Does the B&R utility backup programs, etc?

ignatzatsonic · 11 Apr 2011

You should be able to use a free third party tool like Partition Wizard to get around the MFT problem.

Most imaging tools will NOT allow you to restore to a smaller partition---so yes, you have to shrink the partition if your destination partition is smaller than the original. Your alternative is to find a program that doesn't have that limitation and as far as I know all of them cost money.

Most would advise you to go with Macrium or maybe Acronis rather than the Windows tool. But you still have to shrink the partition if you intend to restore to a smaller one---as WHS originally said.

If you use a dedicated backup tool (not an imaging tool), you can certainly have it back up your drivers directory---or any other directory. That kind of flexibility is a very important.

whs · 11 Apr 2011

The backup is for files, the image is for the whole system.

Also, if I use the image you think I still need to shrink partition before backing up?

If you plan to restore to the same size or bigger partition, there is no need to shrink the partition beforehand. If, however, you want to dump the image into a smaller partition, you must first resize the originating partition to the size of the target partition (at least with free Macrium). I think free Paragon can deal with dumping into a smaller partition. But I myself have not tried that yet.

jeremyleroy96 · 11 Apr 2011

Alright, I have heard too many unsuccessful attempts with the windows utility. I will not use it

Okay, I'll check out partition wizard.

Thanks for the help guys!