True Image Home 2011 Task Management

Peter,
Well stated. Having to manually delect these is a real pain and a waste of my time.

One of my suggestion is:

"For many of us, we probably have lots of backups created over time, but have only a few active or regular tasks. So any others listed just confuses things and takes up unnecessary space. One suggestion might be to have all the assorted backups listed on a summary page and let the user choose which few of the many listed are to appear on the "My Backups" GUI.
The idea for options might be "Select all"; Select none"; and allow individual selection."

Thank you.

So, if I understood correctly, this suggestion is for the future releases, there is nothing can be done under this version.

Fixes to existing problems are sometimes corrected in the next build of a release. Usually the next build after a new release is usually within a few months. Whether there are any modifications to this behavior is your guess as it would be mine. Who knows. For now, we just try to perform the manual deletions from the task to get them out of the way and move on.

Thank you. I just hope the developers will realize that this needs to be fixed in the future build.

I just upgraded from Acronis True Image 2010 to 2011 and, I too, hate what they have done to task management.

Reasons:
1) I had to weed out many past backup jobs from the backup list because they are long obsolete.
2) The format is totally different and NOT as easy to view and to use as previous versions.
3) I had my backup jobs named in such a way that they were sorted in the order I wanted (alphabetically). Now they are sorted in an odd way that I have not been able to figure out and NOT in the order I want.

This has been a big step backwards for task management. I would like to suggest changing task management back to its former easy to view and use format.

Respectfully, Al Stearns
Pisgah Forest, NC
USA

I just upgraded to 2011 also and I totally agree with these complaints. The prior method was much better.

Hello everyone,

Thank you very much for your posts and I appreciate your useful feedback.

Our Development team is aware of this inconvenience and are currently working to fix the situation. Most likely this will be resolved in a future update of the program, although it is not possible at the moment to commit on a time frame, I am terribly sorry for that.

As soon as I have any new information I will update this thread.

Please let me know if you have additional questions.

Thank you.

Hi,

The task management gets more and more frustrating. Updating the list takes too long, there should be some kind of filters to not reload all tasks every time I start TI2011. Of course those filters should be persistent, but I guess I must not mention this and the programmers should have learned this from similar complaints about TI2010 already ;-)
TI2010 did the job better but still not perfect, using a calender.

OTH, TI2011 tries to find all backups located at any directories. This is not necessary and wanted at all. I've got some old backups which I certainly do not want to be listed in the task overview. OK, I can remove them, however, using menu Help - Update backup list, just adds them again and again.

cu,
Michael

Additional wish: a Collapse/Expand all button and/or context menu entry should be added to quickly fold/unfold all task items.

Micky it would seem the answer is, don't use Help\Update Backup List option. It would seem intuitive that this would add back in all archives found.

I suppose what would be useful is when the first use screen pops up if there is a selection option to add all archives or ignore or all current archives.

Personally, I think it better to add in all those found, and then have the database updated by deleting those that are no longer relevant, than the opposite problem that some people will have in having forgotten where they have placed archives in the past. Whilst this idea seems laughable, there are people who have TI set up by a computer shop, and never touch the program settings again, then decide to update/grade and suddenly find they haven't the faintest idea what is where.

The changes in task management are unhelpful and really uncalled for. Creating and editing up backups, including schedules, was organized and intuitive in TI 2010. TI 2011, by contrast, is helter skelter, requiring considerably more time to get things done. System State backup is gone, though that may not be too important in Windows. You cannot make changes in a backup scheme while the backup is running, which was not the case in 2010. Most important is the lack of scheduling flexibility in 2011. I run daily backups of my data files every six hours in 2010 and might decide to change that in the future; in 2011 the maximum is four hours.

2011 allows two backups to run simultaneously, which just happened to my Windows 7 computer when a full disk backup ran longer than expected and a small data backup started up, but neither ever finished. 2010 queues them so that this does not happen. After this, my confidence in 2011 vanished and, for this reason, and also because of the problems with managing the backups mentioned above, I uninstalled 2011 and reinstalled 2010.

I agree, TI 2011 looks more like downgrade to me rather than upgrade. Some non-essential features like Windows integration had been added, but the most important functionality had either been removed or messed up.

