ATI V11 Can you backup to network share?

I'm using ATI V11.8101. After having a strange assortment of problems trying to backup my C: drive to a mapped network drive, I talked today to "Ilya" in support at Acronis via Chat. Ilya shocked me by informing me that, if you backup to a share, then all the management features, including quotas, max number of backups, max number of days, auto-deletion of older backups, auto-naming of backup files---ALL these features will not work, period. Ilya also told me that if you backup to a share, that you have to do ALL file management manually yourself, including all file deletion, and that the program will simply make incrementals FOREVER unless you go in and manually delete the old full, and manually make another full. All I could think was : UNBELIEVABLE. Is this true? Is this software really that limited and that "dumb"? Is there really virtually no functionality if you choose to backup to a share? Or is this tech support person blowing smoke?
For the record, I'm trying to backup the C: drive to drive W: W: is a mapped network drive on another PC, and happens to be a folder called "raid" which is shared. This folder sits on a 2TB drive which is actually a dynamic disk composed of 3 x 750GB drives in a windows RAID0 stripe. The drive and share are 100% OK, pass all chkdsk tests and others, and are used extensively by many other apps without a problem. Only ATI is having an issue, and Ilya is telling me that ATI just won’t fully work using a share.
Can anyone tell me is this is or isn’t true, and their experience with trying this? And, are there any plans to fix this, and when? Thanks, --Lisa S

 

As far as I know, it's true. The Backup Locations feature doesn't work properly on network shares. The only automated option is to use batch files run as pre-commands or on a schedule to rotate the backups as required.

I don't know if this has been fixed in TI 2009 or not. I haven't tested that part.

 

Just installed a NAS device and was intending using scheduled backups to a share there. Bit shocked to read all this, but will try it out and come back - probably in a few days time.

 

Does Norton Ghost v14 have similar issues with network shares?

While I know Ghost doesn’t have as many bells and whistles as ATI, the bells it DOES have all seem to work.
What perturbs me about ATI is that are multiple places it bombs out and produces error messages when you are following the rules and using it in a "normal" fashion.
I don't see equivalent behavior from Ghost. It just works.

It looks like I have the choice between driving a stable Toyota, or driving a top-end Mercedes that won't work on 1-way streets, wont drive in the rain, and deploys it's airbags randomly 6 times a year but only when driving over 85mph. I'm starting to think Ghost is like Linux, and ATI is like Vista.

 

I've by no means got to the bottom of this network storage issue yet, but on my Gericom laptop ATI 11.8053 running in XP can use network backup locations and all their features. However ATI 11.8101 running on my Medion Titanium in Vista hangs when trying to create a backup location on a network share.

This could take some sorting ...........

 

The OP didn't say which OS she is using, but my testing suggests it's Vista. I have now tested creating backup locations on network shares on two XP machines, in both ATI 11.8053 and ATI 11.8101 and all appears to work correctly, including the various options. However Vista just hangs when asked to create a backup location on a mapped share.

Testing will continue, albeit rather slowly - I have other things I must do - but can anyone confirm my findings?

 

I'm on XP SP3.
I am able to CREATE backup locations on a share. The problem is that FUNCTIONALITY of managing the backupsa(quotas, # of backups at a location, the # of days they will stay, the auto-naming of files,etc) will not work, and Ilya of tech support at ATI says this is a known "bug".
So, I end up with one initial full,and then dozens of incrementals created forever.

I'm amazed at how buggy ATI is compared to Ghost. Ghost has its critics, but for me, it works. Maybe it's because they decided to stay simple.