Does Acronis take account of deleted folders in differential backups?

Menorcaman,

Many thanks for that list. In my experience, all non-trivial software has issues of one kind or another and it can save users much time and effort (not to mention grief) to know what they are.

Having gone through each of your links (and their links!) I made a list of my understanding of the TI9 Build 3567 issues. I thought that this might be useful for others, so I've included it below. If you feel that it may cause problems by being over-simplified (or just plain wrong) please let me know and I'll delete it.

(1) This issue, i.e. restoring a Differential includes files and folders which were deleted after the Full backup but before the Differential Backup.
(2) Scheduling a Differential backup actually produces an Incremental one. This may be simply be the result of (3) below. For me, (2) and (3) seem to be the most dangerous of the current issues, e.g. produce a Full, then a Differential and then a second Differential. Deleting the first Differential means that the second one is now useless .
(3) When setting up the details of a Differential backup, the final confirmation screen sometims(?) shows that it's been changed to Incremental. The workaround is to step back through the set-up and re-enter that it's a Differential.
(4) Verifying a Differential requires the availability of all earlier Differentials based on that Differential's Full backup. (This is different from (2) and (3) above as there is no such problem with a Restore.)
(5) When upgrading from TI8 to TI9, two entries are shown in the "Acronis Devices" section in Device Manager. This doesn't appear to cause a problem , but getting rid of the extra entry requires Registry changes and/or complete TI uninstall and re-install.
(6) Verification happens twice when restoring the system partition from Windows. The effect of this is that the Restore takes significantly longer than from a boot CD.
(7) Can't restore individual hidden files (and folders?) using a boot CD. However, they are restored by a full restore. They are also available from within Windows.
​

(Aside to Acronis - It's World-Class service to customers to provide them with details of current issues. Hint: this is especially true of backup software. )

Again, many thanks,
Brian.

 

Had a reply from Acronis. They asked me to go through my backup/differential & restore, making a screenshot of each step, which I did.

And, now isn't this just typical!, I can't get Acronis to 'misbehave' itself again, as it was doing yesterday. So much the better, but it's a bit embarrassing. Today, although the programme shows the deleted folders in the tree of the differential image, it does not restore them.

No idea what is going on and if differential backup restores weren't working properly yesterday, my confidence is slightly shaken that they will be OK tomorrow. Because of the type of data I am backing up with Acronis, if deleted (= obsolete, replaced with newer versions) files were restored in error, it would be a total disaster for my PC setup, which is why I was so alarmed at what happened yesterday.

I think in future, should I ever need to restore from Acronis, I will make a new image of my current setup or folders & files before I continue - just in case it all goes wrong. Better safe than (very!) sorry!

Maybe you could try again and see if your installation is working today?

Martin

 

Well I'll be jiggered!! Just tried it and you are right. Whilst my deleted folder 2006-04-24 was present in the 2nd differential, and TI allowed me to select and restore it, once the restore process had completed the folder and its contents hadn't actually been restored . In a way that's good news but nevertheless, in my view, the deleted folder should not have been visible in the 2nd differential in the first place!!

To Acronis Support

Hopefully the Acronis Development Team will get rid of this, what now transpires to be a cosmetic bug, in a future build.

Regards

 

But yesterday my setup was actually restoring the files/folfers I had deleted, not just showing them in the tree!! It's beyond me. Maybe that was with the old build I had installed - can't recall exactly now.

M.

 

<BUMP>

Hello Acronis Support,

Would appreciate your comments.

Kind Regards

 

Hello Menorcaman, martinlest and everyone interested,

Thank you for choosing Acronis Disk Backup Software.

We are very sorry for such a big delay with the response.

I've made some testing and it seems that the issue is that files and folders included into the initial full backup are always shown in the Restore Data Wizard even if they were actually deleted and differential image was then created. However, they are not being restored anyway.