The reason I'm still keeping TI 2011 is because it backs up to DVDs much better than 2010. The previous version didn't work for me, I couldn't back up to DVDs, was getting all kinds of errors and finally gave up. TI 2011 does it well so far.

I'm glad I found this thread before I upgraded to 2011. I think I'll stick with 2010 meantime.

MFL wrote:

The changes in task management are unhelpful and really uncalled for. Creating and editing up backups, including schedules, was organized and intuitive in TI 2010. TI 2011, by contrast, is helter skelter, requiring considerably more time to get things done. System State backup is gone, though that may not be too important in Windows. You cannot make changes in a backup scheme while the backup is running, which was not the case in 2010. Most important is the lack of scheduling flexibility in 2011. I run daily backups of my data files every six hours in 2010 and might decide to change that in the future; in 2011 the maximum is four hours.

Hello MFL, thanks for feedback anyway
What about only every four hours daily backup it is a known bug and we are going to fix it till the next update. What about "more time to get things done", we compared 2010 and 2011 main use cases perfoming time, and 2011 was abou 20% faster. I mean that users spent 20% less time to complete main use cases (backups, recover etc.).

Thanks

I upgraded from 2010 to 2011 and I believe I will ask for a refund. The program has taken a step back. Instead on my partition backup taking 28 min it took almost 2 hours. The program format is horrible. I repair computers for a living and I was amazed that they took a great program in 2010 and went down hill. It took me twice as long to figure my backup than 2010. I will remove 2011 and reinstall 2010 because of confidence issue.

(deleted)

The backup list is not only bulky and unmanageable, it is totally inconsistent (s. attachment "Backuplist Disaster"!).  Managing backup tasks with 2011 is next to impossible and at best even more cumbersome than in the 2009/2010 releases! It seems things are only getting worse with each "upgrade". One thing in 2011's favor is all the exercise my fingers get left and right clicking the mouse buttons! (I think I have developed the equivalent of tennis elbow in my mouse hand.) Don't you folks know that some of us still actually use keyboards???!!!

The attachments show what an egregious disaster the backup list truly is:

1. not ordered in any particular way,
2. some backups are missing,
3. others appear and then disappear with each new opening of the program and
4. the same backup archives suddenly appear with different names
5. the same backup archives sometimes appear with and without the tib extension (see "With and without tib.jpg"!

Every time I open 2011, the backup list is in some way different that before even though no backups have been run in the meantime and the external storage has not been removed. To release this once fine program in this state goes beyond being sloppy and shoddy!

Acronis should be ashamed of this release! I can't help feeling like the consumers are the guinea pigs and we paid to test this release and report bugs back to Acronis. (I have easily found at least three bugs in this release... and you can be sure more are on the way!)

Task management in 2011 is terrible. This is a huge step backwards. It's unusable, inconsistent and totally unreliable. I've been a big fan until now. This release is awful. The product is not fit for purpose.

After strugling with the new TaskManager for an hour I reverted to 2010. I had to recover my task settings from a backup, as they got corrupted for the 2010 version.

What most surprises me is how this piece of crap could have passed all Acronis quality controls. You don't need more that ten minutes to realize it goes nowhere, old TaskManager seems in fact 2 or 3 version ahead in evolution.

Appart from the clumpsy desing, it is plenty of new bugs. For example it don't recognize the size of the drives with no letter -but folder- attached. There is not a clear distinction between the task name and the backup file name. I fact I couldn't figure out how to properly consigure the manager to have a single copy backup, it always created new ones.

Something seems to be going badly with the Acronis technical staff (new people?). After trying 2011 I feel they won't be able to recover the old fuctionality. Too bad to be optimistic.

JOSE wrote:

For example it don't recognize the size of the drives with no letter -but folder- attached.

Some partition size information shown on he non-lettered drives as circled in red in the attachment below.
Click on picture for full view.

JOSE wrote:

There is not a clear distinction between the task name and the backup file name.

Yes, the task name and name of archive is the same and that is intentional as designed.

JOSE wrote:

I fact I couldn't figure out how to properly consigure the manager to have a single copy backup, it always created new ones.

This setting will produce one full backup and each next backup will overwrite the last.

Hi GroverH thanks for your comments.

