I've read the manual but have a couple of questions.

I've read the manual and I apologize if I'm asking a question that's answered in there. If so, it went over my head.

I’ve created an image file with Acronis backup in case I need to restore on the same hard drive and created bootable rescue media.

I read that a cloned image is for moving to a bigger hard drive. What if that hard drive totally fails? Will the image file/backup restore on a new hard drive or does it have to be a cloned image to a new drive?

If so, I'd like to have a couple of cloned copies a head of time. Can you store more than one cloned image on a hard drive (each on it’s own partition) in case you want to transfer it in the future due to hard drive failure or does each clone need a dedicated drive?

Thank you for any advice.

 

Howdy,

On at least two occasions, I have had disk failures.

Each time, I purchased a new, significantly larger disk, installed it, and booted of the TI CD to restore.

The restore completed without difficullty, and the new disks worked just fine.

Each time, I had images that were NOT created with the clone feature. They were made with the Backup function.

I hope that this is useful information,

Kenneth

 

To "clone" (as the word is used in hard drive manufacturer's lingo) a disk is from the old entire disk to a new entire disk. To have multiple clones requires multiple disks when used in this sense. Many people do in fact do so.

Sometimes the word "clone" is used generically for "copy" or "image" which makes for some confusion.

Multiple TI "images" of an entire disk can be placed onto another disk (in separate partitions if you want) and restored as posted by KennethS. This assumes of course that there is enough space to do so.

 

No, you cannot have more than one Clone on a hard drive. The word Image is reserved for a compressed Backup, so there isn't a Cloned Image as far as True Image is concerned.

To look at it another way. Some people use the Clone feature when they want to upgrade to a larger hard drive. Some use it to have a second drive that is identical to the first and which they can substitute for an original without having to go through a Restore (called Recovery in TI) process.

Then again, some use the Clone feature to exchange the drive in their system each day i.e. at the end of the day they clone the drive then use the newly cloned drive as the main drive the next day ... and repeat this every day. This way they have a backup drive that is only a day old. This method is made very easy by having both drives in removable trays.

 

If you mean you have created the image on the same hard drive and your hard drive fails you will not have a image to restore anyway and as TI deletes everything on the hard drive before restoring it will not be able to restore (unless your image is in a separate partition and you only do a partition restore). You should keep your images on a separate hard drive either as a second drive in your computer or a external hard drive.

If I have misread your post then I apologise

 

Funny, I have been able to use "uncompressed" images to backup with TI10 and they do restore.

TI10 obviously allows for "uncompressed" images and it is a feature I believe is useful (the more capabilities the better).

The words "image" and "compressed" are in fact counterintuitive when one thinks about it a bit: the usage has become custom on this forum but it is not completely reflective of the capabilities of TI.

I do realize that TI does not do a bit for bit copy in "uncompressed" mode which could be seen as ultimately "compressed" as the entire partition is not the actual size of the "image" file. In this sense the image DATA is uncompressed but the space of unused/unneeded portions of the partition are not imaged at all (they are marked and "reconstituted" during restore).

Perhaps to much attention to a single word and not worth debating about.

If I am wrong in this I hope I will be quickly corrected.

 

"I’ve created an image file with Acronis backup in case I need to restore on the same hard drive and created bootable rescue media."

como: What I mean by this is if I need to restore the same hard drive that was copied because it became corrupt or something not that it needed replaced. The copy is on an external drive. I've done a full system backup on an external drive.

I was wondering whether it was necessary to also do a clone or clones (I have 2 computers) on an external drive in case the hard drive I'm currently using totally fails. However, KennethS said he twice successfully installed on new drives with full backups (not clones) so I don't really need a clone if my hard drive totally fails. It sounds like I can use the full system backup if my if the harddrive totally dies and I have to get a new one. I'm assuming he means he didn't have to reinstall his OS or any of his programs.

If so that's especially good news since DwnNdrty and Cortez said you can only put one clone on an external drive and I really don't want to go buy more external drives if I don't have to. If I needed to clone as a backup that would reinstall OS and everything in case of total hard drive failure, I was hoping to partition an external drive for more than one clone so I wouldn't have more than one external drive.

Cortez: Yes, I think I wasn't clear on the drive manufacturer's lingo. I was using the term clone as "copy" or "image" in uncompressed form in this instance and have also used it to mean copying old entire disk to a new entire disk, not realizing that the original lingo was ONLY as copying old entire disk to a new entire disk.

DwnNdrty: That's a really cool idea to clone and swap drives every other day in a removable tray.

Thank you everyone for your comments.

 

You can indeed do a restore to a new/different drive (or even the original drive) from a backup image. You don't even need to format the drive first. If you want to be able to restore the Entire Disk Image, then create an Entire Disk Image (check the Disk # checkbox). You can also just restore any necessary partition(s) from an Entire Disk Image backup or a partition backup.

Cloning a drive uses one hard drive per clone. Any amount of backup images can be stored on a drive and are just limited by the space available on the drive. If you clone a 250GB hard drive to a 250GB hard drive, then that's one "copy" of the drive. If your used space on that drive is only 20GB and the backup image is 15GB then you could store about 15 "copies" on the drive (a much more efficient use of space).

 

Thanks MudCrab. You've clarfied things even more. I don't think I need to clone right now.

 

Hello everydayearthling,

Thank you for choosing Acronis Disk Backup Software.

Please be aware that there are two approaches available:

Clone Disk - migrates/copies the entire contents of one disk drive to another;

Backup - creates a special archive file for backup and disaster recovery purposes;

Please take a look at this FAQ article explaining the difference between Clone Disk and Backup approaches in more detail.

Actually, Clone Disk approach is usually used to upgrade the hard drive (e.g. install a larger disk), while Backup approach is basically dedicated for the complete data backup and disaster recovery purposes. Since you are interested in backing up your hard drive for the disaster recovery purposes, we would recommend you to follow Backup approach.

Moreover, there are several advantages of creating an image over the disk cloning procedure such as: you can create an image without rebooting your PC, image creation can be scheduled for the particular point in time, Acronis True Image allows you to create incremental and differential images, image archive contains only the actual data and so it has a smaller size, images are ordinary files and so they can be stored on any type of the supported media, etc. However, the final choice is always up to your needs.

You can find more information on how to use Acronis True Image 11 Home in the respective User's Guide.

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.
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Marat Setdikov