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System (disaster recovery) backup - TI 2020

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I would like confirmation that I am backing up/imaging correctly should eg my boot disk fail and need to be replaced. The current boot disk is MBR/UEFI with 3 partitions: System Reserved, Backup, and Program (c:). I didn't need the Backup partition in my image so I unticked it, and created and verified the resulting tibx image. Does the image file contain everything necessary to restore my system to a new drive, which is bootable? Win10 Pro x64 (1903), 8gb ram, i5 8500

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Henry,

Microsoft Windows partition structure has changed over the years and the introduction of UEFI/GPT has brought even more change.

In light of these changes I would recommend that a backup of a Windows system disk contain all disk partitions.  By default True Image, when configured to backup the Windows disk, selects all partitions on the disk even hidden ones.

The use of UEFI/GPT disks expects the disk partition structure to conform to a certain layout.  I am including a link below that explains this in detail.  It is worth your time to read it gain understanding in this area.

Windows Disk Partition Layout

 

The proper way to backup a boot disk is to tick the box at the disk level, rather than selecting certain partitions. This ensures that some partitions that wouldn't be listed but do exist are actually included in the backup.

You can still use the exclusions to exclude a given chose partition from the backup.

It was set up as a disk level backup - I unticked the unwanted partition per the uploaded screenshot. Is that what you mean by using the exclusions, or otherwise how should I have done it?

I have been creating and using images for many years without problem (in the main), including up to 2014 with Acronis TI. I am not suggesting there is a problem, but the software and terminology used are different and I seek the comfort of knowing what I have done is correct, and that there should be no problem if I recover the image to a new disk; or indeed overwrite the current one as I do from time to time to keep things "clean".

I suppose I could restore it and see, but I would want to nuke the current drive to be sure and I would prefer to avoid that unless absolutely necessary.

All comments appreciated. Sorry if I'm missing the point.

 

Henry,

Can you provide a screenshot of Windows Disk Management of the partitions on this disk?

Also, can you confirm that your PC boots using UEFI?  Type msinfo32 into a Run box and look for bios mode or capture a shot of that result and post.

Bios mode is shown as "Legacy" - strange I thought it was UEFI. When I next boot I'll have a look in the bios.

I tried to attached a screenshot of the partitions for the disk, but  an error arose "...can't access dead object". I'll try in a separate post.

 

Here is the screenshot of the partitions on Disk 0 - note the Int_Data partition does not have a drive letter, and which is the one I excluded from the image.

BTW AOMEI Backupper copes with this with no problem, but I want to use Acronis for the cloud backup and it makes no sense to use AOMEI for my images, unless I have to. And TI 2020 is much faster and looks to be better - if it works as I want.

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Henry,

Your screenshot shows that your disk boots as a Legacy device, not UEFI.  So can you explain the usage of the Int_Data partition?  Just curious more than anything else.

Based on what I see and given what you have said here I assume that the backup you have created is of the System Reserved and Program_Int C: partitions.  Given this is a Legacy boot system I see no reason why a restore of that backup would fail to work as long as no corruption exists in the backup itself.

I believe your backup would restore fine, unless the bootloader is tied to the unchecked partition (not likely, but there have been stranger setups).

You said Aomei handles this... does that mean you restored with Aomei and then tried with True Image, but the True Image restore won't boot? Or are you just looking for confirmation?

I wouldn't test on the original drive.  I would strongly advise buying a new disk (or finding an old one) to test with.  That way, you can pull the original and use the other disk to test with.  No harm, no foul in that scenario.  Plus, if you get something a little newer (better SSD or a little bigger), that could end up being your "new" OS disk and you can hang onto the current one for testing down the road.

Thanks for all the most helpful comments!

The int_data partition is spare space that I keep eg an additional copy of my latest image on - can be useful if Windows won't boot for some reason but the disk (ssd) is not otherwise affected.

Apols for the mixup on the boot partition - I may have changed it so I could clone my old boot disk more easily.

When I have time, I'll restore the image to a spare disk and check it will boot.