What are the .opt files used for and when can I delete them?
I cannot find an answer for this anywhere even after years of using the product. What are the saved .opt files for and can I delete all of them or only delete them after the backups have been deleted and do I need to save them for any backups that are still valid? I have used the program to restore my drives in the past, and when I do that, I notice that the .opt file related to that backup that was restored is no longer there. Just curious if the program needs them to perform a restore or are they just taking up space?
Sorry I am now just answering, but I never received an email saying there was a reply to my original. I just now checked and saw your message.
They are in the directory C:\program data\acronis\trueimagehome\archive options. One is written and saved to that directory each time I do any kind of backup. They have always been there since I started with Acronis True Image Home, and that is with Window 7 and Windows 10. Currently use 2014 because later versions deleted the e-mail backup option, but this has been in all versions, as I said, since 2010 when I started using Acronis.
I have just never figured out what they are used for if anything.
James, thank you for the further information. I have just checked on an old system I have which still has ATIH 2014 installed (on Windows XP) and the .OPT files are simply text files in XML data format that you can drag on to Notepad (or any other text editor) to see the contents.
These .OPT files have no connection to your Outlook email .PST files, but are simply configuration options for the program.
Email backup as a separate backup option was removed from the later versions because it isn't really needed and it was always playing catch up with all the different email applications and the locations where they save your data.
If you make a full disk & partitions backup of your computer, then this will include all your email data and configuration etc.
You can also use a Files & Folders backup and select the specific folders / files holding your email data but with an email program such as Outlook, you need to understand that any data being held in memory by Outlook that is not committed to disk will not be saved - this is the same for Word or other MS Office applications which only write to disk occasionally or when closed down.
Thanks for the reply! I do know all of that, but I still like to make separate backups of the email since with that I can recover indiviual emails and you cannot do that with an image backup which i also do. You can only recover the .pst files intact with an image backup, and I have used ther email backup to recover emails that I might have accidently deleted.
I just want to know what the .opt files are and is it safe to delete them.
James, with a disk image backup .tib file, you can mount this via Windows Explorer to a new drive letter, then open any .PST file within that backup by just pointing Outlook at the file, which would allow you to recover individual emails as if you had restored that file. .TIB files are read/only but you could move the recovered emails to a different .PST in your Outlook folder structure.
Difficult to say with certainty what the effect of deleting the .OPT files would be - there is no ArchiveOptions folder in the later versions of ATIH such as 2017. Would suggest making a backup of the files then try removing the oldest to the recycle bin and see what happens?
Thanks. I have come to the conclusion that they are there for any problems that may occur during a backup and are really just to help support as would the log files. I don't think they have a thing to do with restoring any image or backup.