSTEM SAYS "PRESS ANY KEY TO BOOT FROM CD". DO NOT PRESS ANY KEY. ALLOW BOOTING TO PROCEED FROM THE HARD DRIVE.
BOOT SUCCEEDS. DESKTOP SHOWS UP. APPEARS NORMAL BOOT UP.
IN CONTROL PANEL/WINDOWS UPDATE REVIEW STATUS OF PREVIOUS WINDOWS UPDATE. MINE WAS "SUCCESSFUL" AND "NO UPDATES AVAILABLE"
IN SERVICES.MSC, EXTENDED TAB, CHANGE "Acronis NonStop Backup Service" and "Acronis Scheduler2" from to "Manual" as follows: Beginning at the Desktop, right click the Windows logo in lower left corner of screen. Select "Run". Then type in "services.msc" and press Enter Key. In the "Extended" tab, the two Acronis services will be near the top of the alphabetic services listing. Highlight them one at a time and for each service, right click "Running" in the Status column. Then click "Stop the service" in the left panel. Then right click the entry in the Startup Type column. From the drop down list select "properties". On the next screen click on the "Startup type" box and select "manual". Click OK. After processing both services as above, select File/Exit.
This process recovered my system from the never ending blue screen, back to a normally running system. Windows backups work normally. My next step is to investigate alternatives for Acronis2014.
With as many posts that have been made to this you would have thought that Acronis would have made an official fix. For those of you that were complaining about Hagrinas comment You are no better that the Nobelist attitude of Acronis that won't fix this. This is a real problem and needs a real fix that should be able to be downloaded and that works. I've purchased ATI 14.0 and It is obviously broken. No More. I can remember when Acronis was a great product that worked every time it was installed. And by that i truly mean it was flawless. It seems the more they have added to improve it the worse it is. I need to be able to make an image of my harddrive and do a restore if needed. I don't need all of the extra bells and whistles that makes the new version more complicated to use and now this problem that isn't going to be addressed. Just out of curiosity I wanted to wait it out and see how long it would take for the operations that are in progress to complete. 48 hours later it's still doing the same thing. To make things worse, I tried to do a restore and it doesn't even work!! For something like this.....It shouldn't matter if it's out of warranty or not. This is a flaw in the program and it should be fixed. I would be ashamed to have my name in the credits for something like this. I am infuriated at the fact that I got taken by these people. Acronis and I are finished. At least they can all take turns patting them selves on their back at how great they are. Unless of course they are all going to buy this product them selves they are on their way out. People will not put up with this kind of lack of support. I cannot believe they have sunk so low as to sell a product that doesn't even work. No More.
As I have said before I was an acronis customer for over well over ten years, and since this fiasco I changed to Macrium Reflect and have been using that on windows machines ever since, and of course Time Machine on my Macs. Macrium is a good product that just works as Acrnonis used to. Nothing however comes close to Time Machine....pity
nw
I think that what's true about most people here is that they like the base product and liked the company and hope that they can get this product to work better. Acronis might see it as bashing when they should really be looking at a group of potential customers who would gladly buy the product if they clean it up. Not only that, I'd go out of my way to give them positive reviews if they did that. I'm not out to hurt them. I want them to do well. In order to do that, they need to fix what frustrates people. Somebody made a very bad decision a long time ago and they aren't going to listen to rational arguments. They start off with "those people don't understand...it's supposed to work that way" when in reality we do understand perfectly that it's not supposed to work that way. They need to understand that working that way is harmful. A hard reboot of a computer can do more harm than good, and if people are going to restart the computer anyway, they can't do something damaging in the name of data integrity when it's a lie.
If I'm in the middle of editing a Word document, Windows has no problem giving me an opportunity to abort a shutdown so I can save the file or do anything I want. It's not even as if they have to go through any extensive effort to do the equivalent.
I have experienced this problem on a number of occasions on my home machine (I also use the product at work). I'm using the 2013 edition. If you go to the backups screen that shows your backups in a list, and click on view log first, and witness a "backup validation" operation. This should have the current date or day before if you were validating all night. So this is the problem and here is the fix:
click settings.
click disk backup options in the VERY lower left.
click on Validation (green check icon).
uncheck monthly validation.
check validate on backup (the one you originally wanted, right?)
You have to go through two "save" buttons and everything should be cool from now on.
