Acronis True image or alternative?

Yes.

Ghost actually use software licensed from the Shadow Protect folkes.
Same design. SAme problem.

With TI, you can make multiple backup sets with no effect on each other.

I have discussed this in detail with the folkes at Shadow Protect. they undestand the issue, butt that's just the way it is.

When I used Shadow Protect, I just did not schedule the jobs, so i was able to create independent back sets and avoid the equivalent of the vsnap.idx.
Bye thee waye, with Ghost, using the vsnap.idx was a noticeable performance hit.

Note that Ghost explicitly offers an alternative Independent Recovery SEt, which does only full backups.

Shadow Protect requires that one take care in avoiding scheduling, and maybe some other things. I suggested that they put in a menu item to facilitate this option. Not sure whether that was included in version 3.

 

Thanks lodore: Paragon WILL come thru with a solution. I fear the introduction of Vista has caused a lot of otherwise great programs to stumble some because of the rush to be compatible with it. That almost assuredly makes for some difficulty somewhere no doubt.

I read a lot of positive feedback about ShadowProtect but i am still very well aware of the problems they have had wit their other product ShadowSurfer, one can only hope SP breaks that pattern.

As for me and my camp we will continue to allow PARAGON to serve us with it's excellent results as always.

 

they said the technicans are working on a fix and will be fixed in next build.
when a new build comes do you uninstall the old build reboot and install new one?
or do you install over the top of old one?
also do you know how to do incremental images with paragon?
i ticked the perform incremental image in options.
then done another image and it done a full image again.
i must be doing something wrong.
we can always discusss this via pm to not go OT.
lodore

 

nah,

my acronis secure zone does its job, and im able to restore fully if my vista fails to boot, or when i want to revert back to this earlier restore.

sure if my HD blows up, i cant do this.... but a new HD, will bring a fresh install of vista anyway, whether i had the image or not, thats still what i would do.

 

Well, that's certainly not the way the product is marketed by Acronis; they state that the advantage of the SZ as *not* having to purchase an extra hard drive or use other media such as CDs or DVDs.

What did I miss? Since you stated you don't use SZ, and many appear not to use it either, I fail to see your point. As I stated earlier, the reason I bought the software was for recovery purposes in the event of a hard drive failure.

 

Well, I don't know the inner workings of Acronis, but you may try putting the SZ in another hard drive (if allowed).

 

prius, I'm here trying to help you, not argue with you. I'm an experienced ATI user, but I can't (and won't even try to) account for Acronis' marketing hype!

My point was that the major objective of ATI is no different than that of any other disk-imaging software. That objective is two-fold:

• To create an accurate image of any of your PC's internal hard drives (or partitions thereof) onto another internal drive or (preferably) an external drive.
• To restore that image whenever necessary from the media on which it has been saved to an internal hard drive in the same PC where it was created.

The SZ works just fine if your system drive is still operational (note: Windows need not be operational for the SZ to work). However, if your system drive has crashed, in all likelihood you will be unable to recover your SZ partition! Therein lies the risk in totally relying on the SZ.

~pv

 

I understand and, in fact, *that* was *my* original point. I can only assume that I failed to make that point more comprehensible.

 

Yes, you can create the SZ on an external drive. However, if you accept the default option to also activate the Acronis Startup Recovery Manager (the boot into TI via F11 function) then the external HD must be connected and switched on each and every time the system is booted up. If it isn't then the system will hang. Also worth bearing in mind that activating the Startup Recovery Manager (SRM) overwrites the standard Master Boot Record (MBR). This will "break" most Multi-Boot managers and, if I remember rightly, prevents booting into Windows "Safe" mode.

Prior to the release of TI 10.0, the best use for the SZ (minus the dreaded SRM of course!!) was to automatically limit the number of scheduled incremental images created to it via its FIFO algorithms.

Regards

Menorcaman

 

See? Acronis to me demands jumping thru so many hoops just to get to a certain point of performing one feature and that's where the confusion can overtake it even if it is a good imaging app. I thought there was nothing like TI when i made my very first images and fell under the spell of assuming the restore would eventually take like you might expect. For me though, thats where everything bogged down and there was no remedy at the time. This was back at version 8 but there was enough frustration experienced to discourage my interest in it so i went looking for a more friendlier and dependable alternative.

For the life of me it still boggles my mind whenever i visit to review their forums section with all the issues still happening.The strangest part for me is that those who do either master it or are fortunate enough that it performs well for them each and every time have repeated success with it. Beats me.

 

using the startup recovery manager does not stop safe mode working,

i have it activated, and i use the SZ aswell ... and safe mode still works fine.

windows vista. (f5>then f8 for safe mode)

 

which is ? I just got the link to the 30 day shadow protect to test later today.
Asked for a refund for Paragon - changing drive letters without permission is not good. An emergency disk that doesn't recognize a wireless Microsoft mouse is not good. Being slower than Acronis and making larger Images is not good.

