Testing new software in a VM is a really good idea provided you realise that the virtual "hardware" is not the same as your real hardware and act accordingly. There is no way to know, for instance, if a rescue disk which works in a VM will see your real drives.
For trial runs I suggest you create a small 2GB partition and work with that. It is a lot faster and no damage done when things go bad.
1.Copy some data into the 2GB partition
2. image it
3. delete some data from the 2GB partition
4. restore the image
5. if the deleted data is back, the imaging worked.
I do not remember the details of Acronis (has been too long since I treid it). But be careful, a clone is not an image. You can boot from a clone but you cannot restore it like an image.
Your virtual machine deal may not work because e.g. with free Macrium the partition to which you restore must be at least as big as the partition from where you imaged.
You can image and restore any partition not just the one containing the OS. What whs is suggesting is that you perform a test by creating a small partition, adding some data to it. Test that you can create an image of that partition and then test that you can restore that partition from the image using a rescue disk that you create.
Last edited by kado897; 16 Feb 2012 at 14:57.
No idea what you mean by "Backup". An image is a backup. If you refer to seperate data backup, I suggest to define seperate folders on the external disk - one for images and one for data backup. That way stuff does not get all mixed up.So both an image AND a backup of an SSD drive can be stores on an external USB drive and used? That's where I was confused at. I'm new to the solid state drive thing.
I also suggest that you move all your user data to a seperate data partition on the HDD (if you have a desktop). The data partition can also be imaged but sync is faster.
For Data partitions there is also another way to backup with Command Promt using the Wbadmin command. I do that sometimes because I like to play around with VHDs.
Well all of my data is stored on a separate internal data drive anyway as SSDrives aren't suppose to be for storing data, only for installing programs to (based upon what I know about solid states, at least) unless when you say "data" your referring to what's in my "my documents" folder etc. all of my downloads, music, movies, and pictures are stored on another non SSD drive. The only things on my ssd are my installed applications.
I just want to make an image of my ssd, save it to my external, and restore from it later.
That's what I thought you were trying to say. Just make sure you frequently backup your user data too. There are many ways to replace your OS, but when you lose your data, you usually have few options - unless you have backups.
Thanks all.
I too am looking for the "best" backup & recovery software out there for Win 7 (particularly 64-bit) that can handle drives that are >2TB in size.
Just my 2 cents, but I'd avoid Acronis True Image Home 2012 like the plague. I actually purchased the full, paid product, but after a week of being unable to install it on a 64-bit system (along with 100s of others on just their own user forum!) got a full refund.
I've since downloaded the trial version, & you guessed it, it wouldn't install either! Also, another caveat is if you do own a drive that is >2TB, you have to purchase a $35 add-on in order for the product to work. What a rip!
I also tried EaseUS a couple of months ago & ran into the same drive limitations. I haven't been back as I found that their agents on their own user forums were constantly 'blowing smoke' & passing along misinformation.
So, if anyone out there who has found a software recovery & backup tool that can perform a full disk image then incremental backups on a 64-bit Win 7 PC with a hard drive that is >2TB, please let me know!
Thanks!
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