TIH 2011 System State Backup?
Has system-state backup disappeared in version 11? Can't find it anywhere. The prog has picked up a system-state backup task from version 10 and is carrying out the task at 7 every evening (its own choice not mine) and there seems to be no way of changing it.
Interesting that the function still appears top be in the app - although without any external means of control....
I agree with what everybody else says about the 2011 task management - 2010 was much better. In fact the whole 2011 appears to have been released without beta testing - or maybe we are the beta testers?
System state is not part of the 2011 process.
Your next best choice is to perform a backup of the system partition.
Keep in mind that if you have a harddrive failure or if your old drive will not boot, you may need the contents of other partitions to be within the backup. Both Vista and Win7 have hidden partitions and these need to be part of your backup structure--either combined or separately. If moving to a replacement drive, the hidden partitions becomes a requirement to be installed if your new drive is going to be bootable.
Thanks for the suggestion, but my point is that they took away a rather useful feature.
My system partition is not small, and the user iterface to exclude folders is fine for one or two, but is a nightmare if you want to pare it down to just the system folders.
I'm running WinXP 64bit, and I'm very technically literate so I know what I need to backup, but the user interface is a nightmare to achieve that. Even if I were to persevere, because they are EXCLUSIONS, any more folders I create on the root of the partition will have to be excluded each time.
Sure I can backup the whole partition, and I'm sure it does that well. But my drives are running raided so total loss of the partition is far less likely. My need is to backup just the system state, so that I can overcome a non-bootable system if the OS becomes corrupt. On the old version I was doing system state automatically on a weekly schedule. I can't automate a full partition backup.
As I said I am seriously considering downgrading because this new version doesn't do what I want. I am very disappointed, because the old version was fine.
Keep in mind that if you have a harddrive failure or if your old drive will not boot, you may need the contents of other partitions to be within the backup. Both Vista and Win7 have hidden partitions and these need to be part of your backup structure--either combined or separately. If moving to a replacement drive, the hidden partitions becomes a requirement to be installed if your new drive is going to be bootable.
So where do I find those hidden partitions? TI2011 only shows partition with assigned drive letters. TI2010 was way better in this place and perhaps more accurate at the end?
Thanks for the suggestion, but my point is that they took away a rather useful feature.
Acronis stripped off many many useful features in TI2011 they thought their customers won't need anymore...
So where do I find those hidden partitions? TI2011 only shows partition with assigned drive letters. TI2010 was way better in this place and perhaps more accurate at the end?
Windows Disk management is the best place to look as it will show the drives without Windows drive letters and it shows the true sequence of partitions.
Below is the type backup I am suggesting as it includes all the necessary partitions/data to restore to either an old or new disk.
It seems nobody tried excluding many folders when they tested this. The disk backup screen grows wider and wider as you add to the excluded folder list. I have the panel up to at least twice the width of my physical monitor.
I have yet to find anything compelling enough to have upgraded, I'm just missing things I used to use (I upgraded from Acronis 11 not even the previous version). As a software developer myself I understand that changing UI's etc can be troubling and cause users to complain until they become accustomed to it, but removing functionality is a definite no-go area without very good cause.
I would have great difficulty recommending this software to anyone any more.
GroverH - Sorry for my ignorance, but we are talking about TI 2011, correct?
I cannot find the image you attached neither in partition mode nor in disk mode. I've attached an image of the disk mode I can see in TI 2011. OK, to be honest my Windows 7 installation does not have a system partition at all (verified in Disk Management Console). This may be due to the fact I've previously installed Windows XP and added Windows 7 afterwards.
Now I've removed the XP partition, recreated the boot sector and it seems I don't have any hidden partition as a result.
Anyway, I've got partitions w/o any drive letters assigned on some of my harddisks. This is intended. Of course TI cannot save them neither in partition mode (because of missing drive letters) nor in disk mode. I don't want to backup a complete disk just selective partitions.
I don't remember exactly but was TI 2010 not capable of backing up partitions w/o assigned drive letters? How can I do this with TI 2011, now?
Micky,
My apologies for not identifying the source of my image. This is the 2011 Rescue CD view (also the 2010 Windows View).
You are correct in that the Window7 hidden partitions appear mostly in factory installed computers. Since you installed your own, you had control over your installation.
I do not have any hidden partitions on my system. I am using XP Pro so I cannot perform any tests. Generally speacking, TrueImage will display the hidden partitions and assign its own drive letters (Linux) to these partitions so that a partition will appear without letters inside Wndows but the same partition will appear with drive letters when viewed from within TrueImage.
When creating a backup of individual partitions, are these partitions missing from your choices of what to back up?
If you boot from the 2011 (or 2010) REscue CD, do you have the options to backup your desired partitions?
Again, my apologies for not being able to test what actions TrueImage does actually do when the non-lettered partitions are on other drives.
Note: the column heading showing the partition number, start and ending sectors are user options available from the columns icon located upper mid right of the screen.