Hope this helped you,
Matt Schifter
PS I agree this is a poor user interface default. Monthly validation for a backup that is sitting on a drive is not desirable!! Almost Never!!
That is not a fix if the backup itself is scheduled. Any scheduled backup can result in the inability to shut off the computer that is running the backup. Your suggestion addresses the problem occurring as a result of scheduled validation, but there is still no way to have a schedule for the backup without risking the inability to have a normal shut down of the computer due to the "Operations are in Progress" structural flaw in Acronis.
Hi L B L,
Yes, I agree and have experienced that problem enough times for me to disconnect the backup drive (usb anyway), and then it still tried to run (and failed), so I gave up and disabled the backup scheduler. It's the only way to avoid the problem entirely -- only let true image run when I want it to. It normally takes overnight to complete my backup from a high speed SSD to a 7200 RPM USB 3.0 drive, around 8 hours, around 800+ MB, so I do this once a month. Only complete backups, never differential, and fully verified on backup, always!
I've already had a problem with a driver and my machine got into a repeating reboot state, so I ran True Image from safe mode, and restored fully. It worked flawlessly and the result was a low stress rest-of-day.
I won't give up on the product because of this. Saved my ass. I've had drive enclosures fail at work, corrupting drives, and True Image saved the day each time.
I think if you're considering this product or are about to give up on it, you should consider the annoying "operations in progress" as a result of letting True Image automatically control backups and verify backup images on a predetermined schedule as a bad feature if it conflicts with your schedule.
If you take over control and run things manually, you can prevent ever seeing the true image BSOD again.
I let it run when I'm going to sleep, and just shutdown my gaming laptop in the morning when it completes verifying. If it needs part of the day as well, I'm off to work, so there's no conflict between True Image's backup & validation and anything you need the computer for.
I hope this helps somebody,
Matt
This problem seems to be fixed in Windows 10 tested with ATI 2016. He will cancel the job and repeat it after the computer has been restarted.
Hello everybody,
I am one of the victims of this "Operations in progress..." and used to be really cross with Acronis for not doing anything about this. Further cause of my high bloodpressure is the fact, that after buying their product you suddenly find out that the support from the manufacturer is limited to a short time. How did they decide on the period they are willing to smile at me is a mistery - seems they to get REAL problems that arise only after gaining experience with the product and becoming a "Power User"...
Well, I must tell you, that I am not at all angry with Acronis. In fact I am very grateful for their neglecting their customers. This has been the cause of my switching to Macrium Reflect joining the long line of Acronis' dissatisfied ex-customers.
Macrium Reflect is a far better application than Acronis True Image. It is more versatile and easy to use.
Thank you, Acronis, for leading me to Macrium.
That is good news for people running Windows 10 and ATI 2016. The problem I have is that I'm running neither. I'm not planning to upgrade to Windows 10, even for free. I can't blame Microsoft for leaving out features that aren't profitable, but I'm sure it's fine with them if I don't upgrade and continue to use the features I need. If that means that 2016 won't work for me, then I guess that's the end of the road. If 2016 works with other versions of Windows, I might consider it.
Then again, maybe it is time to start looking at Macrium. It's a shame because I really do like ATI overall. It's just not reliable, and their solution to make it reliable did the opposite.
That didn't work for me because I found "three" Acronis processes open when I looked in Windows Task Manager.
taskkill /IM schedhlp.exe /f
taskkill /IM TibMounterMonitor.exe /f
taskkill /IM TrueImageMonitor.exe /f
call shutdown /a
The last line is part of the shutdown script.
Here is a website with instructions how to add the batch file to the windows shutdown process.
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/12434863/executing-a-batch-script-on…
"I can't blame Microsoft for leaving out features that aren't profitable, but I'm sure it's fine with them if I don't upgrade and continue to use the features I need."
Can you specify these features?
If you're replying to my comment, I don't understand it. This is an issue with Acronis, not Windows. It's Acronis' fault that they haven't figured out how to allow Windows to shutdown normally without doing this patch. The script should be added to the Windows shutdown process when True Image is installed in your computer.
No I pointed out Hagrinas quote.
But your post is rather wrong. Windows has registry keys that are responsible how to handle terminating processes on shutdown / restart, those exist since Windows NT. Editing the Local Group Policy and adding the script is just a workaround to address this issue. For some reason Windows will not properly kill these tasks on timeout.
