Raxco Instant Recovery - Comparisons

Discussion in 'FirstDefense-ISR Forum' started by Peter2150, Nov 4, 2014.

  1. kennyboy

    kennyboy Registered Member

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    Many thanks to you both for the guidance. As I use Macrium V5 and SP for backup, it is good to know.

    Regards
     
  2. beethoven

    beethoven Registered Member

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    Pete, I know you explained that in more details somewhere but I forgot some of it. I too use shadow protect and IR but am now thinking of switching to Macrium due to the rollback feature. I am not quite sure how to incorporate IR in there and what benefit it has over having a second image (Shadowprotect). For me at the moment updating an archive with IR and doing a full image with SP is about the same time. I use IR as my first line of defence with the image as the backup. If I were to switch to Macrium, then this would be my first line as it allows the very fast update and rollback. I probably would have a "just in case image" from SP in reserve but don't quite know why I would still need IR? I understand that you use IR in case you lost an image or an image was corrupted but given that this requires an updated archive and the update time is as long as an image, apart from reliability was there something else ?
     
  3. USAAlone

    USAAlone Registered Member

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    Instant Recovery is not a image backup like Macrium or ShadowProtect. Instant Recovery cannot backup a partitioned hard drive. It can restore your C drive.The next time you install Windows you should install Instant Recovery. You can install Windows on a different hard drive. Can also install Windows in a blank snapshot. Boot the empty snapshot. You will get the unable to boot error. Boot your Windows DVD and install Windows. Do not choose format hard drive.Make a image of the hard drive before you try to install Windows in a empty snapshot. Make sure Windows and Instant Recovery is activated. After you installed Windows and Instant Recovery make a Archive of your fresh install of Windows. It will be small enough to fit on a DVD. Put the archive on a DVD. Give it a name like fresh install of Windows(version of Windows you are using and 32 or 64). You will never have to install Windows
    again. Boot from your secondary.Import the fresh install archive in to a new snapshot or a snapshot that will not boot.Keeping a fresh install of Windows archive can restore a new hard drive. It can restore a C drive you cannot fix with Windows repair. If you have a 1 TB or 2 TB hard drive. You can import the fresh install of Windows in to a new snapshot. Use it to boot your C drive that needs to be repaired. Keep the fresh install of Windows as is and install a free antivirus program. Import the fresh install to your secondary snapshot. Keep one fresh install of Windows snapshot with a free antivirus. It can be used to restore a broken snapshot. Make an archive of every snapshot. After you modify a fresh install of Windows archive export it to a new archive.
    Export a archive of every snapshot to a external hard drive, to backup your snapshots. Also make a image of the whole hard drive, using Macrium Reflect or other image backup programs. This will backup the whole hard drive. When you restore the image all your snapshots will be restored. Instant recovery cannot restore a whole hard drive. It can restore a snapshot that is corrupt. Instant Recovery can also copy update a snapshot. A snapshot that is a backup of your boot drive you use everyday. Each snapshot is another
    boot drive on the same hard drive. You can have a snapshot to fix a drive that won't boot by selecting a different snapshot from the menu. After you choose a different snapshot to boot from. You can use a backup snapshot of the broken one. Use copy update to fix the corrupted snapshot. If you do not
    keep a backup snapshot of your C drive in a snapshot or a exported archive. You will have to restore the hard drive from a Reflect image if you use Macrium Reflect. If you keep updating a archive after making changes to it. Installing more apps and Windows updates. Your main hard drive will always be updated.Your main hard drive is a boot drive without Instant Recovery. A boot drive with Instant Recovery, turns your boot drive in to a multi boot drive on one partition. You can boot XP, Windows 7 or other operating system. If your hard drive is a 1 or 2 TB drive you can have many snapshots of your favorite operating systems.If you store all your data on a external drive. The snapshots will not take up too much drive space. keeping your data in the snapshots will make them very large. Using a main snapshot your primary to use everyday. Adding applications shouldn't make the snapshots to
    big. You can make a snapshot for work, for music and videos. Always keep a fresh installed Windows snapshot. Do not modify it just install a antivirus of your choice. A fresh install of Windows snapshot will get your computer back in service. Never modify the fresh install of Windows archive. Keeping it unmodified can reinstall Windows You have to make a image backup using Reflect or other image backup. Instant recovery cannot restore a drive without a boot drive with Windows and Instant Recovery on it.