With respect the partition size problem you may want to try this:
-Prepare a disk with small a primary partion, let say drive D, size 1GB
-Create aditional partitions -in my case are extended ones- to host the backup files
-Don't assign drive letter to theses partitons, but paths in D:, let say D:\Pictures, D:\Maps,....
-Try to backup a drive to any of these folders. In 2011 I always get a not enough space warning,
becuase it supposes they are in the D: drive, which only has 1 GB.
2010 is smart enough to figure out that these folders are in fact plenty of room partitions
and doesn't complain when I try to backup to them.

On the other hand, if task and archive names are the same by desig as you pointed out, I feel it is a neat step backwards in interface desing.
And worse, it is incompatible with previous configurations like mine:

TaskName--------------------------FileName
-----------------------------------------------
Pictures-->ExternalDisk -------- Pictures.tib
Pictures-->InternalDisk -------- Pictures.tib

An innecessary bad idea risking to broke 2010 configurations. What for?

Reagarding the single copy backup, I remember I selected a Full Backup, but I seemed to me TI2011 assigned aditional letters as Pictures21.tib preventing delete Pictures.tib.

Now I back to 2010 again, so I can't experiment with the "store no more than" spinbox I was no aware off. At that point my patient level has lowered to the ground after one hour strugilng with the interface and blaming myself for having lost my previous configurations. So it is perfectely possible I missed the main point here.

Anyway, I don't like the new interface, I will stick to 2010

I have been using a variety of Acronis products for many many years and there are some differences from version to version which is expected. I know this has been stated several times during this thread, but the Task Management in the 2011 version is the worse idea I have ever seen Acronis come out with. I manage the IT staff in several offices in my company and the primary concern with any developed application is being "user friendly". As complex as applications are these days you need to make the user interface as intuitive as possible to keep your help desk requests to a minimum. All versions up to and including 2010 have been that way. So my message to Acronis development is this "Don't fix what isn't broke". They need to put the task management back the way it was, if for anything, simplicity.

I cannot agree with you more. I was astonished to see how they took a easy to use format and made it hard to follow. I took the 2011 off and reinstalled the older version. I will be reluctant to upgrade to a newer version in he future.
Bruce

I held off buying ATI2010 as the feed back here was poor. It now seems that 2011 is also poor.
I think investigating an alternative product will be necessary when I move to W7.

The Acronis ATI product seem to be going backwards not forwards. Every year there is a new version which does not meet users needs. I have been using ATI for 4 years.

If I wait long enough Windows will have have great backup software built in and there will be no need for Acronis.

I just programmed/scheduled a number of back ups from one pc to different external drives, set for starting tonight and next weekend. Now I want to change something and I cannot find them! I can't see the backups that are scheduled ahead. Are they still there? If I repeat, will I duplicate? How do I find them? Have they warped into another universe?

I am glad I did not upgrade all my pcs.

I will shop around for another product.

Lawrence,
The task listing has multiple tasks listed but only a couple show. To see more tasks, therer is a vertical scroll bar a few inches to the right of any any task listed.

Click image to enlarge image.

GroverH

Does not have a scroll bar on mine. But thanks. The bugs must have eaten it :-)

Lawrence,
I was referring to version 2011. If using 2010, there is an option to supress some tasks or display all tasks.

GroverH

Yes, I have used Acronis for 3 years now. No real problems 2009,2010. Now I upgraded a machine to 2011 today and getting invisible schedules. Actually, I got an email notification that my evening back up ran successfully. May be the other three schedules will run too. I will not know until next Sunday if they still exist. I can't see them listed anywhere.

Acronis 2011
W7 Ult 64x

.............................................................................

I have now uninstalled 2011 and reinstalled. uninstall seemed clean and complete. It was a bit annoying to have to find the old serial number for the next install. Maybe too clean an uninstall :-)

This time I used the Back up assistant. I found that one cannot get back to the Back up assistant after setting up the first Back up scheme.

I think my original problem was that when one gets to the point where it says "Back up now" I exited the screen thinking it would pick up the schedule at the alotted time. Now I think it discards the scheme unless one picks "Back up now", a delay or "Later". Is that correct?

Anyway, this time round I picked "Later" and all was well.