Addendum-Edit:
I took a 3 partition sata disk and used Disk Mangement to remove two of the drive letters.
The Windows TrueImage 2011 only displayed the one partition with drive letters as available for individual partition backup.
The TrueImage 2011 Rescue CD showed all 3 partitiion. Assigned its own drive letters and the any of the 3 partiions could be backed up as either single or multiple partitions. Correction: Un-Lettered drives are displayed in the 2011 Windows version. You have to look carefully and completely and may have to maximize the screen width for all to show. I will post in more information & examples in my next post below at a later time.
GroverH no problem at all, I've asked for clarification.
You mentioned you are booting from the rescue CD, this explains it why you see unassigned partitions. I'm using the installation on my Windows 7 OS, which actually does not show up those partitions.
Can sbdy please confirm or perhaps yourself, GroverH, if the installed TI2010 shows up partitions with unassigned drive letters. I could swear I had them in the previous TI version.
Thanks
"Has system-state backup disappeared in version 11? Can't find it anywhere. The prog has picked up a system-state backup task from version 10 and is carrying out the task at 7 every evening (its own choice not mine) and there seems to be no way of changing it."
Well it seems that my system state backups that were running in Acronis 11 also seem to continue running. As Mel reported, there appears to be no way to change that. If I try telling Acronis 2011 to re-create the backup settings from one of the backup files it comes up with something that is most definitely not the configuration that would perform this type of backup (just a straight backup of the system partition).
Did anyone at Acronis even test upgrading from earlier versions...
Maybe I should be happy I still have the functionality of a system state backup...even if I can't make any changes to it.
Micky,
I have corrected my prior comments in post #9. The installed versions of 2011 and 2010 both display hidden partitions for backup creation. In the installed version of 2011, the hidden partitions are listed first in the listing/display of partitions. In version 2010, the hidden partitions are grouped with other partitons on the same disk. Attached is an image of both versions.
Ok, thanks again for your reply!
I am experiencing the same issue that user "Cpljacko" wrote about in his post of 2010-09-03. I upgraded to 2011 a month ago and when the program did the automated backup, it picked up the system state restore option I had selected when I used Acronis 2010. And, I have no ability to turn that feature off. I guess I should have completely removed Acronis 2010 before I upgraded to 2011.
I now need to do a restore of my C Drive since I got hit by a virus that Norton Internet Security let through, and that damaged some of my windows system files. The fact that the C Drive back up file contains this System State backup seems to be causing a problem. When I look at the C Drive back up file made by Acronis 2001, it not only shows the C Drive folder but is showing a D Drive back up folder also. I think "maybe" the system state backup portion is what is showing up as a D Drive backup in the backup Acronis 2011 did of my C Drive, this is just a guess. That is an issue since I have an actual D drive, which contains my desktop manufacturer Restore Files, which I do not want to over write when I do a restore of the C drive. Any ideas on how to get around this issue??
Not sure if anyone else has run into this issue, but I agree, with what I have seen others say, I do not think Acronis 2011 was well beta tested and there seems to be issues with it. Now that I need to do an actual recovery, I wish I would have stayed with 2010 version. That version seemed much more user friendly and I didn't run into this issue.
I'm not sure the original (or subsequent) questions have actually been answered.
I only upgraded to ATIH2011 (from 2010) because I'm now using Office 2010 and the old ATIH2010 won't back up Outlook 2010!
But like others, the upgrade has picked up on my daily system state backup task. It shows in the task list as "system state backup" - Acronis's words, not mine. [Aside: does everyone else get the identification text in the coloured box partially off the bottom of the task area??] So it does presumably recognise it. I believe it runs too, but don't know what it's actually doing! I can't edit it but I can delete it.
If this isn't supported by ATIH2011 (and some of what I've observed above suggests it is) why was it imported in the upgrade??
Why is there no mention of this in the manual??
What is Acronis's recommended course of action?? Leave it be? Delete it?
I have used Acronis backup for many years and this has to have been one of their worst-thought-out offerings yet!
Try this:
- close ATI
- download Acronis schedule mgr (schedmgr.exe)
- run it from an elevated command prompt
- type "GET LIST"
- TASK ZAP
Go to c:\programdata\ACronis\TrueImageHome\Scripts (Vista, 7). For each script, right click, choose edit, scan the file to see if it corresponds to a taks you want to keep. If not, delete the script file.
I was able to complete my restore of my C Drive by just selecting the C Drive and the MBR, and Track 0, and not selecting the D which appears to be the System Reserve folder.
There does seem to be a glitch with the UPGRADE version of Acronis 2011 TH. In the full install version of 2011 TH (I have the full version installed on two laptops running Windows 7-64 bit and Vista 32-bit), the System Reserve backup no longer exists. In the 2010 TH version, Acronis recommended that you select this along with your C drive and it would back up key hidden Windows system files needed in a restore. The step to backup these key Windows hidden files seems to now be built into the 2011 TH FULL version and so the needed hidden system files are backed up with the C drive backup.
