Cold vs. Hot Imaging

[Aaron Here]

This poll is intended for those who rely on disk-imaging to backup their system drive/partition.

I started by voting for cold-imaging as I believe (without proof) that inherently it's the more reliable method.

[bellgamin]

It doesn't look like a poll -- where are the choices for voting?

Excuse my ignorance but -- what IS "cold vs hot imaging"?

[Fad]

I use the Hot option with Macrium, although the boot menu option is available... I really only use that to restore.

(There was no polling option visible when I replied at first)

[Aaron Here]

Originally Posted by bellgamin

It doesn't look like a poll -- where are the choices for voting?

Excuse my ignorance but -- what IS "cold vs hot imaging"?

Hi bellgamin,

Choices appear above the first post - which include my definitions of 'cold' and 'hot' imaging.

Aaron

[Peter2150]

I am not sure, I can give a straight answer. When I do a single image, I generally do a "cold" image, but not because of reliability, but because I am going to restore it anyway. And then on my main system, I have the SP continuous incrementals running, so that of course is a "hot" image.

Pete

[Scott W]

Aaron,

I'm pretty much a noob at this and so far I've been doing only hot imaging (so that's the way I voted), but I'd be interested as to why you think cold imaging is more reliable.

Scott

[appster]

Scott,

I don't mean to answer for Aaron, but I completely share his belief in this matter.

Most disk-imaging programs use Microsoft's Volume Shadow copy Services (VSS) in order to ‘hot-image’ the Windows volume (to the best of my knowledge, only Image for Windows uses its own proprietary 'Phylock' driver). While I don't know about Phylock, in order to backup Windows while it's running, VSS makes a point-in-time copy of the disk-volume when a VSS-aware backup program is running and under certain circumstances that can be error-prone. Furthermore, VSS requires sufficient storage space to create its shadow copies and must be 'run as Administrator'.

So count me in the cold-imaging camp.

[Osaban]

With Shadow Protect backups can be done within Windows but restores are only possible "cold". The good thing about cold restores is that the program can be completely uninstalled from Windows.

[Cutting_Edgetech]

Originally Posted by bellgamin

It doesn't look like a poll -- where are the choices for voting?

Excuse my ignorance but -- what IS "cold vs hot imaging"?

There is a description of cold, and hot imaging by the poll choices. I use both myself. In my experience cold is more reliable , and hot is more convenient.

[Aaron Here]

appster,

Your post confirms my beliefs on the subject - thanks for the validation. In addition to the reliability factor, I can add that in my comparison tests cold-imaging was always faster than hot-imaging!

Aaron

[J_L]

I almost always Hot image, because of its convenience and scheduling.

[Jo Ann]

There's no arguing that hot imaging is the more convenient method of the two, but when I need to restore my system I want to be sure it will work perfectly ....so I cold image (and cold verify)!

JA

[farmerlee]

I always hot image. I let acronis do its business in the background while i go about my own business uninterupted.

[bellgamin]

Originally Posted by Cutting_Edgetech

There is a description of cold, and hot imaging by the poll choices. I use both myself. In my experience cold is more reliable , and hot is more convenient.

The poll choices were NOT there when I posted. They were added afterwards.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I voted hot image. However, I do BOTH types. I hot image at least weekly to an internal HD, using Keriver 1-Click Restore Pro. I cold image ~monthly to an external HD using Image for DOS.

[Scott W]

Hmm, after reading these enlightening comments, I'd like to change my vote (but I can't).

[moontan]

the first time i got introduced with imaging was with the Win 7 RC.
and of course, Win 7 can only do hot imaging.

in close to 3 years it never failed once.

i've switched to IFW about 3 months ago and it has not failed yet using Phylock.

in my experience, hot imaging has been reliable 100%.

[Sully]

For those here who remember when imaging was always cold, you might get a warm fuzzy feeling doing hot imaging. I know I do

Having done both, in many different fashions, I can't say either has an advantage. I have had good images and bad images using both methods. One thing is for sure though, PE has radically changed the landscape of imaging for me. Prior to PE things were quite different. I am soooo glad floppies died out. What an awful way to rely on your imaging software to boot up!

These days things are much much much better -- and faster. I prefer hot imaging to create, and PE to restore. I've devoted more time to my PEs so restoration of my machine is a breeze.

Sul.

[Boyfriend]

I always prefer cold imaging application (preferably WinPE based like Active@Boot) for backup and restore

[PJC]

+1 for the Cold one.

[Peter2150]

Originally Posted by moontan

the first time i got introduced with imaging was with the Win 7 RC.
and of course, Win 7 can only do hot imaging.

in close to 3 years it never failed once.

i've switched to IFW about 3 months ago and it has not failed yet using Phylock.

in my experience, hot imaging has been reliable 100%.

Are your reliability related to imaging, or does that include restores?

[moontan]

Originally Posted by Peter2150

Are your reliability related to imaging, or does that include restores?

both Peter.
IFW doesn't do hot restore but the (estimated) 30 hot restores i did with Windows 7 went perfectly.

[pvsurfer]

Interesting poll. I do "cold-raw" backups, because that's the only way I am able to completely image a Rollback Rx system (with all snapshots).

However, years before I was a Rollback Rx user I started-out hot imaging my system (with Acronis True Image) and a couple of times ATI failed to restore an image which it had successfully verified after backing up!!! Upon reporting those episodes in the ATI forum a couple of members suggested that I switch my backup method to cold imaging (using ATI's boot disk); I did and I've never had any restore issues since then.

[Aaron Here]

Hey pvsurfer, it's been quite a while since seeing you around here - welcome back and thanks for your insight.

[Scott W]

I want to be sure I understand the differences between hot vs cold imaging. It's a hot backup when I run the program that's installed in Windows, whereas in order to do a cold backup I would shutdown Windows, boot up with the program's recovery disk and run the backup from it. Do I have that right?

Scott

[moontan]

Originally Posted by Scott W

I want to be sure I understand the differences between hot vs cold imaging. It's a hot backup when I run the program that's installed in Windows, whereas in order to do a cold backup I would shutdown Windows, boot up with the program's recovery disk and run the backup from it. Do I have that right?

Scott

yes.

also, you can also run some imagers at boot-time without a disk.
either through a Command Prompt, a boot console, etc
but i'm pretty sure that qualifies as 'cold' imaging as well.