Macrium Reflect

Discussion in 'backup, imaging & disk mgmt' started by Stigg, Nov 23, 2013.

  1. guest

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    Macrium Reflect v7.3.5555 Released (January 19, 2021)
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  2. jimminy

    jimminy Registered Member

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    Recovery partition question:

    A good while back, a windows update created a new recovery partition(515MB) , but it left the old one too, which didn't have much in it now. I deleted that extra partition, and everything seems fine.

    Should I use that space (about 462MB) to make the real recovery partition larger? It would make it almost 1 GB. I vaguely remember reading that there can be problems if recovery partition is bigger than some amount, but can't remember where I saw that, so could be untrue.
     
  3. jphughan

    jphughan Registered Member

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    If Windows created a brand new Recovery partition rather than making your existing partition larger by shrinking the C partition and having a single Recovery partition occupy that combined space, then I'm guessing your "defunct" Recovery partition is not located in an area of your disk that would allow your new Recovery partition to use it. If you're planning to use a live repartitioning tool to shift partitions around in order to get that free space where it needs to be, then go ahead. I'm not aware of any problems using Recovery partitions larger than 1GB. I do know that during Windows 10 feature updates, the formula for determining whether the existing Recovery partition has sufficient free space varies based on the partition's total size, and larger partitions have higher minimum free space requirements (maybe there's a minimum percentage requirement?), so larger isn't always better. But 1GB or slightly below seems reasonable. I use 750 MB when starting from scratch.
     
  4. jimminy

    jimminy Registered Member

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    Thanks JP. The unallocated space is right next to the recovery partition. The disk looks like this:
    1-System (none) 100 MB | 2- Windows (C) 446 GB | 3- (none) 515 MB , and following is the 461 MB unallocated space.

    I used windows disk manager to try to expand that 515 MB recovery since the free space is adjacent to the right, but when I right click it, the only option is help. No way to resize it or even assign a drive letter.

    Some history: Originally the machine had a 120GB SSD. I replaced it with a 480GB model. I used macrium reflect to restore an image to the new drive, dragging each partition down (in order) and resizing only the Main c partition (using the properties box). I left the small system (active) partition and the recovery partition the same size as original. Just dragged them onto the new drive. There may have been a very tiny space left unallocated.

    It was a later windows update that shrank the C partition to create a new recovery partition (slightly larger) but it just left the old partition to the right, which I deleted.
     
    Last edited: Jan 19, 2021
  5. jphughan

    jphughan Registered Member

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    Interesting, if the original Recovery partition was immediately to the right of the Windows partition, I'm not sure why Windows created a new one and left it there. But in terms of extending the partition, try doing it in Diskpart using the "extend" command. It's possible that Disk Management doesn't allow certain changes to Recovery and other System partitions. Diskpart itself won't delete a Recovery partition unless you enter "delete partition override", but override doesn't appear to be valid for the extend command. If you can't get it to extend in Diskpart either, one option would be to capture an image backup of the new Recovery partition, delete the partition on disk (using that "delete partition override" command), create a new empty partition that fills all remaining space, and restore your image backup of that Recovery partition "into" that empty partition you just created. To do that in Reflect, you'd drag and drop the Recovery partition from the Source row on top of the new partition in the Destination rather than using "Copy selected partitions".
     
  6. jimminy

    jimminy Registered Member

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    It was no go for both disk management and diskpart. I downloaded mini partition manager, and it seemed to work fine. Time will tell if there are problems. I rebooted and now gmail don't work, but that may be a coincidence.

    Another odd thing is that the recovery partition only shows as 430.4 GB used, so it should have fit into the original 461 MB partition without windows needing a new partition.

    Very Strange!
     
  7. jphughan

    jphughan Registered Member

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    If memory serves, the free space requirement for the Recovery partition has always been at least 100 MB, if not more. I'm not sure why -- maybe to temporarily have both the old and new WIMs on that partition simultaneously for a brief period, or maybe because Windows won't always know exactly how much space the new Recovery partition will require since it can incorporate drivers specific to your system? But what you've observed where the used space is less than the total size of the original partition isn't unusual.
     
  8. jimminy

    jimminy Registered Member

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    Yes, it makes sense. I also noticed some log files on that partition ... They were small. but it's likely windows needs a space for extra stuff. I always thought of it as a static partition, but it's not.

    Anyway, that partition is now 976 MB. Should be plenty for a while.

    Thanks for your insight JP.
     
  9. Minimalist

    Minimalist Registered Member

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    I have one question about MIG. I was think about giving it a try but it seems that it can't be enabled now after it was not installed during MR installation.

    When trying to configure it I get this prompt:
    upload_2021-1-24_9-25-46.png
    and after confirming installation I get this error:
    upload_2021-1-24_9-26-42.png
    What would be the best way to proceed? Uninstall/reinstall, install over the top enabling MIG during installation or is there an option to repair installation?

    An answer from someone solving similar problem will be much appreciated.
     
  10. Minimalist

    Minimalist Registered Member

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    A follow up. I just tried using Change and then Modify through Control Panel and got prompted for missing MSI file. That's because PatchCleaner thought it was not used any more and moved it to another partition. After moving it back MIG install succeeded without a problem.

