Introducing AX64 Time Machine - hybrid imaging/snapshot software

twl845,
That is not how RBRX works. If you take a snapshot (call it "snapshot x"), you are NOT in that snapshot. "Snapshot x" is a point in time that you can go back to if you want to at a later point in time. That's the point of taking snapshots, so you will have a point in time to go back to.
sb

 

Thanks, I think that's a major point nowadays.

 

I would check on that, but I can't since I haven't re-installed RBRx since I installed AX64 Time Machine. At this time I'm relying on my 73 year old memory. As I remember it, When you access RB you're in a snapshot that already has RB in it. So when you make the new snapshot it's in that one too. Then you install your AX64, so now they're both in the same snapshot. If you want to get rid of AX64 God forbid, you have to go back to the snapshot before the new snapshot which only had RB.

 

You are both right (just coming at it from different angles) in that when you take the snapshot you are in it and it is seen in the RB Rx Console as the current snapshot (until the next one is taken). But if 10 minutes later you then carry out an install which you do not like you can then rollback to your current snapshot, which is the last one you took, and you will be back in a disk state that you were at when you took the snapshot. Anything done since the current (or latest) snapshot was taken will be 'wiped away'.

Balders

 

How does defragmentation impact AX64 functionality? I'd to try it myself but first I want to know if somebody has any experience with this.

 

atomomega,

No problems with defragmentation, the only side-effect is the bigger incremental backup size.

Isso

 

Seems like this thread has been hijacked by Rollback Rx.

 

Wondering if you are paranoid about RB Rx? There are a lot of RB Rx users (I am one of them) who are interested in AXTM as a replacement for RB Rx...and so are asking questions...it is only natural.

 

Balders,
Well said! Thanks!
sb

 

Thanks

 

and those, like me, who like to have both because when you use something for very long time , its hard to get rid of it

 

Weeks ago I tried AX64 and had zero issues. The thing is I doen't really recall restore times. I believe I removed it because I don't test a lot of software and this PC that I built has an Ivy Bridge 3570K cpu and a SSD and a backup SSD . I also image with a USB 3 external drive using W7s. Anyway, is AX faster at restore because it only restores what is different from the base and then subsequent snapshots?

 

Basically, yes. When a RESTORE operation is done under LIVE Windows, AXTM only restores what's necessary to reach the restore destination snapshot.

If you restore to the BASELINE, only the INCREMENTAL changes since the baseline are restored to the baseline. If you restore to the previous snapshot, only the most recent incremental (snapshot) is removed from where you are and you are back. This type of operation is much faster than a typical image restoration, mainly because the baseline doesn't have to be rewritten to the volume. Doing restorations does not preclude you from going to any snapshot at anytime.

When the above operations are done using the RECOVERY MEDIA, presumably on an unBOOTable system, the restorations are done just like any other imaging tool... the baseline + all incrementals (snapshots) up to your restoration point will be restored.

This is why this tool is both a snapshot manager as well as an image backup tool.

 

Hi Speedbump. Lets see if i can answer your original question.

The short answer.

"YES". If you install AX64 after RBrx then restoring to any RBrx snapshot before AX64 was installed will competely remove AX64 (except for AX64's backup folder...but again there is an exception to this as well. More on this later).

The long answer.

The following is an example setup that I'll use to explain.

2 Physical HD's

HD0 = 2 partitions C:, D: (C: is the system partition)

HD1 = 1 partiton E:

Now, when you install RBrx and choose the custom setup and get to the HD selection screen (where you select which partitions to protect) you notice that you can only see partiton C: and D:. This is correct. I wont get into the reason why you cant see E: (it's not the focus of what i'm explaining here). In this example, you choose to select both C: and D: to protect by RBrx.

Skipping a little forward, RBrx is now installed and you can see the baseline in the "History" screen. (I think your still using RBxV9.x. Thats OK). Of coarse this baseline is protecting both C: and D: and their respective contents without AX64.

Now you take a snapshot with RBrx. Call it "B4 AX64" (Before AX64).
Install AX64. You select Drive E: ( the unprotected RBrx drive) as your backup drive for AX64. Now all of the snapshots that you take with AX64 will be backed up to this drive. As you probably already know, the snapshots taken with AX64 are in fact duplicated data that reside on another Drive/partiton, an entirely different approach than the one RBrx uses.

Now you decide you dont want AX64 installed. You use RBrx to roll back to "B4 AX64" snapshot. AX64 is now completely removed. But the AX64 folder still exists with all of AX64's snapshots. Because this drive (E: ) was not protected by RBrx then they still all remain. This is the exception i was talking about. If the AX64 folder exists on a non protected RBrx drive, it will not be restored. This is actaully the recommended way to set it up if using RBrx otherwise RBrx will have very large snapshots because it will track changes in the AX64 folder if it existed on its protected drive (D: ). The AX64 folder can be harmlessly deleted manually if you so wish. Now AX64 is completely removed.

 

Hello,

if i have Acronis installed and install AXTM will that leas to problems? Does the driver that AXTM installs interfere with Acronis?

In what scenario could both programs bite each other. If for example i create an Image with Acronis and in this moment AXTM wants to create an Image too, than whats happens?

 

Thank you TRF! I'm thinking I'll purchase it the first time it goes on sale. My internal backup SSD, which I put my Paragon images on, is only 60gbs. I keep two, always deleting one for the next image. I'll partition my USB 3.0 500gb ext HD in half using one partition for Paragon and one for W7's backup. When the SSD starts to fill I'll just format it and start over. My non-incremental images are not large usually 22gb and in retrospect since W7's are incremental, I could give Paragon a larger partition if I want numerous images (although I don't normally, just restoring to the last image).

 

FYI... as Isso has said all along, if you PM him and tell him you're a Wilder's member, he will offer you a 25% DISCOUNT coupon. I don't know how long this offer will continue... knowing Isso, probably for quite a while.

 

Carfal, What a wonderful post!!!
Thank you for all of your work on running both apps together!
sb

 

Hi Isso

Froggie kindly told me how to create the recovery media, and I am all set to go.

I backed up C:\ and let the recovery media have its head. I was having a cup of tea, and I swear that I blinked a few times had a sip of tea, and bingo! Recovery done

God God, Isso, what have you created. I have 20 days to go on trial. I will play with this for a day or two and I will purchase.

Thanks Isso

Marse

 

Hi Marse,

I'm glad to hear that Recovery Media is working for you (kudos to Froggie). No need to buy a license as I promised free licenses to all beta testers. I've sent your key as a PM. Could you let me know how did you fix the recovery media problem? Thank you

By the way, try restore from live system too - you'll be impressed with the speed.

Isso

 

WYC,

There were reports of incompatibility with Acronis version 2011 that prevented AX64 from working properly. The latest Acronis version 2013 works fine along with AX64.

EDIT: just noticed your question in "Experience with imaging programs" thread regarding how AX64 works. Aladdin explained it very well (thank you Mohamed!), I'll just add some info:

Indeed AX64 is a pure imaging program. Why is it restoring so fast? So let's say you have a full backup, then you changed a few files, and created an incremental backup. Now you want to restore your full backup. What the other imaging programs do - they rewrite the entire drive. But why do that if only a few sectors had been changed?? It's a useless work to overwrite the entire drive with the data, 99% of which already presents there.

So all that is needed is to figure out which sectors had changed since full backup and restore only that handful of sectors. The end result will be exactly the same as restoring the entire drive. That's what AX64 does and you get your full backup back in seconds, saving your time and HDD/SSD life. Hope this makes sense.


Isso

 

Hi Isso

Many thanks for the licence.

Froggie told two ways to solve the problem. I opted to download a Win7 installation disk and burn this iso to a USB drive: with that in place, your software found WinRE.

I merely followed Froggie's instruction.

Regards

Marse

 

Hi Isso,

thanks for this no rubbish clear answer - like this way of communicating a lot!

Could you tell me how this is regarding Image for Windows or Shadowprotect?

could you explain this more. So as i speculated in the other thread there must be a "tracking file" - where is this files saved? Can i change the location where this file is saved?

P.S. One thing that i really like about your software is that you can "jump back and forth" in time. Many Programs like Acronis can do this of course since its basically just applying another image. BUT you can not use your created imagejobs anymore since Acronis saves all its own settings on C in the program folder (not the userprofile/my userprofile is on another partition).

Of course it's kinda the idea to revert all the software and their settings to an older stage - but usually people don't want that to happen to the imaging program itself. So how did you do this in AXTM?

 

That just reminded me of a question i wanted to ask a while back but forgot....

as the AX data file is saved in the "System Volume Information" folder, is the size limit setting for system restore in any way tied in to the disk space allocation for the AX files ?

I have system restore disabled and the storage allocation at minimum, so just wanted to be sure this wouldn`t have any effect on the AX storage space.

I know AX has got nothing to do with system restore - just questioning the size & storage settings.....and confirming there`s no relation, as I don`t know if the SR size limit is some kind of global limit for the size of that specific folder, regardless of what else happens in there.

 

BTW, Isso, do you recommend to disable System Restore (on the system disk) when AX64 is installed ?