ATI 11 Secure zone use

[Senioruser]

Hi ! I am a new user of ATI 11 and am confused about the use of the Secure Zone (SZ). I set up a SZ on my second internal hard drive H:/ (20Gbyte) and ran a full Image backup of my primary internal hard drive to the SZ. My primary HD has (3) partitions : C:/ contains the operating system (XP svc pack3); D:/contains all 3rd party programs :E:/ contains data files. I backed up a separate image file for C: and D:. I have since read that all partitions have to be included in the same image file or partitions not included will be lost on a Snap restore. I can't find anyway to access the SZ to delete and start over other than to delete the SZ itself. I have a 320Gb external hard drive that I am using to store AT11 file backups. Can anyone provide me with a sanity check and provide some direction ?

[seekforever]

You are correct about any "not present" partitions in your backup causing the one on the HD to be deleted. I don't use Snap Restore and don't see any real benefit to it - it's not like you are restoring your disk 100 times a day.

The backups in the SZ have to be managed via the Secure Zone option - the partition is hidden to normal Windows operation. The Linux people have tools that will do it though. I also don't use the SZ since I like to manually manage my backup files and copy selected ones to other locations after they have been created. My archives are just stored in a regular folder.

The SZ is handy if you want some of its automatic features but its main reason is to provide new users who only have one partition on their disk an easy way to create a second partition without any additional software to store the images in.

Perhaps somebody who uses the SZ can tell you how to delete backups from it - I couldn't see any reference to it in the User Guide but I may have missed it.

[Senioruser]

Thanks 'seekforever' for the quick response. I am interested in the SZ approach for its simplicity. From reading recent posts I gather that not many people use it. Does anyone have any input to SZ's usefulness ?

[Xpilot]

Once you have got to grips with some of the funny ways of the secure zone you may come to realise it is one of the best features of True Image. That is up to and including Version 11. From then onwards....Don't go there.

I use the secure zone to store eight or nine full images of my main drive. Just one simple schedule and away it goes. The images are created automatically and they are managed automatically on the FIFO basis.
I have never felt the need to delete any old images. After all they just might come in handy. In any case in the fullness of time they will be overwritten by more current images.

Like you I have the secure zone on a secondary internal drive. To keep things really simple I only use full images of the main drive that is being protected.
I have never considered using Snap restore because it will only work if you are restoring to the same hard drive. My method involves restoring to an earlier generation hard drive. This is facilitated by using exchangable drive caddies.

In the early days of developing my backup strategy I swapped over main drives and restored them on a daily basis. Now after two years of sucessfull working I only swap over and restore the main drives once a week.
I use the same method with a laptop but in that case I only swap the drive on a monthly basis. The images are stored on a USB drive for that machine.

Xpilot

[Senioruser]

If I change the image file to include the partitions, will the original separate partition images eventually be deleted to make space available ?

[Xpilot]

-{ Quote: "If I change the image file to include the partitions, will the original separate partition images eventually be deleted to make space available ?" }-

Yes.

Xpilot