    Tested it and it works great :thumb:

    upload_2021-1-24_9-42-7.png
     
  11. MPSAN

    MPSAN Registered Member

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    I am on windows 10 pro 1909 64 bit and still use the paid 7.2.4952. Should I update to 7.3.5550 and do I rebuild winpe or re?
     
  12. Osaban

    Osaban Registered Member

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    An update in Macrium is not mandatory unless the changelog addresses a bug in one's version, although I always update to the latest (I like to test latest versions). I think the most urgent 'problem' is your version of Windows 1909 which won't receive anymore updates very soon from MS. As far as the rescue media is concerned, jphughan often advised to wait a bit before updating as it might assist you in case the new media has bugs...
     
  13. Osaban

    Osaban Registered Member

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    I think you made the right decision, it is one of the features available for the paid version and I believe it is a solid protection against ransomware. I can only delete images from within the Macrium GUI, if I try directly MIG will block the operation unless it is disabled...
     
  14. jphughan

    jphughan Registered Member

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    7.3.5550 hasn't generated any reports of problems except for people using the German language version, and to deal with that, Macrium released 7.3.5555, which only applies to German language installations. So I would recommend updating. I moved to 7.3 to gain the ability to use Macrium's Task Scheduler instead of Windows Task Scheduler because on WTS, my monthly Full backup would run twice each month, which obviously wasn't what I wanted. Macrium's Task Scheduler is working as expected.

    You don't have to rebuild Rescue Media right away, but you'll be prompted to do it after you update when you next open Rescue Media Builder. Here again, 7.3.5550 has been out for a while and I haven't seen reports on the Macrium forums about bugs that broke their Rescue Media, so it seems safe. But of course always retest your Rescue Media after updating it. And BEFORE updating, you might want to create an ISO build of your current Rescue Media just in case you have a problem. That way you can use the ISO to build "known good" Rescue Media just in case.
     
  15. MPSAN

    MPSAN Registered Member

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    OK, and I build rescue media on rewritable dvd's so I usually keep an older one.

    Thank you all for your help. Still do not know if PE or RE is better, but may use PE.
     
    Last edited: Feb 5, 2021
  16. jphughan

    jphughan Registered Member

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    Happy to help. With respect to RE vs. PE, see this post I wrote about that.
     
  17. MPSAN

    MPSAN Registered Member

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    Great...PE it is for me.
     
  18. Spartan

    Spartan Registered Member

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    you must have run into issues trying to clone a disk to a smaller or larger disk where you had to manually adjust / shrink the partitions for it to fit. Well, with the new Macrium Reflect 8, all that is done in a single click: https://youtu.be/fVQPp2qZsA8
     
  19. Minimalist

    Minimalist Registered Member

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    Reflect 8
    https://www.macrium.com/reflect8
     
  20. jphughan

    jphughan Registered Member

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    Well since Macrium is now advertising, here is their KB section about Reflect 8, which contains a bit more detail about new features than that webpage, and details about features not covered on that page at all.
     
  21. xxJackxx

    xxJackxx Registered Member

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    As long as they don't go subscription licensing it will be a guaranteed upgrade for me.
     
  22. Minimalist

    Minimalist Registered Member

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    Thank you for that link. I especially like new file name parameters that will be introduced in this version. :thumb:
     
  23. jphughan

    jphughan Registered Member

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    I agree. Although the Image ID is going to be on by default as a prefix ahead of whatever the user provides. The reason is to ensure that all backups of the same set consistently group together when files are sorted by name. Previously you could choose to have only an Image ID or only a user-supplied value. At the moment, you can disable the Image ID prefix under Advanced Options, but there isn’t a way to default it to off because Macrium strongly recommends using it, based on their experience supporting a variety of cases where users set up custom naming and ended up having no idea what backups they really had or how they were related to each other.
     
  24. jimminy

    jimminy Registered Member

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    I never had any problem with the old way; just drag the partition where you want it and click properties to adjust it's size.

    I wonder how the new version will know what you want or need?
    For example how will it know you're going to add another partition, so need to save some space for that next partition.
     
  25. jphughan

    jphughan Registered Member

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    Reflect V8 will include a large AI/ML engine that trains itself using data from all Reflect users.

    ...Just kidding. This is addressed in the KB article about this feature, but basically, small system partitions like EFI, MSR, and Windows Recovery partitions are never resized. For any other NTFS or FAT32 partitions on the source disk, you have the option to clone them in "Exact mode", i.e. maintaining their current size, or "Resize to fill mode”, which proportionally extends or shrinks source partitions to fill the destination. (When shrinking, partitions obviously aren't shrunk beyond their used space, even if that results in disproportionate resizing.) And either way, that just sets up a default staging. From there you'll be able to further adjust the sizing of the partitions if desired.

    One new capability for V8 that wasn't possible with the V7 method is the option to leave empty space between newly staged partitions. Reflect V7 doesn't allow that when using the drag and drop method, unless the target disk already has those gaps between partitions and you're dragging and dropping onto existing partitions. But if you're staging an empty disk, you have to work left to right with no gaps allowed.
     
    Last edited: Feb 13, 2021
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