    Have to keep a fresh install of Windows image backup stored on a external drive. Use this image to restore your hard drive. Install Instant recovery on it. Make another image with a note in it "Fresh install of Windows with Instant Recovery. Keeping this stored on the same external drive in the same folder. You will install Windows using the Windows DVD. If yo have a Blu-Ray DVD drive you can put store the image on a 25 gb, 50 gb Blu-Ray DVD. That is if you can afford to buy, a Blu-Ray drive and the DVD big enough to store the image on. Storing it on a external drive and a backup drive your image backups. Keeping a unmodified image backup with a fresh install of Windows with Instant Recovery.
    It is like having a WinPE DVD with Macrium Reflect to restore your hard drive. Instant Recovery can restore a hard drive, if you keep a hard drive with Instant Recovery on it unmodified. It can be a drive smaller than a terabyte. Put the drive away unmodified. Use it to clone to another drive. You can also use the image to restore it the drive. Cheaper to use a image to restore the fresh install of Windows with Instant Recovery. This restored drive can allow you to import your Instant Recovery archives you made. If you have a boot drive with Instant Recovery will make this app a recovery app. Of course it
    will just restore one snapshot you will be able to import the other archives. Hopefully you kept the archives updated after installing more apps and Windows Updates. Keeping the archives updated turns Instant Recovery in to a recovery app, by restoring one snapshot at a time. Keeping a freshly installed Windows drive to use for restoring. Do not use it after cloning it to your drive that had to be restored. Use this hard drive to add Windows to a new hard drive or your current boot drive.



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    Last edited: Aug 29, 2015
  4. Peter2150

    Peter2150 Global Moderator

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    Hi Beethoven

    I will get back later with a detailed answer, give me a bit of time.

    Pete
     
  5. Peter2150

    Peter2150 Global Moderator

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    Hi Beethoven

    I've switched to Macrium paid v6 as my primary imager. The speed is unbelievable, and it's just as reliable. I still use Shadowprotect as a secondary imager, and IR is still on board.

    One word of caution. I've found a conflict when both Macrium and ShadowProtect are installed. If I image with SP and then MR, and then restore SP, all is well, but if I restore MR, then I have some strange license issues. It's strange. So.....

    I've got Macrium installed, and I image with SP once a week, from usb recovery. I image with MR frequently. Also have IR on board, although I have no secondary snapshot. I've created two schedule task so they just run during the day. These just update the archive.

    Clearly I primarily rely on Macrium. With several hundred restores under my belt, I've never had a failure of any kind. Should I have to fall back to SP images, they could be somewhat out of date. In that case, what I'd do is restore my Secondary archive, creating a secondary snap, boot to the secondary snap and restore my primary which is up to date. Works well.

    If that doesn't make sense fire away.

    Pete
     
  6. beethoven

    beethoven Registered Member

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    Pete,
    thanks for that. Yes that clarifies it a lot. It seems to me then that you use IR primarily to have an additional safety belt and that it gives you the option to cover the period between your last working SP image and the current state of the pc. You only need this if Macrium fails for whatever reason and to bridge the data loss to the last SP image. I have been using IR similar to you (basically following your thinking over the last few years - also having a stripped down boot-up snapshot). I do not use scheduled tasks for IR, only update my archive manually prior to Windows update or similar. However I very seldom had to use it and fortunately almost never had to use an image. I don't particularly like the fact that even with a stripped down snapshot, you still increase the size of any image considerably if you run IR. So am tempted to uninstall it for a now and see how I go with a proper Macrium schedule and SP image for backup. I think that would be more convenient for me and safe enough. Just need to consider your point about the license issue. So are you saying that you solved this by uninstalling SP and doing the weekly images with SP cold?
     
  7. Peter2150

    Peter2150 Global Moderator

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    Yes that is exactly what I did with SP. And yes, I do have the IR as a safety belt. I guess I am attached to it, because before Macrium, that approach really saved my bacon. Plus, and I know this may be silly, but the IR, preboot screen just gives me a warm comfortable fuzzy feeling.
     