It is a problem of the OS not Acronis. In Windows 8 and Windows 10 you will not see this behaviour.
No I pointed out Hagrinas quote.But your post is rather wrong. Windows has registry keys that are responsible how to handle terminating processes on shutdown / restart, those exist since Windows NT. Editing the Local Group Policy and adding the script is just a workaround to address this issue. For some reason Windows will not properly kill these tasks on timeout.
It is a problem of the OS not Acronis. In Windows 8 and Windows 10 you will not see this behaviour.
Utter nonsense, Windows does not pull the rug out from under an app unless forced. It sends a message to the app to terminate as Windows is going down, but Acronis does not exit, it ignores the message. This behaviour also occurs in Win8 and Win8.1
With all of the depth of comments on this thread to make the statement "It is a problem of the OS not Acronis" is absurd. Acronis is the only program that I've ever used on Windows that rigidly blocks the Windows shutdown process from completing.
I agree with the other recent comment about using Macrium for PC backups. Macrium works, without this built-in bug that Acronis persists in ignoring.
To illustrate the magnitude of this problem with Acronis, go to a boundary condition of having just automatically (in background, as is common) installed a Windows update and needing to restart the system to complete the update. If one is not aware of that automatic update and gets into the Operations are in Progress trap from Acronis, and then does the only thing you can do which is to force the shutdown by holding the power key, then the entire system is put at risk due to the interrupted Windows update process.
This is an Acronis bug, and is inexcusable as it creates risk for customers who bought the software specifically to reduce risk. The attempt to deflect this bug over to Microsoft is misdirection that is not helpful to anyone.
I heartily agree that it is an Acronis problem. If it's something that can be addressed in the registry that's Acronis' responsibility. However,, I've never had the problem in a shutdown after a Windows update and I'm not sure why.
"I can't blame Microsoft for leaving out features that aren't profitable, but I'm sure it's fine with them if I don't upgrade and continue to use the features I need."
Can you specify these features?
A prime example is Media Center. Microsoft counted on multimedia being important but the user base felt otherwise. For those using it to have a movie library, photos, videos, etc. all in one place, there are other applications and it could be done piecemeal. But for those using their PC as a DVR, there's nothing to take its place. Windows 7 is a better DVR than Tivo or the ones from cable companies. I'm not limited to four tuners, if I put in a 4tb drive for $100, I have plenty of space (I actually have a network with far more space, but it's a typical limitation with other methods) and there are other advantages. The problem with not having it, aside from recorded TV being in Microsoft's own format, which is a big enough reason if all content is suddenly worthless, is that I'd need a new solution that will work throughout my home network. Having it built into Windows meant simply plugging in a tuner card and having to buy or install no software, and having media throughout the home. On other PCs in the home, it meant doing nothing at all. Shared libraries simply show up. And media center also does plenty of content management. I'm not trying to sell Media Center to anybody. Microsoft should have replaced it with stand alone apps such as a DVR app, and other apps for picture and video libraries. But without it, I can't upgrade.
As I said, I don't blame Microsoft. Most users of Windows never used it, or if they looked at it, they did so once and never did again.
The point you are missing is that Acronis says it's by design. They want it to work that way. They aren't going to implement a registry change as a "fix" because they don't think it's broken. They went out of their way to do it this way, and their response is "those users just don't understand why this is good for them." It's Acronis that doesn't understand that the rest of the world not only survives just fine not doing it that way, it works better.
It's pointless to have a "feature" that causes users to do a hard reboot. Then Acronis backs up day after day after day, and if the user needs to recover, the user might find out that Chkdisk fails and the backup is worthless. If they can't handle a hard reboot, then their way of handling it doesn't work. It makes it worse. If they put in code to handle it, then there's no justification for doing it that way. With everything else, I see that Windows is shutting down. I might see that certain programs are keeping Windows from shutting down and I'll get a chance to force everything closed, or to abort the shutdown. If a backup is running, I might want to postpone the shutdown, but with Acronis, there's no such option.