I have to admit I like most of the new procedure now I am more familiar with it. Why did I have to fill in the email notification four times though, after I checked the default button?

I can concur with all the above but Technical help have been extremely helpful and I could not ask for better
Certainlly 2011 is not an upgrade but a down grade
Yes 2010 did have its problems but why did Develoment not follow the same format which was simple to read follow and use
I agree with an earlier posting if it" ain't broke don't mend it" JUST address develeopment to the few problems it had for me Script Errorswhich are now creeping into 2011 (see attachment)
Bwep

+1

to having a new UI and not what we have which takes up and too long (and too large for text and icons).

pending
today
week
in progress
all

click to expand

And I only have three data drives, but 7 backup scripts so far (drive images, full system images, media files, documents, email, software program download/updates).

SORRY G 7

I DO NOT UNDERSTAND YOUR REPLY
ARE YOU IN THE CORRECT FORUM >

REGARDS
BWEP

Barrie,

If the posting problem you are seeing is one where you've clicked the post button, but nothing seems to happen, this is often a page refresh packet not being sent back to the browser correctly.

If you find the forum appearing to hang, open up a new tab (if your browser has tabs) and go back into the forum. Then you can see if your post/edit really did work or the forum really has timed out.

THANK YOU COLIN

NO COLIN IT HAS HAPPENEDED WHEN I TRY TO EDIT

POSSIBLY FINGER TROUBLE BUT IT IS NOT VERY CLEAR
REGARDS
BARRIE ALIAS BWEP

RE THE REPEATS
iTS THE SYSTEM HANGING FOR SEVERAL MINUTES AND A ANOTHER SAVE REPEATS THE POST
SOMETHINKG FOR THE ATENTIONOF THE MODERATER PLEASE
BWEP

(Refer to my entry for background on this.)

Hey, I know! It's like a party! A totally freaking anarchistic Backup List Party!

I have a support case open on this issue in Germany. They just sent me a new Build 5519. (Imaging releasing another Build with the same bleedin' Backup List format!).
After following their instructions to uninstall TI2011 with their Acronis Clean-Up Utility, I installed the new build and let TI have a shot at filling the Backup List with entries from my external USB harddrive. (see attached "nachher-backupliste.pdf" - the previous build of TI2011 added five ones to the archive names! What the...?). As we can see it's a free-for-all. Without rhyme or reason, TI2011 grabs a few archives and randomizes the listing. Ah, no, but wait! Can it be? Yes! The puzzle has been solved: Only the last archives in a given chain are listed in descending chronological order! Got it. Great, right?

But wait, there's more!

I made a new differential scheduled backup which TI2011 called "Volume-Backup (XPG)" (Partition G with the volume name XP) and saved as Volume-Backup_XPG.tib. I figured things were bad enough already, so I just let TI2011 do its thing. The backup ran fine, so I did what no one should ever do with TI2011: I cloned the backup task. Little did I know that this would mean trouble.
So,  task cloned and modified to backup Partition E instead of G. TI2011 cloned the name of the Backup Task as well, but, hey, no problem. Just change the name (like in TI2009/2010) to "Volume-Backup (E)" and relax for a change.

WRONG!

As we can see in attachment confusion.jpg, the Backup task named "Volume-Backup (E)" was saved as Volume-Backup_XPG1.tib, thereby stacking the first differential (i.e. full) backup of Partition E on top of the first differential (full) backup of Partition G! Holy cow!

But wait, the party isn't over yet! It gets even better!

The scheduled diff-backup of "Volume-Backup (XPG)" (G-Partition only) runs afterwards as scheduled, creating archive Volume-Backup_XPG(1).tib. So, now I've got the following archives:

• Volume-Backup_XPG.tib with a full backup of Partition G
  
• Volume-Backup_XPG1.tib with a full backup of Partition E apparently including a backup of Partition G and
• Volume-Backup_XPG(1).tib with the first diff-backup of Partition G.

Well I didn't want E with G, so I figured I would just delete the troublesome (cloned) backup task which caused that little problem. (Can you see what's coming?). With the help of our drunken friend, Backup List, I clicked on "Actions - delete backup" (translating from the German version) and what did TI2011 do? Yep, that's absolutely right: it deleted ALL THREE archives. (Since I didn't delete the Backup Task named Volume-Backup (XPG), it remained in the list as an orphan - having  no backup archive associated with it anymore.)

