Need Help With Workflow on TI 10.0

[mdbassman]

I am having an extreme amount of trouble following the User's Guide for TI 10.0 for creating a backup on 2 EHD's.
Chapter 5 in the User's Guide deals with creating backups. I am trying to backup all my digital photos(22k images) to the ExtHD's. The Acronis program keeps asking for a path. Since these are EHD's the drive designations are "I" and "J". Since I am backing up 22,000+ digital photos and wmp music files I am using the "My Data" category. From here it is all uphill...
Can someone please advise me of the workflow in sending the programs/files from my computers HD to the external hard drives?
I would greatly appreciate this "coaching".
Dan

[Acronis Support]

Hello mdbassman,

Thank you for choosing Acronis Disk Backup Software.

We are sorry for delayed response.

Could you please clarify, which step of chapter 5 "Creating backup archives" of Acronis True Image 10.0 Home User's Guide is troubling you?

Thank you.
--
Marat Setdikov

[mdbassman]

Sorry so late in responding. Had emergency surgery. Problems: Cahpters 5&7
1) I have my some of my "Favorites" on my Desktop, such as Photoshop which contains all 20K + of my digital photos.
2) I have other programs most on a seperate "D" drive internal.
3) "Selecting backup location- I am using a 500 gb WD Ext HD as the "I" drive.I want a full back up right now.
4) Chapter 7.1.1 on EHD- it sez full path but if i desigante "I:\ Backup and then try to back up all i get is the folder structure with no data in the folders?
5) I did find that if I drag-n-drop from left column into "I" drive thru Windows Explorer that all folders and there contens go fine.
I cant figure out why if I follow the steps in Chapters 5,6,7 that when I go to the EHG:I:\ and try to look at what is in there I get just folders that wont open.
I want to be able to backup all my precious data onto the ehd, verify(that is another issue..TI never asks me if I want to validate the backup) my clicking on the exhd contents and actually see that my images and data is there.

After about 4 hrs I was able to do this by drag-n-drop only from left C:\ drive to right I;\ drive.

The Users Guide is very confusing to me and non techie.
Any help is appreciated.
Dan

[GroverH]

For some help in creating a full disk backup, check line 1 of my signature below.

Food for thought:
1. True Image does well when creating a full disk backup which includes all partitons and all data on the system drive. Having such a backup will enable you to transfer your system to a new disk should you have a disk failure or want to move to a larger drive.
2. Several post have indicated problems with a Files & Folders backup when audio or image files are involved. I never use this option--only full disk backups. Audio and image files are already compressed so additonal little additional space is saved.
3. I suggest you use an additional program such as Karen's Replicator. All her tools available here
http://www.karenware.com/powertools/powertools.asp
Using this program (or other sync program), the program can copy whatever user files or folders you choose onto another location and this can be scheduled, etc. This is a straight copy process so you have an identical copy of whatever is copied. In addition to my scheduled TrueImage backups, I schedule Replictor to copy all my personal files to another disk. This programs has lots of options and works extremely well. I find this an extremely useful tool.

4. TrueImage Home is great as an imaging tool for recovery but I supplement it with for data backups. I would not want all my pictures and audio tied up inside a proprietary program unless I had other copies elsewhere. I know photographers that have extra disk drives and they second copy all their stuff to the spare drive and store the drive. They cannot afford to have their work ruined by not having backup copies.

[mdbassman]

Grover, I thank you. This is probably exactly what I have been looking for and TI Tech Support can fail to understand.
I send and call them and I NEVER get more than what was initially posted on this thread and I even replied, 3 times with no response.
And these companies wonder why their sales drop>>
Dan

[seekforever]

Originally Posted by GroverH

... I know photographers that have extra disk drives and they second copy all their stuff to the spare drive and store the drive. They cannot afford to have their work ruined by not having backup copies.

I saw a news article on TV some time ago and that is exactly what the pro photographers were doing - copying and storing HDs.

I am not a pro at anything but it is now what I do rather than fool around with a bunch of DVDs for my off-site or a third level backup. I use TI for my OS/apps partition images and all data files are backed up in native format with SyncBackSE or just a Windows copy.

I used to burn DVDs for off-site, third level backups but they are a slow, PITA to handle. HDs are now very cheap and often you can even find 40-80GB IDE ones people are giving away. I have a USB gizmo that has IDE, SATA, notebook IDE connectors and a power-supply which makes an uncased drive easy to use.

[GroverH]

Seekforever

Yes, I think more and more people are finding an extra drive to be a very practical backup plan. I have and use the USB gizmo you mentioned but my experience using it has not been consistent. I have two because of a duplicate replacement (Sabrent M501-1220 ). My problem has been that the attached drive is not always seen or seen but no drive letter assignment. Both my units have given me difficulty with consistency. Sometime they work as intended and other times it does not. It may be the specific brand but I have other real enclosures(both USB & SATA) so this inconsistency has been mostly a nuisance.

However, for ease of use, i recently purchased a SATA docking unit. This is a combination USB/eSATA. The unit will accept either size disk and the disk easily inserts into the unit. No screws or cover needed. When in use, the raw disk protrudes out from the unit and is very visable.

Thermaltake ST0005U BlacX 2.5/3.5 Hard Drive Dock - SATA to USB and eSATA (T925-1252)
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicati...29117&csid=_21