Solved Image your system with free Macrium

[mjf]

I use Macrium all the time and don't rename the images - just follow the bouncing ball and click ok.
Windows inbuilt imaging which I also use does require rename fiddling

 

[whs]

on the mac, I just set time machine as my backup and forget it. a few mouse clicks and done (never have to set or change anything again). wish windows had something as easy for backups...

You can do the same with Macrium. Scheduled images are no problem. And I don't see why you think Macrium is difficult to use. Have a look at this:

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/73828-imaging-free-macrium.html?ltr=I

 

[lehnerus2000]

IMO, the old version used a better method (i.e. the "wizard").

 

[Stephanie]

I have been using Macrium for a couple of days now and very happy with it (easy to use and fast)

 

[kado897]

 

[agile1]

Hi. DavidW7ncus suggested I post my questions here for a veteran's perspective. I'm new to MR Free and only last week had to do my first restore. It was pretty straightforward and most important, successful! I was unsure why the partition letters of the Rescue Disk did not match up to my partition letters, but remembered reading somewhere (this forum most likely) that the Recovery CD (thank you whs for the pre-built WinPE) doesn't know what your system's letters are?

I currently run vista x86 and backup to an external HD. I'm getting ready to replace the HD with a new SSD onto which I'll install W7 Prof x64. The SSD is considerably smaller than my external HD and I'm concerned that I may lose access to all my "old" backups. I've read (free users can't post) throughout MR's official forum and here, but find nothing specific to, say, x86/x64 compatibility issues. So perhaps my concerns are unfounded.

But if x32/x64 issues aren't important, then why are the two builds available? Is x64 always backwards compatible but not the other way? How do you gurus think of these things? And bottom line, will my newly made (x64) rescue usb and MRF (x64) both have ready access to my old (x32 made) backup images? Or perhaps someone can suggest an easier strategy for regularly accessing (old) files/folders.

Thanks, Karen

 

[kado897]

Hi agile1 and welcome to Seven Forums. It is my understanding that the format of the backup files is not dependent on the architecture so you should have no problem with your old backups. Macrium claim the images are both backward and forward compatible. That is to say an older image can be restored by a newer version and vice-versa. I'm not sure how far that extends though.

 

[Britton30]

Hi Karen. Yeah Macrium does seem to have its own drive and partition lettering scheme and doesn't necessarily agree with w7's opinions. It may be due to the fact that some external media is used to store the image and adds an extra letter in the mix if only temporary. It does however retain any NAME I have given to a drive or partition, eg, w7 SSD.

 

[whs]

Regarding backwards and forwards compatibility there is no problem with Macrium - within limits. Every once in a long while they come out with a new release where they recommend to burn a new WinPE disc.

 

[agile1]

Thank you for all your responses. I now anticipate no problems accessing backups made with different OS/MR architecture.

Yeah, during my restore I ended up relying on the names (and sizes) I'd given my partitions, not the new letters the Rescue USB assigned them.

I really am delighted with MRF. When I think of all the time/effort I've wasted these past several years trying to get Acronis to work, and ultimately never knowing if I really had a reliable backup strategy! Now if I can convince a sibling how important Backing up is, I'll know what to recommend.

 

[kado897]

You are welcome agile1. Macrium has saved my bacon several times.

 

[lehnerus2000]

First Failure

Well I just had my first re-image failure using Macrium.

I tried to re-image my XP partition and somehow my Linux Mint partition suffered some sort of damage, which rendered my PC unbootable.
Not only that, it totally hosed the recovery disc functions.
I couldn't use the Linux Recovery disc to restore any images at all (it would "stick" on the image folders and then reboot the machine).

Luckily my friend (Linux Expert) was able to force the Live Linux Mint DVD to perform a disc check on the damaged partition and it miraculously fixed what ever had gone wrong (it listed a lot of changes).

It looks like I might be forced to image the entire disc from now on.
Creating 500GB+ images are going to be lots fun.

 

[SIW2]

Not sure macrium handles ext4 all that well. It seems to make a sector by sector copy - as if it doesn't understand the filesystem.

I use Paragon. Perfect for windows and linux filesystems. You do have to reinit linux bootloader after restore .

 

[lehnerus2000]

Weird

Not sure macrium handles ext4 all that well. It seems to make a sector by sector copy - as if it doesn't understand the filesystem.

I use Paragon. Perfect for windows and linux filesystems. You do have to reinit linux bootloader after restore .

I haven't had any problems in the past.
It has always restored NTFS and EXT4 partitions correctly (no tinkering required) using the restore disc (albeit that was using the older version).

I was restoring a NTFS partition (XP) and somehow it corrupted the adjacent EXT4 partition (it did successfully restore the XP image though). :shock:
Macrium verified the XP image before and after the incident.

Normally I restore W7 from XP and Linux from either Windows OS.
I couldn't restore XP from W7, because it said the partition was being used (the boot files?).
That meant I had to use the restore disc.
It's a pity that I don't know how to transfer the restore functions, from the Linux Restore disc, to my Linux Mint OS.

I wonder if the latest version of my restore disc is defective (i.e. maybe it didn't burn properly).
I have an earlier version, but it wouldn't select any locations on my other internal HDD (after the other restore disc damaged the target HDD).

I think that because the target HDD was damaged, Macrium couldn't figure out where the backup image was supposed to go and that made it crash.

The GRUB Rescue utility listed all partitions on that HDD as MS-DOS.

The Linux Mint Live DVD couldn't see the EXT4 partition either (using Caja).
I was able to locate it using the Terminal and my friend was able to make it perform a disc check, which fixed it.

Next time I'll try the WinPE disc that I got from whs and Britton30.

 

[SIW2]

It's a pity that I don't know how to transfer the restore functions, from the Linux Restore disc, to my Linux Mint OS.

I don't know how to do that either. If I did, I would put paragon into ubuntu.

I am enjoying using Unity now. Interesting Ubuntu can also claim to be the first os to include search scopes ( MS will be doing it in 8.1 ).
There are only a couple in 13.04 - including amazon, but I see there may be up to 100 in 13.10

 

[lehnerus2000]

It's a pity that I don't know how to transfer the restore functions, from the Linux Restore disc, to my Linux Mint OS.

I don't know how to do that either. If I did, I would put paragon into ubuntu.

Paragon uses a Linux based recovery disc too (like Macrium)?

 

[SIW2]

Yes, Paragon comes with Linuxbased iso . There is a separate package at no extra charge to create winpe media.

Paragon Linux iso looks like this:

 

[Gary]

I Downloaded this today, it looks pretty neat and will do the job.

 

[agile1]

So having updated to MRF 5.2.6249, I attempted making first a Windows PE 3.1 and then a 4.0 Rescue Media. Repeated attempts have failed, all ending in "An error occurred mounting the Windows Image File".

Viewing the waiklog one reads: "Failed - Error code 6, The handle is invalid. Unmounting the Wim". I've searched online and find nothing.

Any thoughts on where to go from here would be appreciated.
Karen

 

[whs]

Why don't you just download the WinPE .iso from my Skydrive. Then burn that to CD.