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Convert backup to full

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I can't seem to find a solid answer to my question.

I have 1 full backup and several incremental backups:
1F 2I 3I 4I 5I 6I (F=Full I=Incremental)

If i convert a incremental backup to full (lets say 3I) what happens to that backup? Does it copy everything from all the previous backups to itself in order to make itself a full backup? When can I safely remove the previous backups?

So for example:

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I have my existing backup: (F=Full I=Incremental)
1F 2I 3I 4I 5I 6I
Right now all my incremental backups are dependant on 1F because its the last full backup.

If I convert 3I to a full backup. If i understand this correctly now it should look like this:
1F 2I 3F 4I 5I 6I
This means the conversion copied everything from 1F and 2I into 3I. It is now 3F. Now everything past 3 is no longer dependent on 1 or 2 because I've converted 3 to a full backup. It should be safe to move 1F and 2I to another location or delete them entirely.

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Is this correct?

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Hello Greg!

The answer to your questions can be found here: http://www.acronis.com/en-us/support/documentation/AcronisBackup_11.5/#…

Yes, everything is copied from the previous backup to make the selected backup full. You can remove previous backups when the operation is complete.

And yes, in your example, it will be safe to remove 1F and 2I since 4I, 5I, and 6I will no longer depend on them.

Hi Greg!

I would like to correct myself a little here. When a backup is converted to a full backup, the resulting full backup only contains the information that was present in the backup at the point in time when the initial (not full) backup was created.

For example:
1) A file was backed up to backup 1F.
2) You deleted the file from your computer somewhen between backups 1F and 3I.
3) You converted backup 3I to full.
4) The newly created full backup 3F will NOT contain the file, because this file was not present in backup 3I before the conversion was performed.

I hope this makes it clearer. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask.