Waking up out of suspended mode to make a backup

Software these days is so complicated, and production so market driven, that virtually all software is always broken one way or another; it's more a question of whether the cures are worse than the illness. I wihs I could get the IT audit folks here to realize that a newgrade is not necessarily an upgrade and may even be a downgrade.

However, if you don't install SP1, then at some point in the not too distant future, you won't be able to get any security "up"dates for your OS.

I you are going to install sp1, make a full disk backup first, just in case the install itself goes wonky or soem other serious probs surface.

 

Oh and I *strongly* recommend SP1, at least if you don't have any of the problematic drivers (but if Windows Update is offering SP1 to you, then you don't).

 

Thanks BC. I didn't realize Windows update could recognize whether my PC was "ready" for the update. It recently appeared on my automatic update and I've kept it at bay. I think I'll try it this weekend.

Still, my big question vis-a-vis ATI is whether I'll be able schedule differential backups.

I suppose at worst, I can make the change you recommend set Widows Task Scheduler to do something like open notepad and then a minute later have ATI run the task through its own scheduler.

Of course, once again, this work-around is ridiculous and Acronis should be embarrassed. It's been many months since folks on this forum (even dilittante me) noted the problem and even pointed Acronis to the Windows Vista development presentation that discussed the change MS made in Vista to how sleep mode works. Maybe it's understandable that the Acronis developers missed that when working on ATI. But, after being told specifically what the issue was I really cannot understand why this fundamental problem with a core function hasn't been fixed.

OK, rant over. I feel better now.

 

Does anyone know if Acronis has fixed this in TI 2009? If not, I'm not gonna upgrade. TIA...

 

Anybody?

I cannot believe that this problem hasn't been fixed or that we've been given an explanation as to why it hasn't been fixed. This functionality is so basic and important.

 

I have the same problem after restore img file created by trueimage enterprise server on my Server 2003. NTLDR is missing....Press Ctrl+Alt+Del to restart.

Server 2003 SBS runing on IBM X225 SCSI 80GB x 2, Raid 1, single intel processor.

why not Acronis support team give us a clear solution instead of ask us to provide more information?


Thanks.

 

I'm not sure if this is what you're looking for, but I use Vista's Task Scheduler to wake the PC in the night to make a full image of the OS on a weekly basis. It then goes back to standby after completion.

Perhaps this will assist?

http://www.personal.psu.edu/mjw12/public/StayAwake.pdf

 

Thanks. I've been using this solution for some time. However, as I've noted, this solution will not allow differential backups. For example, I've got a scheduled task to back up my data partition every night after I turn in. Obviously, I'd like it to be a differential. However, every time it runs, I end up with a full backup. It's better than nothing, but it is still terribly, unexcusably flawed.

 

Ok... Can I ask why you would image your data? Images are far less robust than file copies, and given that the price of storage is so low these days, I can't think of a reason to image your data. FWIW, I use the Task Scheduler to schedule data backups with SyncBack SE.

 

Well, I don't really want to get into a debate about the merits of images v. backups. Suffice it to say that I also sync my data in real time to my server. I'm a belts and suspenders kind of guy. I also have a task that is intended to wake my computer at night and image my OS partition: Differentials then a full every 14 days.

The point is that ATI will not allow you to schedule differential (or incremental I'm assuming) backups that occur when the computer is "sleeping".

 

SUCCESS!!

A few days ago, I decided to circle back and see whether I could come up with a solution to the problem on not being able to run differential (or presumably incremental) backups using the Vista Task Scheduler/StayAwake method. I succeeded.

1) Background:
As we all know, the ATI built-in scheduler will not wake a computer from sleep mode to run a task. While the Windows Task Manager will allow you to schedule a task, there's a problem with Vista. It seems that when Microsoft was designing Vista they tried to address the problem some users had with laptops where a sleeping laptop would be inadvertently awaken (e.g. it would get brushed or bumped in a backpack) and the computer would stay awake and drain the battery. MS "solved" this problem by having the computer fall back to sleep after a short period of time (2 minuted) if the computer is awaken from sleep but there is no user input. They call this being awaken in "unattended" mode. The problem for us ATI users was that if you used the Vista Task Scheduler to start an ATI task when the computer was asleep (e.g. in the middle of the night when a lot of people want to run a daily backup) the computer would wake, start the ATI task, but fall back asleep two minutes later. The task would not be completed until the user woke the computer the next morning.

2) StayAwake, a partial solution.
In this thread we discussed this falling asleep problem. I discovered a discussion of Microsoft's reasoning and a suggestion for a fix. See posts # 14 and 17 in this thread. I had hoped that Acronis would review the materials and implement the code necessary to address the issue (something that should have been done before they declared ATI Vista compatible). Acronis did nothing. Fortunately, Mark (forum name k0lo) bravely took up the challenge and with his neighbor, Chris, developed a utility called StayAwake that would keep the computer awake.

Using StayAwake you could use the Vista Task Scheduler to schedule an ATI task to run when the computer was asleep. Great!! Unfortunately, it turned out that for some (and possibly all) users, every backup would be a full backup even if the task was designed to create differential backups. This was not horrible, but it was a major inconvenience because, of course, you eat up disk space pretty quickly with a bunch of full backups. Again, I asked ATI to address this problem. They did not.

3) BCronin finds another solution.
In August 2008, BC reported that he had found and modified the registry entry in Vista that controls how long Vista stays awake during an unattended task. See post #47 in this thread. BC modified the entries so his computer would not fall asleep for an hour after being awoken in unattended mode.

At the time BC reported his discovery, I noted that I could not find the registry key he referenced and hypothesized it was a feature added with Vista SP1. (I had not yet installed SP1 at the time). Sure enough when I recently went back to look for the registry key BC identified, I was able to find it. Like BC, i modified the key (in fact I modified the keys for each power scheme) to "e10" (i.e. 3600 seconds).

4) A Solution:
Here's the solution. I opened the Vista Task Scheduler and disabled the tasks I had been using to make daily backups with StayAwake. I then used Vista Task Scheduler to crate new "simple" tasks. For example, I create one task to awaken the computer at 1 am and run the calculator program. Next I used ATI's task manager to create new tasks that would start 1 minute after the Vista scheduled task. So, for example, I created a new task to run at 1:01 am to create a backup of my OS partition (with 6 differential backups followed by a full). My thinking was that the Vista scheduled task would wake the computer and because I'd changed the registry, the computer would be awake when the ATI task time came. Sure enough, it works! For the past 2 nights, my computer has awaken, the ATI tasks have run and then the computer has fallen back to sleep.

I still believe that this is an inelegant solution and that Acronis should have addressed this by now. However, something is better than nothing and this solution will work.

Good luck.

 

Glad it worked out for you. So, it seems my incessant complaining to MS about that setting not being exposed in Vista RTM did indeed help (i.e. it is clear from your experience that it definitely was a new setting for SP1). Your strategy is exactly what I would have done (post SP1 and changing the setting) had I stayed with Acronis. Windows Home Server has proven to be a much more reliable/dependable solution for me, although there are some things that it can't do quite as well as ATI (e.g. once I had to restore a WHS image to a hard drive that was smaller than the one the backup was made from and even though there was enough free space on it that the restore would have worked, WHS couldn't hack it). On the other hand it is just inconceivable and unforgivable that ALL THIS TIME LATER Acronis hasn't done a single thing to address this (in my opinion fatal) flaw in their product. They don't have to use the inbuilt task scheduler in Windows if they don't want. All they have to do is implement a "wake the computer to perform this task" and set the "stay awake" bit during the backup. The fact that they either don't care enough about their customers to do so (or worse, don't have the technical chops to pull it off) speaks volumes and should make anyone considering ATI for a backup solution to think long and hard about whether they want to trust their data to such an outfit.

Best of luck to you all, whatever you decide to do.

Cheers,
bc

 

Out of curiosity, Have you tested what Vista does if the ATI-scheduled task requires a longer period of time to complete than the allotted to stay awake in 'unattended' mode? For instance, you modify the reg to allow for 30 minutes, but the ATI task itself requires 45 minutes? Does ATI's operation remain invisible to Vista even after 30 minutes of activity?

 

Floepie:
I haven't tested this. I will probably review my logs after a while and determine the longest time a task takes. If it is substantially shorter than the 1 hour I've set, I'll shorten the time (to save energy).

I would imagine that if you were to shorten the stay awake time too much (so that it was shorter than the time it takes for ATI to complete the task) the machine would fall asleep in the middle of the task and the task would not finish until the computer awoke the next time. That's exactly what was happening before I lengthened the time.

 

Hi! I'm new to these forums but I just finished reading through this great thread. I've been trying to figure out a similar solution for ATI Home 11. I was previously using a lightweight app called Wake Up On Standby that allows you to wake your computer at a scheduled time, then keep it awake for a specified interval. The problem is sometimes my backups take 2 minutes (an increment with very little change) and other times they take 2 hours (a complete image). My solution is to keep my computer awake for 2 hours upon waking up to make sure I get my complete images finished, but this is very inefficient for the next 13 days in a row where increments are scheduled. Ideally, I'd like my computer to fall right back to sleep after the backup has finished.

Unfortunately, I know very little about programming, but I've stumbled upon what may be a solution. In the "Backup Creation Options," there is a place to enter "Pre/Post commands." Here you can enter scripts to run before and after the backup has completed. It would be very cool if we could use a script to run the "StayAwake" program while the backup is running, then another script to shut it down when the backup has completed. It would be even cooler if the script ran CCleaner to get rid of the junk and tmp files prior to image creation to save on space. Have you guys toyed around with this? Do you know how to go about implementing such a thing?

You will obviously still need to use Wake Up On Standby or a novel task in Windows Task Scheduler to wake the PC, but this could make for more efficient entry back into sleep mode after the backup has completed.

 

Hi spritemv,
In order to do that, please paste and copy this syntax in the NotePad :
"C:\Program Files\CCleaner\CCleaner.exe"/auto
Save it with the extension .bat.
In a second step, just include this file in the pre post command of your Acronis scheduled task.

 

I haven't included CCleaner, but this works for me:
https://www.wilderssecurity.com/showpost.php?p=1462663&postcount=78
Basically, I am using delayexec as the process to keep Stayawake running.

 

I just upgraded to ATI Home 2009 in the hope that the ATI scheduler would now wake the system from hibernation. Apparently, it doesn't. So I am back to the solution of using Windows Scheduler (in WIn XP SP3) to wake the system and lauch the backup task directly, as indicated in earlier posts. However, when a task is run this way, ATI does not send a status notification emil when the backup finishes. So at present, I can either use hibernation or get emails, but not both. Does anyone have a fix for this?

I notice that in the same folder as TrueImageHomeService.exe there is TrueImageHomeNotify.exe, and I'm guessing that might be the execurable that needs to run to send the emails. But I don't know what parameters to give it so that the status will be included, or if there is a way to perhaps launch it as a post command. Otherwise I'd probably need to put the backup task launch and the notification launch in a bat file, but I'm clueless as to how to connect them.

Any suggestions?


Thanks,
Henry

 

I haven't luck trying to start some other task with Windows Scheduler in hopes that and ATI task will then run. It ended up being much easier to jsut schedule the ATI task directly from Windows Scheduler.

 

Is this stayawake thing needed with ATI 2009, or has Acronis addressed the issue?