So leaving out Paragon is there anything else to look at other than Shadow Protect ?

 

If you read the post (link below) by "Nate", who really appears to know his stuff, on the SP Forum, there isn't much beyond Acronis, StorageCraft, and Symantec, in his opinion at least.

http://forums.storagecraft.com/Forums/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=352

 

Hi C.S.J,

I'm not surprised that modifying the MBR has no affect on Vista's ability to boot into Safe mode!! However, for non-Vista flavours of Windows ( I should have qualified my previous statement) you need to use the key push sequence workaround advised by Acronis Support (Aleksandr) in this <previous thread>.

Regards

Menorcaman

 

its odd since ATI seems very unreliable and hard to remove.
ghost is made by symantec and the new version only does imaging inside windows.
which only leaves shadow protect desktop which is very good.
IMO you cant go wrong with eiether paragon or shadow protect desktop.
paragon may be slower but its very reliable and only starts its one process
when you open the interface or doing a backup you sheduled.
if someone brought me shadow protect desktop i would use it.
I found ATI slower than paragon and makes bigger images.
Long View found it the other way around.
lodore

 

my main concern was the way paragon restored my C: partition and then without permission changed my data partition to D: and image partition to E:

All very neat and tidy but not what I wanted.

Then when I used Acronis to restore and old image I had to run the restore twice. Somehow Paragon is "protecting" itself. Now I will not be surprised to find other users who have not had these problems. Some work with one partition. others will have removed Paragon and reinstalled Acronis. My point is that one slight difference in hardware, software, or procedure can cause havoc. when I made the "emergency" disk and found my mouse wouldn't work
I gave up.

If Paragon works for someone then fine. I would imagine that when working it is an excellent program for perhaps 95% of the population. Unfortunately I'm one of the X% it doesn't work for. I will give Shadow Protect a go this afternoon.

 

Exactly. And exactly again why some imaging apps seem to do just fine for some where others experience nothing but grief. But being realistic here and not to downplay the effectiveness others have with Acronis, just look at the "New Posts" menu on this Forum's main page, time and time again Acronis Forums overwhelm that list EACH & EVERYDAY without end. Are all those issues also without end? That's very troubling for many to stomach even wanting to try them.

You keep posting that way Peter because your results are thoroughly convincing and anyone can read into the excitement & satisfaction you experience when you been impressed. Unlike Acronis, with Storagecraft i also harbored some doubts because of issues with ShadowSurfer but i been around long enough to know you don't judge the rest of the product line based on some slight issue with one.
If ShadowProtect V.3 doesn't try to empty my billfold as fast as the Gas Stations these days, i have no problem whatsoever joining their customer/client base as a loyal user. I also must admit, with Speed results like those StorageCraft might just prove a very worthy competitor if not Leader in Imaging solutions.

 

on my test pc i have four partitions.
C: system
D: data
E: images
and G: linspire
i just click on restore partition select image.
tell it to make the image as C: partistion and it reboots and restores.
I have restored about 20 images with paragon and hasnt changed my drive letters at all.
i have a basic windows 2000 sp4 image that i restore before testing a new av.
to make sure it doesnt conflict with remaindents of another av.
its a shame it changed the drive letter when you restored an image.
lodore

 

I have had poor results with Acronis True Image. It is hard to uninstall. Paragon Drive Backup in contrast works perfectly. Any one could operate it not so true of Acronis. I have always wondered why everyone thinks they need more than one imaging system. if paragon works why not just use that?

 

i have had the same exprience as you.
acronis not working.
hard to uninstall.
then paragon works perfectly.
lodore

 

The problem for me is that I have
C: system
D: DVD Drive
E: DVD Drive
F: Data
G: images

I could easily change my partitions to the same as you BUT that is not the point. when restoring C: Paragon has decided to change F: to D: and G: to E:

Again I could accept this and change the links. My point is I am not very happy about using a program which decides (1) what is best for me and (2) does it without my permission.

 

I can't speak for everyone but for myself I simply got bored with Acronis. I am one of the 0.005% ( if you believe some of the posts) who has been using Acronis since version 6 and never had any real problems. so I decided to try Paragon and found it far less intuitive, slower, made bigger images, messed up my drive letters, tried to stop me restoring an Acronis Image and wouldn't recognize my wireless mouse when using the emergency disk. Apart from these minor issues I thought it was a very good program. Even though I only paid $29.95 I agree with you that there is no need for more than one imaging program and have asked for a refund.

 

With version 7, I have found that if one uses the secure zone with TI the uninstaller needs to run twice. The first run will notify the user that the secure zone and recovery manager need to be removed first and to run the uninstaller again after the reboot. The second run of the uninstaller then removes the program components, services, and folders.

I had one machine that refused to restore or verify images no matter how they were made nor where they were placed. I went the uninstall reinstall route several times trying to make it work.