Drive Snapshot queries

Any more thoughts on this? I've asked DS support, but he never responds.

 

I'm X-Tremely pleased yet again to report that DriveSnapshot has done it again.
This app in the many months i've had it is still not failed one time at all and even recently as last week i got in a pinch while researching a pretty bad malware online. It trashed IE entirely and without remedy as well as some other crucial system componants, leaving me no alternative but to restore a back-up image = .SNA.

The restore went off "again" without a hitch and i was right back and up with normal operations within some minutes.

This app is a PROVEN WINNER! for me and i can safely say that mothballing my long time PARAGON Drive BackUp was no mistake.

 

I have restored images about 15 times . I has worked perfectly.Since i have two xp partitons installed , i just boot to another xp and restore.If both of the fail i use windows based boot disk,again since it is portable any boot disk works just as fine.It takes just 5 minutes to restore .

Shadow Protect and paragon takes twice as much time as DS.
I removed have the rollback rx after experiencing the efficiency of Drive Snapshot.

MBR restores is a slight problem in DS , since it warns that all the data would be deleted .Shadow protect has a better MBR restore option.

 

Yes Indeed!

You said it all in the one word, "efficiency!".

DS is rapid enough at both ends of either Imaging & Restore. The best part is this back up app is amazingly resilient and seemingly failproof. Something i really couldn't say for others i've used in the past, including Paragon as reliable as it's been for me = approx. 90%.

DS is batting 1000 for me at 100% dependability! This is true testimony AFAIK that bigger doesn't always equate to better, and that many time, modular is much more efficient and definitely quick.

 

It is surprising that this app is not that famous like Acronis TI or Norton Ghost.
Answering to n8chavez question
Registration data has no effect on portability the software works just as fine.I Haven't tried Bare metal restores (restores to different hardwares)through this software.

 

Thank you. Those question have been answered earlier in the thread though. Now I am wondering if anyone has had ant luck with the .bat file. I cannot seem to get it to work on my system; the command window open and closes right away.

 

Try putting stops and checks in the batch.

Remove the @echo off rem it out:

rem @echo off

stops:

pause

and read this for more help with NT batch...

http://www.ss64.com/nt/
An A-Z Index of the Windows XP command line

also see:

Create a Shortcut with this

%windir%\hh.exe ms-its:C:\WINDOWS\Help\ntcmds.chm::/ntcmds.htm

I think there is a problem with "quotes"...

rrrh1 (arch1)

Life is short...

 

Markymoo's batch file is fine. It works.

 

Then I have no idea what to do. It does not work for me.

 

Could you post the text of your registry file?

 

I was referring to my instructions...

Create a Shortcut with this

%windir%\hh.exe ms-its:C:\WINDOWS\Help\ntcmds.chm::/ntcmds.htm

I thought general batch information was his problem.

rrrh1 (arch1)

Smile...

 

Success!!!!! I finally got it to work. I am using the below batch.

I'm using the below registry entry/context menu:

Everything works perfectly!

Thanks Brian and Markymoo.

 

EUREKA! & CONGRATS!

I monitor all these DS topics/threads and i was sure you would finally get it working. Your issue will help even me because i have a dickens of a time when it comes to DOS commands with all the characters & letters and such, but when the right formula works, it really works!

EASTER

 

because some like how it looks and follow trends. which is not exactly the priority for quality backup. lol

 

Does anyone have a complete list of DS command line arguments. I know there are some available on the site but it seems incomplete. There are others shown when running ...snapshot.exe --? Then there are still others that are listen when the user tries to run the exe with an incorrect argument. Is there a complete list?

 

[backup a volume]
Snapshot C: X:\C-DRIVE.sna
-A - save ALL sectors, ignore free cluster info (maintenance)
-L650 - Limit resulting imagesize to 650MB (CDROM size)
-T - Test generated image file (verify correct checksums)
-W - suppress <Hit any key> if started from scheduler
-R - Empty Recycle Bin for this drive before Backup
-G - Graphical status display for command line mode
-PW=MyPassword (also used for restore and viewing)
-C="My comment" add a comment to the image
-o[path][filename] generate hash file with name "path\filename"
-o - don't generate hash file
-h<HashFile> make a differential image

Options for command line substitutions

Possible values for substitution are:
$disk is substituted with the drive letter
$date results in 050131 which represents January 31 2005
$computername is substituted with the computername
$type results in "dif" or "ful" for differential or full image
$weekday is substituted with the first two characters of the Weekday
$year is substituted with the year (4 digits)
$month is substituted with the month (2 digits)
$day is substituted with the day of the month (2 digits)
$hour is substituted with the hour
$minute is substituted with the minute
$second is substituted with the second

