Making ONE Backup file and update it everytime

Hello,

I'm really tired of using True Image to create an incremental backup of some of my data.

What I want to do is the following:
Once running my backup task, True Image should create the backup-file. After clicking running the same task again, it should simply update the file.

I thought this is a normal task of a backup program, but it's unbelivably hard to get that work in True Image.

In standard settings it seems to make 2 backups (the newest and the "second newest"), but this isn't what I want as you read above.

Could you please help me or provide me some kind of guide ?

Thanks.

Bye The_Unknown

 

Which version are you using?
I gather that ATI Home versions 9 and 10 have quite
different schedulers from versions 11 and 12(2009).

In ATI home 12(2009), you would simply choose:
'backup method -> full' in the scheduler.

> Once running my backup task, True Image should create the backup-file.
> After clicking running the same task again, it should simply update the file.

Being pedantic, I would have used the word 'update' to describe incremental or differential backups.
Maybe 'refresh' or 'over-write' would be a better explanation of what you want.

> In standard settings it seems to make 2 backups (the newest and the "second newest")

What is the name and file size of the second backup?

 

I have Home 2009 (build 9.646)

But I don't want to make a full backup. I want to make an incremental one.

 

lol.... then why are you complaining about having two files created?
A week of incremental backups will look like this:

image.tib (100gb) <--- full backup
image1.tib (250mb)
image2.tib (210mb) <--- the 'increments'
image3.tib (300mb)
image4.tib (280mb)
image5.tib (320mb)
image6.tib (170mb)

The full back-up (100gb) will take 1.5 hours.
The daily increments will take 10 minutes.

However, if you really want just one file, I wonder what would happen if you set auto-consolidate to '1'?
Logically, that might merge image1.tib into image.tib every time a new incremental is created.
It will add some time onto your task though, and it means you lose the ability to restore to a certain day.
Also, it *might* increase the chance that you're backup becomes corrupted (ie. 'chickens in one basket').

 

This auto-flag I tried to set to 1 before I posted here and you're right it increases the backup time.
But when I set this option back to standard (no consolidating) and I have some files with only the changes, where's the use of that ? And in addition the old state of the data is stored still on my small external drive (in the full backup). In that way my backup drive gets full rapidly, no ?

What might be important to know: I don't want to restore old backups.

And another thing: Why could my backup get corrupted by functionaliy the program offers me !?!?!?

Edit: And what exactly is "chickens in one basket" ? I'm German so perhaps this is why I don't get that one

PS: Sorry for the bad English

 

> But when I set this option back to standard (no consolidating) and I have
> some files with only the changes, where's the use of that ?

If your original full backup was deleted, leaving behind only 'orphan'
increments, then that is a bug in the scheduler - you always need
the original, full backup, as you cannot restore individual increments.

> And in addition the old state of the data is stored still on my small external
> drive (in the full backup). In that way my backup drive gets full rapidly?
> What might be important to know: I don't want to restore old backups.

In scheduler -> backup method, there is a choice to 'create new full backup
after N increments' and to 'remove old archives'.

This means, for example, that you could take a full backup, with 6 small
increments each day after that, and on the 7th day they all get deleted
and you start again.

> Why could my backup get corrupted by functionaliy the program offers
> me !?!?!? And what exactly is "chickens in one basket" ?

The software creates a small percentage of corrupt backups; it is not
100% reliable. So, with the following backups saved:

image.tib <--- 100gb full backup
image1.tib <--- smaller incremental backups
image2.tib
image3.tib

To restore to the most recent backup, all four files need to be ok.
But imagine that image3 is corrupt. In this case you can *still* restore
from image2.tib or image1.tib. If image1.tib is corrupt, you can still restore
image.tib

However, if you consolidated each increment into one file as you suggested,
then if any *one* of the increments was corrupt, you'd make the entire
backup corrupt; you couldn't restore anything.
This is 'putting all your eggs in one basket' - if you drop the basket, all the
eggs break. But if you have two baskets and drop one of them, only half the
eggs get broken.

I am trying the following schedule to minimise the chance of having a
broken backup that doesn't work:

I have 'task1' create a full backup on sunday, with increments on tuesday
and thursday. The next sunday, these three are deleted, and a new full
backup is created again.

I also have 'task2' create a full backup on saturday, with increments on
monday, wednesday, and friday. The next saturday, these four are deleted
and a new full backup is created.

So my backup looks like this (just before it gets deleted by the scheduler):

black.tib (86gb) sunday
black1.tib (150mb) tuesday
black2.tib (150mb) thursday

white.tib (86gb) saturday
white1.tib (150mb) monday
white2.tib (150mb) wednesday
white3.tib (150mb) friday

 

But why does the software create corrupt backups ? In fact the only thing a backup solution should do is to copy data from one device to another one. Where's the point data can get corrupted ??

And another question: Is it possible with ATI to create backups that aren't in a *.tib file but are just the copied files ?

 

You could clone the entire drive if your backup drive is identical or has more space.

I backup like that.

I don't think you can clone individual partitions (like Ghost can). That would be nice though.

 

NOt quite. But with ver 12/2009 you can make a zip backup file insteaq of tib and zip files are can be extracted by a explorer, winzip, and a host of other progs without having ATI installed or loaded.

It sounds like what you want to do is make a single ful backup file, and then have subsequent backups revised that file per changes ont he source disk. That's one way a backup proglram could work but ATI can't do that -- it can only make inc or diff files to supplement the original full backups or completely overwrite the original full backup with anew full backup.

 

> But why does the software create corrupt backups?

You can be optimistic as say that all software has bugs, that it is difficult to write software that runs well on such a bad operating system as microsoft windows, or that disk imaging is a difficult task to perform.

Or you can be cynical and say that there is too much money to be made from people actually losing their data and feeling unsafe, so it is not in the software manufacturers' interest to create software which really protects people with 100% reliability.

I don't know what percentage of full backups and increments fail, but from my experience of ATI, and the amount of 'restoration issues' posted in this forum, the corruption level seems to be quite high. By 'corruption' I mean that a disk image .tib file cannot be restored, or that once restored it does not produce a bootable operating system.

 

Where can I change the setting to ZIP ?

 

I'm not using 12/2009 I bagged it and went back to 10, but I recall it was one of the options.

I'm sure you can find it if you look in the user guide

 

> I'm not using 12/2009 I bagged it and went back to 10,
> but I recall it was one of the options.

Only for an additional 'reserve copy'.
The main backups still have to be .tib

 

Hello again,

I tried some things with the program but the problem I see, is that the consolidating takes most of the time of the backup even if only 500 KB are changed (out of 2 GB). Is there any way to bypass that without having hundreds of incremental files ?

 

Hello The_Unknown,

Thank you for using Acronis True Image

You can avoid the consolidation in the following way: At the Backup method window select Incremental or Differential backups, mark "Create a new full backup after" and "Remove old archive" boxes.

When the "Remove old archives" box is selected, creation of a new full backup in accordance with the specified backup policy results in deletion of the complete old backup chain – the old full backup and its subsequent incremental (or differential) backups regardless of the overall limitations you set on the archive at the Automatic consolidation step.

Thank you.

--
Oleg Lee