But for some reason in the 2011 TH UPGRADE version, the System Reserve feature is still available, and if you unselect it, a window pops up strongly suggesting that you include the backup of the System Reserve drive along with the C Drive. The issue I have with this, as I have said, is that when you try to do a restore the System Reserve folder shows up as a D drive, and this is an issue since most PCs already have a D drive.
I spent hours in a chat with Acronis technical support, all in India, trying to figure out this issue. I needed to be 100% sure the recovery process was not going to over right my D drive as it restored my C drive, since my D drive is where all of the desktop manufacturer set up and recovery files are stored. The Acronis support was no more than very basic at best, but I finally was able to gain enough confidence that I had the right steps selected and I hit the proceed button. It took two hours but the recovery occurred and worked successfully.
As I mentioned, in the 2011 TH FULL version, you do not have the option to select System Reserve folder, so if you need to restore your C drive, Acronis will only see the C drive, so that eliminates this issue. So my recommendation is buy and install the 2011 TH FULL version - do not buy and install the 2011 TH UPGRADE version if you happen to already be using Acronis 2010. And, be sure to completely uninstall all of Acronis 2010 TH before you install the FULL 2011 TH version.
If you have already installed the UPGRADE, and it picks up the System Reserve folder and it shows up as the D Drive when you try to restore the C Drive, then following the steps I mentioned above and you should be able to get around this Acronis 2011 UPGRADE version glitch. I totally agree with Robad, I have used several versions of Acronis over the past 4 years and their 2011 version is the worst thought out and worst beta tested product they have put out by far. And if they do not correct the issues with it in their 2012 version, then I think there is a chance the Acronis company won't survive. I say that because I have read a lot of reviews over the past 2 weeks about Acronis 2011 TH on various websites such as Amazon, and what I am seeing is that there are many folks that are very displeased with the 2011 TH version.
As I mentioned above, I recommend if you have the 2010 version - stick with that until Acronis comes out with their 2012 TH version, and then see if they have paid attention to all the complaints and fixed all the 2011 TH bugs I have experienced or have read about.
Hope this helps anyone who comes up against this restore issue if you are using the 2011 TH UPGRADE version.
Gary,
I am not sure this is correct. There is no difference in terms of functionality between the upgrade and the full.
Some systems has the "system reserved" partition, some don't. It is not a problem, and it is not a feature of ATI: it is a characteristics of your system. When it is there, you 'd better back it up because it contains the boot files.
When you back it up, your backup will show a D disk when you double click on the TIB file. That corresponds to this hidden partition. I have the same on my system. It threw me off for a while, but I dismissed it because I know that partitions letters in ATI can be different from Windows, so I guess the ATI TIB explorer just assigned a random letter for browsing.
Of course, you can elect not to backup the system reserved partition. But if you disk fail, you will make recovery on another disk more complicated.
One additional note. When I installed the Acronis 2011 TH UPGRADE on my desktop running Windows 7-64 bit, I did not delete the last version of the C drive and System backup that I had made with the 2010 TH version. After I installed the 2011 TH UPGRADE, I tried to do a new backup and it would not let me unselect the System Reserve option. But later, I decided to delete all my desktop Acronis backup copies and do a new full backup of the C drive. Although the option to backup the System Reserve folder was still present, now the program gave me the option to not select that backup feature. However, if you do not select the System Reserve, I get a window that pops up and warns me that I should include it. As I mention, in the FULL 2011 TH version, the option to select a System Reserve backup does not exist.
Gee... Simultaneous posts!
Pat L, thanks for the comment. But when I was chatting with an Acronis tech, I was told that in the Full version Acronis 2011 TH the option to back up the system reserve no longer exists, the files needed are backed up as a part of the regular C drive. When I look at my back ups on my laptops using the 2011 full version, that does appear to be the case.
The files I see in the system reserve folder on the UPGRADE version are now included as a part of the C Drive backup and are inside that backup file, not is a separate folder like in the UPGRADE version. When I was using the 2010 TH version on that laptop, it did make a system reserve folder, but for that laptop I opted to uninstall 2010 and install the FULL version of 2011 TH instead of the UPGRADE version. Anyway, this is just what I have experienced. It may be different for other users.
Gary,
Functionally, there is no difference between the full version and upgrade version. The only difference is the upgrade version requires the prior serial number. Both types installs the same download file.
Should you have difficulties with your hard drive or want to move to new or larger drive, the type of backup which offers the most restore optiins with the least problems is a backup which iincludes all partitions including any non-lettered or oem partitions. Simply check mark the disk as to what is to be backed up and you have everything you need to recover your existing disk or move to new or larger disk. Also, a disk backup includes the disk signature which usually needs to be restore when moving to a new disk.
Backup only single partitions or multiple partitions
Example below. Backup your entire disk including all partitions.