Hey, really, at this point I'm laughing. This is really becoming worth the money, after all. One of the best non-strategic computer games I've ever played, especially because for its real-life consequences!

So, where does this stand now?
I have sent a less entertaining report to Acronis Germany and have notified them I will be informing all well-known German computer mags which have highly rated this monstrosity. I highly recommend anyone else having problems with TI2011 do the same in their country. It is simply unfathomable and unforgivable that this Version of a once excellent backup software should still be getting such high praise.

Keep in touch! And let's not give up on this! Maybe some well-deserved bad press will get a rise out of Acronis.

Hello all,

I would like to thank everyone for their valuable contribution to this thread and I want to thank Grover and Colin for their kind assistance.

I have created an enhancement request and forwarded it to our Management team regarding the issues with Acronis True Image 2011 Home task management. You can also send your feedback to us by following this link.

Alfred,

Please let me assist you with this issue. I am very sorry to hear about this problem with our software, however, your case is being handled by an experienced support professional and we are currently trying to get to the bottom of it.

We are trying to localize the issue that is why we are asking you to perform different scenarios, I am terribly sorry for any inconvenience.

I will follow-up with the support engineer working on the case and mention that a clean installation did not fix this problem.

Please let me know if you have additional questions.

Thank you.

Thank you for this Alfred

Some time you have had
Lets hope for better things sooner than later

Barrie

Time for some more fun folks!

I thought I would start pretty much from scratch on my external hard drive, so I deleted all confusing backup archives TI2011 made with the previous build and made two new backup tasks: Volume-Backup (XPG) (Acronis' chosen name) and Volume-Backup_E (manually edited name).

Just when I thought I had finally worked out the puzzling Backup List (remember my previous entry?) , it changed it's "logic". Just have a look at the attached guessinggames.pdf!

Expect the unexpected!

@ Anton

This "Backup List" issue is [Case 00898834] Backupliste unbrauchbar [ ref:00D3Zcb.5005A7RdC:ref ]

I have not opened a case on the "Cloning" issue I reported above because the free 30-day Support Acronis offers has expired and I'd be a ninny to pay for $11.94 for additional support on this product! Come on - Acronis should be offering unlimited support at NO CHARGE! Correction: They should be paying us users to be doing their software testing for them!

Alfred,
Your version and my version are different as I am testing.

If you double click on the task name ( or choose the "Explore all versions" options, does it not show you what backups are included in the task. When I click on my Task name, the timeline at the bottom shows date, size and partitions included in the backup.

I have gone back to 2010 from 2011 on my Desktop Win 7 Home Premium and there is nothing more encoutraging than opening uo and seing all those green squares.

I have always had it on my Laptop Vista ( see attachment) A forest of green ( one red on 17th October)
Keeping it there just as a a reminder !!

BWEP

Thanks for that BP!
I've been screwing around with the idiosyncrasies of 2011 for so long I had completely forgotten how the 2010 Task Management worked. (BTW: In Germany "intuitive user interface" is a feature appearing on the TI2011 front web page.)

I have been informed that another build of 2011 will be coming out in about two weeks. Depending on the results, I may go back to 2010 as well, but I remember not being so happy with the recovery listing there either. I remember many inconsistencies in the list. Still, it was easier to deal with these in 2009/2010. In the end I may go back to Version 7 or 8.

@ GroverH
No, we've got the same version Grovers - although all it takes is a single click on the task name to get that slick-looking, sliding multipanel Time Viewer. I haven't spent much time with the Time Viewer level of the Acronis True Image 2011 game, so I don't see where it mentions the actual name of the file it is accessing in a particular panel. Not that I would care about that at this point. I have very mixed feelings about the Time Viewer, but I personally would still prefer a simple familiar directory-tree-like style to manage backups and recoveries.

Interestingly enough, when I clicked on Volume-Backup XPG(1) in my Backup List, I got a message saying the backup doesn't exist. Clicking on "ignore this backup" removed the invalid entry from the list. Apparently, TI2011 isn't smart enough to do that on it's own.