I mentioned that I use Media Center. If I want to reboot and I have four TV shows scheduled to record in 15 minutes, then having the computer down for 12 hours means I lose data. Ironically, I've rebooted a few times, only to realize in the long run that what was stopping Media Center from working correctly in the first place is that Acronis was running. It was a viscous cycle. First Acronis runs. Then I encounter things on the PC that aren't working. Then I try to reboot since I'm not aware that it's Acronis that's messing up the system. Then the reboot gives an "Operations In Progress" message that gives no clue it's related to Acronis. Then I do a hard reboot and the problem goes away. But the "feature" that was supposed to keep my backup from being affected by a shutdown might have corrupted my backup. I've even had a few times when the hard reboot caused system problems bad enough that I needed to restore from a backup.
"I can't blame Microsoft for leaving out features that aren't profitable, but I'm sure it's fine with them if I don't upgrade and continue to use the features I need."
Can you specify these features?A prime example is Media Center. Microsoft counted on multimedia being important but the user base felt otherwise. For those using it to have a movie library, photos, videos, etc. all in one place, there are other applications and it could be done piecemeal. But for those using their PC as a DVR, there's nothing to take its place. Windows 7 is a better DVR than Tivo or the ones from cable companies. I'm not limited to four tuners, if I put in a 4tb drive for $100, I have plenty of space (I actually have a network with far more space, but it's a typical limitation with other methods) and there are other advantages. The problem with not having it, aside from recorded TV being in Microsoft's own format, which is a big enough reason if all content is suddenly worthless, is that I'd need a new solution that will work throughout my home network. Having it built into Windows meant simply plugging in a tuner card and having to buy or install no software, and having media throughout the home. On other PCs in the home, it meant doing nothing at all. Shared libraries simply show up. And media center also does plenty of content management. I'm not trying to sell Media Center to anybody. Microsoft should have replaced it with stand alone apps such as a DVR app, and other apps for picture and video libraries. But without it, I can't upgrade.
As I said, I don't blame Microsoft. Most users of Windows never used it, or if they looked at it, they did so once and never did again.
Good point, as I used Media Center myself. But then the compatiblity of Windows Media Center with modern tuners was lacking since long. I just want to remember issues with DVB-C and DVB-T.
There are apps in Windows 10 that allow you to manage your videos music and pictures easily without this aspect of DVR. There are good and free alternatives to Media Center however (XBMC, Mediaportal).
I will reply to the Operations in progess problem later.
"I agree with the other recent comment about using Macrium for PC backups. Macrium works, without this built-in bug that Acronis persists in ignoring. "
I agree that Acronis is actually ignoring bugs and more or less deliberately stop support for older versions, at the latest when a new version exists. If you can prove that your iteration of Acronis has an unsolved bug like this shutdown issue contact the support and in most cases you will get a free update to the latest version. That is what happened to me.
However Acronis is not the problem imho. If a process prevents to be terminated in a grace period (again parameters can be set in the registry) then Windows should terminate the process non grateful like the kill command does.
It's pretty senseless to discuss whether it is an "Acronis only" issue or not, as I have to agree it is an design issue. I guess very much that you will not see this in Windows XP as you won't see this in Windows 8 and 10 as I mentioned before. So it is a problem that is a sideeffect of Windows Vista and 7.
"I agree with the other recent comment about using Macrium for PC backups. Macrium works, without this built-in bug that Acronis persists in ignoring. "
I agree that Acronis is actually ignoring bugs and more or less deliberately stop support for older versions, at the latest when a new version exists. If you can prove that your iteration of Acronis has an unsolved bug like this shutdown issue contact the support and in most cases you will get a free update to the latest version. That is what happened to me.
However Acronis is not the problem imho. If a process prevents to be terminated in a grace period (again parameters can be set in the registry) then Windows should terminate the process non grateful like the kill command does.
It's pretty senseless to discuss whether it is an "Acronis only" issue or not, as I have to agree it is an design issue. I guess very much that you will not see this in Windows XP as you won't see this in Windows 8 and 10 as I mentioned before. So it is a problem that is a sideeffect of Windows Vista and 7.
I dont know how many times you need to be told this is NOT limited to one OS, but happens in Win7, Win8, Win8.1 I have not tested Win10 but as I know what Acronis is doing I expect Win10 will be no different. You seem to be talking about things you dont understand or know about. A program can delay or terminate the shutdown process, and the OS will NOT NOT NOT (Get it?) pull the rug out from under an app unless forced as data loss can result, timeouts are totally irrelevant. I suggest you stop posting about things you dont get.
NW