A simple 'starter' guide

Adonis True Image certainly looks like just the programme I'm after... but the manuals/forums/support information are way too detailed and extensive to be of any use to a relative novice user like me. I've just downloaded the trial version and am creating a full image backup. All I want to know - surely like many general home users - is how to restore a single hard drive with one partition using the programme. And how to reconfigure my hard drive with two partitions so I can get away from using loads of backup CD's. I can;t be the only potential customer who'd appreciate this straightforward information:

- A list detailing what Adonis discs/images I would need to reformat a PC with a single hard drive that's crashed. If I'm not using the XP recovery disk, how do I reformat my HD?
- What precise, numbered steps would I need to perform to restore a system with a single hard drive and one partition when my OS freezes or fails to boot up.
- What I would need to do to clear down my PC, reformat a single hard drive with 2 partitions - so that the 2nd could be used for backup purposes - then restore my OS and data files so that in future I can make backups without using removable media (ie restore the OS with a new backup alongside)?
- What backups, on what removable media, would be a good idea to create and keep updated?

I'm sorry if this sounds lazy or even pathetic - clearly there are some specialists these boards - but I hope you'll appreciate many PC users learn about the details of programs after they've mastered the basics. I can't find a 'basic' or quick-start guide here. At present I'm using Nero's InCD to create backups of data and have to take a day to resurrect my system when it fails.

Best regards,

T

[Acronis Support]

Hello Teahead,

Thank you for choosing Acronis Disk Backup Software.

If you want to restore the image please create Acronis Bootable CD using the "Create Bootable Rescue Media" tool. After that please boot the computer with this CD and wait till you get the GUI similar to what you see in Windows. Choose the "Restore" image wizard and follow the steps described there. You don't need to preformat the target drive before restoring the image.

You may store images on a lot of types of media: hard drives, network shared fodlers, CDs, DVDs, ZIP drives, etc.

Thank you.
--
Ilya Toytman

[howie123]

As a side note, creating an image on a second partition of the same drive is not really a good idea, although it's better than no backup solution at all. If, for whatever reason, your hard drive should fail, your images will be lost along with your drive. If this is your only alternative, I'd suggest creating a second image to removable media such as DVD or CD, just in case your only drive fails.

This is all generally making fine sense - sorry to be such a dweeb!

I obviously misunderstood some stuff about partitions back there... It was of course outrageously to reckon I might keep the primary ('full') image on my one and only drive - I guess every six months or so users just do a 'full image backup on 10+ CD's.

I'm concerned, though, about not reformatting in the event of a crash/lockup. I always understood that a completely clean OS install was better than an 'upgrade' or overwrite - I'm thinking specifically about situations where the registry has been corrupted, where I've done something silly whilke editing it, or where newly installed software conflicts with an existing programme. Would you say that that's wrong? Or does True Image reformat the hard disk while with the bootable rescue media? In fact, how does the programme restore the data? I'd certainly love to have my set ups and tweaks all restored without working through everything, but does this mean a dirtier OS install overall?

Teahead

When you use Acronis TrueImage to restore a previously backed up image, it completely wipes your partition your restoring clean, and restores the image too it. It does not restore "on top of" your current OS install, meaning it doesn't leaving traces of old files.

Ilya and guys, thanks very much for all your help here - I think I've got the hand of it now and hope to post better in future.

One more little thing... from what I gather, creating a secure zone for images isn't going to make sense if I've only got one hard drive. Right? It's not that I'm slow or anything, just nervous about leaning on a new product to recover all my lovely data (I'm a fiction writer).

Best,

T

[Menorcaman]

Hello Teahead,

Originally Posted by Teahead

One more little thing... from what I gather, creating a secure zone for images isn't going to make sense if I've only got one hard drive. Right?

You can't store the image on the same partition that you may want to restore at some time in the future. This is because TI will delete the partition, along with the image TI requires, before commencing the restore.

If you're stuck with just the one physical hard drive then you will need to either create an Acronis Secure Zone (a hidden partition) or a logical drive (a second partition) and image to that.

Regards

Last one, I think...

I've created a secure zone on my single hard drive and successfully 'test' restored my my system from it. I have also created two scheduled tasks - weekly 'incremental' and monthly 'full'. Two issues:

1. I understand I can use the secure zone image as a straight alternative to XP's system restore, but that it would not be useable with the Acronis Boot CD. Is that right?

2. I understand I cannot copy the Iiages in the secure zone directly to CD's (don't have a DVD burner) as an external backup resource that doesn't rely on the integrity of my hard disk. Therefore, if I want to create an external backup image, I would need to run a seperate backup process from my HDD to CD's. Is that right too?

Best,

teahead

[Acronis Support]

Hello Teahead,

1. You can use Acronis Secure Zone if you boot with Acronis Bootable CD. However, Windows XP system restore is not accessible from the CD.

2. You are right that you cannot copy an image from Acronis Secure Zone to another location and you cannot copy image to Acronis Secure Zone as well. That is why if you need to have images both in Acronis Secure Zone and on some other media you need two separate backup processes.

Thank you.
--
Ilya Toytman

Thanks Illya, that's great.

T