Moreover, if some files\folders were added, i.e. differential image was created, after the intial full image was created then these files\folders were deleted and new differential image was created then these files\folders are properly appear\disappear in\from the corresponding differential images (restore points). That's what made this issue so difficult to catch

Whatever the case, I've forwarded this issue to both our Testing and Development Teams and they will take care of it as soon as possible. I'll certainly inform you about the results of their investigation. Thank you very much for all the provided information and sorry for your inconveniences.

Thank you.
--
Alexey Popov

 

Hello Brian R,

Thank you for your interest in Acronis Disk Backup Software.

The list of the known issues will probably be available in the future. However, the exact time frame for this is not decided yet.

At the moment, you can find out whether some particular problem has already been fixed or not by submitting a request for technical support or posting your question on this forum.

Thank you.
--
Alexey Popov

 

Hello Alexey,

Many thanks for confirming that it wasn't just our imagination!! As you discovered for yourself, this non-critical (as it turned out) bug was a tricky little devil to pin down. I look forward to the fix sometime in the future.

Best regards

 

Well, I am still 99% sure that my deleted files were being restored - but now they are not, so I cannot explain it! I've made new base images of my partitions, just in case!

Martin

 

Hi Martin,

Changing the subject slightly. I can understand why you don't wish to backup your static data files but using TI's Files and Folders imaging/restoring feature is very, very slow compared to Disk and Partition imaging/restoring.

Is there any reason why you can't create a separate partition which you could then move your static data to? You could then use TI's Disk/Partition imaging and restoring feature for regularly backup of the original partition that now only holds your O/S, applications and dynamic data. If you don't have a non-destructive repartitioning utility then you could utilize a workaround that uses TI's Secure Zone (SZ) and Windows Disk Management as follows:

1. Use the Manage Acronis Secure Zone Wizard to create a temporary SZ that's big enough to accommodate your static data needs. Do NOT accept the default option to also activate the Acronis Startup Manager.
2. Right click on "My Computer" and select "Manage" > "Disk Management".
3. Right click on the SZ and select "Delete Logical Drive". When done, you will be left with unallocated free space equal to the size of the deleted SZ.
4. Right click on the "Free space", select "New Logical Drive" and follow the "New Partition Wizard" to create a new partition to hold your static data.

Regards

 

Thanks for the thought. It's not quite that straightforwrad however. I use Acronis to back up my whole PC, but my most 'sensitive' data is my very highly personalised installation of MS Flight Simulator 2004. I have spent 2 years learning how to write programmes for it, tweak aircraft/airport/scenry files and so on, so that if I ever lost everything (unlikely, as I do back it up as if my life depended on it - sad, isn't it?!), I would never be able to rememebr how to reinstall everything as I have it now.

I used to just copy over the separate folders to an external drive, but in the end found Acronis much more convenient. My FS2004 setup has a 60GB partition all to itself (XP is elsewhere) and contains some very large data folders, like 25GBs plus) which, as I say, I don't need to back up as I have all the original installation CD-ROMs. The problem with the full partition backup is that I cannot choose to exclude individual folders, and by the time I have gone to the trouble of moving these somewhere else for the duration - well, I don't save any time. In any case, I find the folder/file backup option in Acronis very fast. It usually completes making the tib file from a 25GBs of data (excluding my large folders) in less than 15 minutes.

In the end, I think that as my FS2004 partition has no O/S on it, the files/folders option is fine for me - just wish my confidence hadn't been shaken by the past week's deleted folders episode!

All the best,

Martin

 

Alexey

Really good news, thank you. Take a bow, Acronis!

Yes, I understand and value that. However, like a lot of other people, I need to be pretty sure that something isn't a "user problem" before bothering other people with it - especially the unpaid volunteers who give so much of their time to helping other people.

More importantly, the forums and Acronis support can only help me with problems that I already know that I have. There's the old saying that you only know your backup works when you (try to ) use it - ouch! A list of known issues is a powerful way of reducing uncertainty.


Thanks again,
Brian.

 

Hey guys, I'm new to the forums and to Acronis but have already fallen in love with what it can do. I am having one problem that is very similar to this thread however, and was wondering if anyone might be able to shed some light on it for me.

