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mount/run 2nd PC in Windows Virtual PC from Acronis Home 2011 backups?

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I have two HP dv8t PCs with identical hardware and partition structures. Both are now using Home 2011 to clone-backup their full (SSD) C: drives daily on their NTFS d: drives. The backup files on the d: drives are rsync'd/copied daily to an external Seagate drive (under separate folders for each machine).

I assume there are no problems mounting/running/restoring files/systems from the external drive for each correlated machine.

When I'm on travel, I would like to know if I can also bring up the other PC from the external drive? So If I have machine A, and the external drive has backups for machines A and B, I would like to access, or even maybe run, the B B files on machine A?

(1)
Can I simply mount the Acronis backup of B on A, without messing up A?

(2)
I have Win7 Ultimate x64 running on both A and B. I can install Windows Virtual PC x64. Would this make it possible to actually "install" machine B in A's Virtual PC, thereby running both A & B on the same hardware?

Thanks.

Lester

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Lester,

1 - There shouldn't be a problem mounting the image to access the data.

2 - I suppose you could try it, but you may find it far from ideal. Windows activation will be triggered and there will probably be driver issues (may need to use UR). I certainly wouldn't want to move this type of setup back and forth between the VM and B, but it might work for temporary access.

An easier solution might be to install the apps on A that are needed from B so you can directly access the data when the B image is mounted.

MudCrab:

Yes, activation issues for the OS and some other apps could be very problematic.

I do have licenses for Powerpack, as well as for UR with my ABR10 licenses, but that would not avoid the licensing issues. Since I use Acronis independently on each PC (separate licences), I'm moving away from ABR and doing all Home backups now. (I now consider it best to tack all my software and install fresh with each new PC, so I probably won't be using Powerpack or UR anyway.)

Thanks very much for pointing out this issue.

Lester