Alfred,

I think you can be pretty sure that Grover has a different build to you, as he is testing something for Acronis, unless Acronis have sent you a specific build to test a specific problem.

Well, Colin, it is pretty clear which build of TI2011 I am using (as mention above it is Build 5519 which Acronis did explicitly send me), but let's let Grover decide for himself if we are using the same builds. 

I do like your footer/signature, though, giving info on OS, product versions and builds which you are using/testing/supervising/whatever. Perhaps Grover (and the rest of us serious folk) could use something similar in the future.

Reading about these Task Management adventures reaffirms my intention to steer clear of upgrades unless there's a compelling reason--and even then wait at least 4 to 6 months while intrepid customers enjoy the experience of paying to be de facto beta testers. By releasing new versions about the same time every year, Acronis has made it clear that the annual revenue boost is "job 1" (apologies to FoMoCo) while customer satisfaction and the safety of your data take a back seat.

Get something out the door, ready or not and never mind whether new features are actually much of an improvement. You can always advertise a return to the slightly better way things worked two versions ago as a selling point for the following year's upgrade. Okay maybe this exaggerates things a bit, but it highlights the absurdity of a fixed annual upgrade cycle--unless you're developing tax software. Oh well, just another cost (pardon the pun) of living under the so-called "worst system save for all the others".

Just so I don't sign off without saying something positive about Acronis TI, I think the free Plus Pack offer may be worth an upgrade to 2011. Then I'll keep using TI 2010 until a month or two before a bug-infested TI 2012 hits the market. By then TI 2011 should be reasonably safe to use. ;-]

Yes, they went to join the developer(s) and test team(s) (in the most unlikely event that something like that exists at Acronis)...
The 2011 version is absolutely not usable and I do not understand that such a version is even being released. Using Lotus Notes as the company's e-mail program already sucks big time in regards to usability - but with this version, the Acronis development team for sure qualifies for the "worst programmer of the century" award...

Thomas Runge

Lawrence Houghton wrote:

I.... Have they warped into another universe?

I am glad I did not upgrade all my pcs.

I couldn't wait to check out the new TI 2011. Then it really happened - I actually saw it. It was like experiencing Star Wars Episode I all over again. You realized that the eye-candy screens were akin to Jar-Jar Binks - it wasn't going to go away.

So, I went ahead an scheduled a full backup to a network share for this nice new 64-bit windows 7 professional computer. I clicked on the backup now button, and it did nothing. Turns out I had insufficient disk space. A popup message would have been nice instead of finding that message in another screen. So I changed the network path to somewhere with room and still the backup button did nothing. The log window remained empty. So I waited for the backup to start at the appointed time which I scheduled it - and it didn't run. No log entry still. I installed the new 5519 build and still no action, no logging, no popup error, no clue.

Did George Lucas beta test 2011? Of course, I'm trying to be humorous here to take the edge off a little bit. I firmly believe that Acronis can indeed make things right.

To be fair, Acronis TI does (usually) do what it is supposed to do: make backups which can also be restored, browsed, etc. Even TI2011 has worked well to that extent, but certainly not "intuitively" so (...then again, we are not born knowing intuitively how to backup digital data, now, are we?).

A new, new build (6574) has been released and with regard to the Backup List and managing one's backups there has been - guess what! - no change...

...except for one significant improvement: the anarchy of the Backup List has been resolved. Only the Backup Jobs themselves appear, not their diff or inc siblings as it was in my case. This makes things comparatively (only to earlier builds) more manageable.

@ Eric Wood - Your (lack of) results are surprising, but not astonishing. I have come to not have much appreciation for the little popup messages if and when they appear. When they do and I click on them, all they do is vanish. "Intuitively" I would expect, as with Windows bubble messages, that clicking on the popup would result in some further activity or offer me a choice of action. Nope. Shoddy programming. Even right-clicking on a menu entry (e.g., "Status" or "Cancel") from the icon in the system tray sometimes (not always) doesn't respond. So, you may not be missing out on much anyway. ;-)

(FYI)

I just was about to post yet another bug (elsewhere) in TI2011 build 6574, when I noticed this post from 3 Dec. 2010: Acronis True Image Home 2011 Update 1 build 6574 has been withdrawn.   *roar*