What I am trying to do is use Acronis to create three images for a system. The first, baseline, image would be a "tuned" image of the system. The second would be a differential image with the only change being that Norton AntiVirus has been installed, and the third would be another differential image with Norton Internet Security installed.

The problem that I am running into depends on which type of image I use. When I use the files and folders method for creating all of the images, then when I restore the baseline image over a pre-tuned image, it doesn't erase any of the junk files that I wanted it to get rid of. That is the same problem with the differential images using this method.

When I use the partition/disk image method it works perfectly for the baseline, and for the first differential, but when I restore the original baseline and create the second differential, it creates a file almost as large as my baseline image. I know this is because Acronis works on a sector basis and will restore all files that have been moved on the disk even if their contents have not changed at all.

So, I'm left wondering if there is any way that I will be able to perform the operations that I am wanting to do? Is there any way to use Acronis to create a baseline "tuned" image that will erase all the junk that is on a system as well as creating differential images which each have ONLY the files which have actually changed since the baseline was created, and not those that have simply been moved on the physical disk?

Any help with this would be highly appreciated.

Thank you.

 

Oh, I forgot to mention that I am wanting to do this using the boot CD and not from the installed software. It seems to work exactly the same way though.

 

To be honest, I think you are going to spend a very long time indeed trying to get this to work - would not one of two options be better?

Either create three full images, one baseline, then one after each Norton installation? Depends how big your partitions are of course - if it's 45GBs each time, then that's not really an option.

Or, couldn't you just keep your baseline image and, if necessary, just restore the Norton from the original discs after restoring your basic Acronis image?

I've been some way down the road you are headed, and decided life was too short, I'm afraid!

Martin

 

Yes, both of your suggestions would work. The problem is that I am wanting to use this process on about 50 different systems in a corporate environment. So, as you might imagine, time and space are both somewhat limited.

I'm a bit frustrated with this problem because I asked Acronis support if the program would perform this task before purchasing it, and now I run into this issue. It's a great imaging program as-is, but I really need it to perform these functions. Is there any way to write a script file for it to perform the erasures that I need using the files and folders method?

 

Hello musouka,

Thank you for choosing Acronis Disk Backup Software.

When you restore sectors might not be restored to their original locations, meaning respective hard disk sectors before the backup and after the restoration do not match.
When incremental or differential image is created only the changed sectors are backed up, that's why your second differential is almost as large as the original backup.

As a workaround you can create an image with Norton AntiVirus installed, uninstall Norton AntiVirus, install Norton Internet Security and capture new differential image. It will be considerably smaller than the full backup.

Thank you.
--
Anton Sherkhonov

 

Yes, I am aware of the reasons for the problem, and I have been using the method you mentioned as a workaround for now. I would still like the ability to have the files and folders mode erase any junk files that were not present during the creation of the baseline image. Is there any way at all to achieve that?

 

Hello musouka,

I've added the suggestion to the enhancements list.
I'm not sure there is an easy way to script it.

Thank you.
--
Anton Sherkhonov

 

Hello everyone,

Please accept our apologies for the current inconvenience.

I've just received a reply from our Development Team and they assured me that the issue with files and folders included into the initial full backup being always shown in the Restore Data Wizard even if they were actually deleted and differential image was then created is fixed. The fix is available in the current build (3677) of Acronis True Image 9.0 Home.

If you have any further questions concerning Acronis software, please feel free to submit a request for technical support or post any of them on this forum. We will certainly try to help you in resolving any issues.

Thank you.
--
Alexey Popov

 

Excellent. I installed the latest build yesterday.

 

Musouka -

Perhaps another solution would be to set up a VMWare (or other virtualization) of your environment. These allow snapshots of the system including all disk/registry changes before and after major modifications.

I've tested several AV packages within a virtualized XP environment.

Maybe this is not what you need?

There are also packages that track all disk and registry changes while installing software. Don't remember specific ones, but I think Norton had such a beast.