Never thought backup software could be exciting

I'm a long term user of NGhost and have been happy with it.
However TrueImage's feature of no reboot backup and image file
browsing tempted me to try TI9. Also the reported speed of its operations.

Ok so sensibly i ghosted my system and installed TI9 on one of my systems. XP pro patched up fully as of today. I used this machine as it's got 1x 120 GB HDD on IDE NTFS and the second drive is 120 GB SATA FAT32.
Pretty simple setup that any backup software should easily cope with - ghost2003 and below does have issues with a primary drive on SATA though. Which I hoped Acronis could solve.

Anyway TI9 installed - all looked well - simple UI etc nothing too complicated - completed a backup (very quickly compared to Ghost). However the backup failed to verify. So i deleted the tib files and tried again - same. I then ghosted a clean install of winxp and patched it (no extra software installed) to rule out any form of software conflict. Tried again - same result. Ghosted back to my current image and installed TI9 again - same result. Then my second drive started trashing (constant access where i had stored the TI9 image files) and TI9 reported Bad sectors on this drive!.
Shut pc down and during the bootup i feared for the life of my second HDD as it trashed all the way through boot up. Upon running TI9 it once again reported bad sectors (trashing away constanty at drive 2) so i ghosted back to pre TI9 and deleted the tib files from drive 2. Checked out drive with IBM DFT and there were no problems with the drive - certainly no bad sectors as TI9 was erroniously reporting.

Any ideas as to why TI9 got so "upset" with such a simple setup? - the potential for actual drive damage was very high and i was very close to switching off the power a number of times as the drive was trashing so badly.

Software companies hide behind an unacceptable disclaimer of - no matter how badly we code were not responsible for anything. This has clearly got to change and it's stuff like this that gives people amunition to force upon the software industry the current situation with real hard goods- in that the consumer does have legal rights and the item must be fit for the job etc etc.
Perhaps not all software - but in this area of data backup then sensible legal protection should be made law.

Well this certainly made Sunday morning a bit more exciting than normal.

Has anyone else had a similar experience - i've got 3 systems and i'm certainly not going to install this on them. Does version 8 have the same issues?

 

TI 9 is very fragile (if that's the right word!) as it appears to have been released much too soon.
I very much doubt you'd have the same problems with TI 8 (latest build 937).

 

OK, first of all, did you have Ghost installed while trying out True Image?

I'm sorry to say that machine ATI 9 has performed flawlessly, so I discount all posts that say ATI 9 is the culprit untill proven by some research...

 

Yes Ghost was installed the first time but the TSR wasnt running - so there shouldnt be any conflicts - the two programs approach the backup procedure very differently so there should be no problems - the version of ghost ive got requires to image from a reboot and it just copies the drive to an image from a small dos program. TI is totally different in that it does it while windows is running.

So i had a clean system except for ghost - obviously. However if TI can't cope with an install of another backup utility then its useless. Nobody in their right mind would install another backup utility without running it alongside their current backup utility first to ensure it works ok.

So if TI can't live on a system with Ghost then its flawed - how are you ever going to get people to migrate to your program. Ohh and if TI doesn't work with an install of Ghost then it should say so during the install procedure - its not rocket science.

However i seriously doubt that this is the issue - seemingly TI9 has fundamental problems - seemingly it cant cope with mixed combinations of SATA/IDE and NTFS/FAT32 - which is essential IMO.

I'm happy that your not getting any problems - what setup do you have.
SATA/IDE or IDE/IDE or SATA/SATA - are they all FAT32 or NTFS or a combinaiton?

 

Like two AV's together is not a good idea...
Like two Firewall's together is a fast road to disaster...

That's why to low-level utilities together is NOT a good idea

SATA primary / IDE secondary drive, all partitions running NTFS.

And yes, its rocket science with all the different systems out there...