  8. beethoven

    beethoven Registered Member

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    Since I am not used to booting with a usb stick, I guess I can still use the recovery CD to do the cold imaging and recovery if necessary. Can you just refresh my memory with respect to Storagecraft's licensing procedure. I remember once having transferred the prorgram from one pc to another one and I had to deactivate the license prior to doing so. Should I do that now too before uninstalling the program?
     
  9. Peter2150

    Peter2150 Global Moderator

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    Yes, absolutely. Easiest way to make the USB, is to grab a freebie that will rip the CD to ISO file. Then another freebie to make a USB key. This presumes you can boot from USB. For Macrium, make either the USB, or CD, and then add it's RE to the Boot Manager and you won't believe the boot speed.
     
  10. beethoven

    beethoven Registered Member

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    Thanks Peter, interesting though that SP and macrium can't live happily together both being installed
     
  11. Peter2150

    Peter2150 Global Moderator

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    I know. I've tried several times, but it doesn't fly.
     
  12. pratzert

    pratzert Registered Member

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    So... what is the latest iteration of Todd's FD-ISR ? Does it still exist in any form of it's former self?

    It doesn't look like RAXCO sells FD-ISR, only the instant recovery which I don't think is the same.

    Anyone heard from Todd recently?
     
  13. Peter2150

    Peter2150 Global Moderator

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    Have you looked at Raxco's site. Instant Recovery IS the old FDISR
     
  14. pratzert

    pratzert Registered Member

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    HI Peter. I had read that it was the old FD-ISR, but then I haven't read much about it in the forums. It used to be the greatest around, but no one seems to mention that they use it or sing the praises of the program.

    I was looking for something new to backup my files/drives and just purchased a 4 pack of Macrium.

    What are your thoughts on InstantRecovery now-a-days ?
     
  15. Peter2150

    Peter2150 Global Moderator

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    Well it's a bit improved over FDISR in that it can be installed in the newer OS's, For every day use yes Macrium makes for much faster snap recovery's, but IR still has some key uses
     
  16. pratzert

    pratzert Registered Member

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    Peter,

    So you are still using Both Macrium and FDISR (InstantRecovery) ?

    No conflicts or problems ?
     
  17. Acadia

    Acadia Registered Member

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    Well, I'm not Peter but I have an answer. Yes, IR is the same, maybe a bit better then the original FDISR. I have both Macrium and IR on my system, absolutely no conflict, in fact, there is no conflict even in both of their pre-Boot screens. Which one do I like best? Not sure, I love them both, but as Peter stated, Macrium is faster.
    Acadia
     
    Last edited: Aug 20, 2016
  18. Peter2150

    Peter2150 Global Moderator

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    I concur with Acadia. No conflicts at all. But say I want to test a new program and then blow it away. With IR, to first update my system takes about 4 minutes. With Macrium about a minute. To blow the program away with IR involves booting to the 2nd snapshot, then doing the copy to get rid of the program and finally booting back to the primary. Total time about 9 minutes. With Macrium it's just 1 boot and restore. Total time about 4 minutes.
     
  19. pratzert

    pratzert Registered Member

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    Acadia & Peter,

    Thank you both for the info.

    Maybe I can stick with MR for now since I just bought the 4 pack. And then get IR a little later.

    Tk's again.
     
  20. pratzert

    pratzert Registered Member

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    BTW... Does Todd have some involvement in Instant Recovery, or is he completely out of the development of the product ?
     
  21. Peter2150

    Peter2150 Global Moderator

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    He actually is the author. But he now is working in cooperation with Raxco
     
  22. pratzert

    pratzert Registered Member

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    Thanks Peter.

    That makes me more inclined to buy it (again) and use it.
     
  23. Acadia

    Acadia Registered Member

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    Todd is one of my few software Gods. Yes, he completely wrote IR and the original FDISR, and is again working with Raxco. Many, many years ago I had a problem with the original FDISR, one of the VERY few problems that I ever had with this program. I contacted Raxco support. Received a phone call, IT WAS TODD, I almost ^&*$ my pants. He took the time to work out my problem. Probably because the program was still relatively new and they may have been working out some bugs, but still, the fact that he developer took the time to call me and, well, I TALKED TO GOD (software-wise).
    Acadia
     
  24. pratzert

    pratzert Registered Member

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    I agree. Years ago I had numerous email exchanges with Todd.

    He was helpful and a real gentleman.

    I am so glad to learn he is still on the scene.
     
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