[restore a volume]
Snapshot X:\C-DRIVE.sna C:

[view a saved file]
Snapshot X:\C.sna Z: -V
explores X:\C.sna as virtual drive Z: (-VM for mount only)
(-VQ for mount only and wait for event. Use --unmount to terminate)

[generate a new hash file from a full image]
Snapshot X:\C.sna -h<HashFileName>

[info about a file] Snapshot X:\C-DRIVE.sna -I
[partition info ] Snapshot X:\C-DRIVE.sna -P
[validate file ] Snapshot X:\C-DRIVE.sna -T

special operations :
--unmount - unmount all virtual disks and terminate Snapshot started with -VQ
--unmount:Z - unmount virtual disk Z
--resize X: - show possible resize range for drive X:
--resize X: 1000 - (try to) resize drive X: to 1000 MB
--resizepart X: 1000 - (try to) grow partition and filesystem to 1000 MB
resizepart is unable to shrink partitions or filesystems!
--SetPartitionSize HD1 1 130000000 (use with care !!)
--exec:"NET START ORACLE" - execute commands as soon as
backup really started
MUST be the last option on the command line!
--ClearSignature HD1
--SetSignature HD1 01234567
--Checkboot HD1 - test if HD1 seems to be bootable
--Activate X: set active flag for drive X:
--Deactivate X: clear active flag for drive X:
--RestoreMBR HD1 filename - writes the MBR from filename to HD1
--RestorePartitionStructure HD1 filename -
writes the partition information from filename to HD1
--excludeath excludes the path and all subdirectories from backup
--exclude:filename1,filename2,... excludes all given filenames from backup
--excludefilename.txt exclude from file filename.txt
--LogFile:filename.log - append log output to file filename.log
--DontLogStdout - don't write VSS log output to standard output
--DontLogProgress - don't write the progress report lines to stderr
--novss - don't use the volume shadow service
--usevss - use the volume shadow service if available
--forcevss - use the volume shadow service. If not available exit with error.
--register:License.lic - register Snapshot
--setdefaultpwd=MyPassword - sets the default password to MyPassword
--SearchFullath1,path2,path3 while working with differential images
search the full image in the given pathes.
--LimitIORate:10 - limts the IO rate to 10MB/s (accepted range 1-100)
--show HD1 - show size and partitions on HD1
--show - show size and partitions of all connected hard disks

plus the options in the new version.

V1.39 - 15 July 2008: Drive Snapshot 1.39

* Supports Restore into Virtual Machines (VMWare/Virtual Server)
* mounted Snapshots are write able (data are buffered in RAM) - and you can make a new snapshot of this virtual disk
* Ability to exclude files and folders has been enhanced ( --exclude:\*.MP3 )
* defect Images can be - within limits - repaired
* allows in WinPE/BartPE Installation of additional (disk) drivers
* fixes/tolerates some bugs in Vista/2008 X64

 

Thanks markymoo. As always, you have been very helpful.

 

Without a doubt!

DS is a real true surprise in a solid quality image backup app that's a consistent proven return for any customer's investment in this software.

I can definitely attest to that. It's not burped, puked, or choked at all in several many image backups and restores. In fact, i never thought DS could live up to my long time favorite Paragon but it certainly has, and in many ways far excell it 4 me.

Thanks markymoo for Drive Snap too. That's just the icing on the cake for us DS loyals.

 

Warning for Drive Snapshot users who use a bat file - The below .bat file will seems as though it is working, however the file it creates is extensionless, cannot be used, and is 0 (zero) bytes.

The filename appears to work; DS displays everything as it is intended. But it does not like the : between $hour and $minute.

Without that : everything will work.

 

Glad you found that out.

I'm sure markymoo has a concise handle on all the proper command line controls for DS since he's had to trial n error many himself in order to better fashion his Drive Snap app everyone is looking forward to.

EASTER

 

It will work, just enclose another set of quotes around the 2nd path like so.

 

markymoo it will not work because windows do not accept the creation of file names that include the following carracters \ / : * ? " < > | .

n8chavez you can replace : with ;

Panagiotis

 

Right. I understand that. It's not a big deal for me is the time is display 2311 versus 23:11. But, since the main concept behind images is reliability, I thought I'd mention that 23:11 will not work.

 

Any idea how I can set up DS to boot up to a PE environment via USB? I just discovered that there are three different USB boot options with my bios.