 

Backup software, running something in the background is not a good idea in the first place. It applies equally to Ghost and TI. It is actually very stupid idea, but quite popular though.
And actually there is a huge basic difference between two AV's or two Firewall's and two backup softwares, except if you are doing backup with both at the same time.
Live backup of the system could be probably called a rocket science, but OP was talking about installer checking if anything incompatible is not installed - and that is certainly not a rocket science.

 

I'd never install two programs to do the same task that run concurrently.
Here Ghost and TI9 are NOT running concurrently. The point i was trying to make was that the fundamental difference between how Ghost and TI operate excludes them from running concurrently.

I would guess if you did try to install say Norton AV onto a system with McAfee installed and visa versa it would stop you - possibly even offer to uninstall and transfer settings etc.

I always remove stuff that I think is a pointless resource waste and thus Ghost was active in my tray for the whole length of time it took me to see there was a ghost icon there and stop it loading in the first place using startup. It's probably just a scheduler anyway and ghost functions without it.. which is a feature I don't care about in software - I like to control when things are done.

Sorry don't mean to be patronising but clearly you've not got that much experience of Ghost 2003.

So being a bit more constructive it seems that TI9 may have issues when drives are formatted with a different file structure. Anyone else tried one FAT32 and another NTFS drive?. If it does have problems the software should maybe stop you backing up to a drive with a different file structure.

The only part of the software that really impresses me on a fundamental level is how it creates a backup while windows is still running - now that is rocket science - creating a backup of a currently dynamic system and thus HDD. Until I was aware of TI I didn't think it was possible - so far in my experience it still isn't as it didn't work on one of my setups. I'll try it on a SATA/SATA setup this week when i get time.

Ohh and it's nothing personal against the software people here, I simply had what I consider a serious problem with a software package and i've take the time and effort to come on here and report my experience.

 

Finally had the chance to try a different setup - with the latest build 2289.

Tried it off bat with 2X 200gb Maxtor Diamond Max 10's, both formatted NTFS and BOTH on SATA. Fresh install of WinXP pro - latest mob drivers and bios (ASUS A8N SLI) and ATI cat Drivers 5.10.

Managed to create a backup of the C drive and recover it . After the last builds efforts with one of my other setups its a massive step in the right direction - still its a long long way from finished (btw Ghost 2003 wont work with this setup as its SATA main drive)

However its not all sweetness yet.. i've got multiple machines and I installed TI9 on my test rig which is rock solid stable - it's never ever Blue Screened - until 10 minutes ago which was exactly 20 minutes after i intalled - backed up and reintalled the image?.. coincidence .. don't think so.

I'm currently using the demo as buying this software now is a bit foolish.

In comparison with Ghost - i find ghost more intuative and easier to use and the language used is more clear. I think TI9 has a cluttered clunky interface. Yes its got more features but making a direct backup of a drive and storing it for retrieveal is more confusing than ghost. Don't care about incramental backups - just a bog standard backup of the main partition results in a clickathon. The source and destination drives should be more obvious, i had to be very careful what i was clicking.

The UI is cluttered with some useless or infrequently used tools - e.g. Manage System Restore - if you understand what it is in the first place you know how to turn it off in windows - its a basic task that is used infrequently - usually once after you install XP and you turn it off.
also Add new disk is on the main pane?.. it's hardly a regular task. Also its imperative that Acronis get the english correct.. some stuff is nonsensical. You don't prepare a HDD for USING your prepare it for USE.

Plug and Unplug image was initally confusing untial i realised what it really meant was MOUNT the image as a drive and thus allow access to the image files.

I'm also still not sure as to the point of the secure Zone? - why would I store an image on the source drive even in a protected partition? common sense tells you to place any image on another drive totally incase your main HDD dies.

I really think Acronis should extend the Trial period to reflect the current state of the software. However i'm starting to loose patience and the latest version of Nghost is calling for me.

 

I wonder when a few years ago, IBM had secure backups to hidden parts of their hardrives mainly on their laptops, if people wondered the same or thought whoopee what a good idea?

By the way this wasn't a dig, just a humourous wondering.

Colin