Introducing AX64 Time Machine - hybrid imaging/snapshot software

I've been following the thread here for the last month or so, very excited about what seems the development of a wonderful program, am encouraged enough by the progress I've seen here that I'm planning on purchasing the program after the new version is released. I have to thank all the brave souls that have been beta testing for the benefit of all of us, and have to remark that I've seldom if ever seen such responsiveness by a developer to user questions, suggestions, etc as I've witnessed here in this forum. Remarkable support for what seems a remarkable product. Thumbs up

One thing has been itching at the back of my mind for a while. I've looked back thru the thread a bit to see if I could find where I thought I saw a reference to this, but have failed to find where it is mentioned. Unless it is my imagination, I think I remember having read ISSO state that there is some way in which manual backups are treated differently than automatic hourly backups. I THINK that perhaps they were said to be different in the way that the program handled automatically merging backups to maintain a relatively lower number of older backups and relatively more frequent number of more recent backups. Is my fuzzy memory correct, that this is true, and that it was mentioned that manual backups wouldn't be automatically merged in the same way as regularly hourly backups are?

In that case, would the manual backups remain as unmerged backups forever unless manually merged?? If manually merged, do they then just get kind of "melted into" (integrated into) the chain of hourly backups within the scheme that ultimately produces the result of fewer old backups and relatively more numerous recent backups, so that the final resulting yearly/monthly/weekly/daily backups fit the same distribution as if there had not been any manual backups taken in the midst of things, or do the manual backups persist as ADDITIONAL backups in the midst of the backup chain?

I hope someone can understand what I'm asking here - I think I may have confused MYSELF just in attempting to present the question, lol

Thanks to whoever can (correctly) clear this question up for me...

Robert

 

When I looked at the first sentence in the section about automatic hourly backups, at the FAQ page that ISSO posted the link to, I was confused. It says "Automatic hourly backup creates a backup each even hour."

I was thinking, hmm, each even hour... so that would be like, at 2pm, 4pm, 6pm, etc, every two hours, on the even hour. I wonder if I'm the only person that would get confused by interpreting "each even hour" so literally. Hopefully others would be a bit brighter than me regarding that. Offhand, I can't think of a good alternate phrasing that would mean "at the top of the hour" or "upon change of the hour" (if that is indeed when they are made)... Or... ARE they actually made every two hours?? Sheesh, I do so well at confusing myself...

 

They are made at "the top of every hour" or "on the hour" assuming that your system is not hibernating at that time. And also to note that if it is and so misses the automatic backup 'slot' there is no mechanism (yet) in place to action missed auto backups...am thinking of checking to see if this has been suggested as an enhancement...and if not the to suggest it for consideration.

 

Good read, ralws... that is absolutely correct.

Once again, good read. Once the manual backup has been "merged" (deleted), its relevant data is combined into the next newest incremental backup, whether it's an AUTOMATIC or MANUAL snapshot. If it was an AUTOMATIC one, it will then be further managed as all AUTOMATIC snaps are processed. If it's a MANUAL one, it will now remain part of that MANUAL snap until processed by the user.

This is my read of the situation... Isso will surely correct me if I'm wrong, and believe me, he will if I've missed this one

 

That sounds like an "Isso Slippo"... Baldrick is correct in his explanation.

 

Isso,

Whenever I schedule a CHKDSK/F C: to run at the next startup, it doesn't run (I never had that problem before installing AX64)!


Edit:
I just noticed that an 'AX64-chkdsk conflict' has been discussed on your website and that it is in your queue to be addressed. Has this issue been remedied in the soon-to-be released version?

Wendi

 

Over the past months I have tried and removed AX64 2x for probably to lamest reason of all, as I found its GUI kind of confusing. Having said that, I probably will purchase it sometime in the weeks to come. I do have one question and one observation. I've built the W7 boot CD and I also have my Paragon boot flash drive. Once booted from one of those sources, would you be able to access AX64, or if you explicitly wanted to use it would you have to boot with their media? Secondly, I kind of find it mind boggling that Acronis, Norton, Paragon, etc. have not developed a similar application. I mention this because just recently I'd mysteriously (As in I'm not sure what I did while dragging and dropping as it wasn't in the Rbin!) deleted a file. I opened a Paragon archive and using their explorer drilled down until I found it and restored it. Now I do realize that AX can and does much more but it is somewhat similar in nature. Just sayin and thank you!

 

It seem strange that AX64 is having problems with Shadowprotect and not with Macrium Reflect. Both (SP and Macrium Reflect) use the Microsoft service VSS (Volume Shadow copy Service), which purpose is to enable disk images to be created and files to be backed up when in use.
Then why has only Shadowprotect a conflict with the AX64 driver and not Macrium Reflect? Is this a bug in AX64?

 

I would think that if SP is the only one with a conflict the problem would be at that end. I run AX64 along side of Macrium Reflect Standard running as a fail safe imager with no conflicts.

 

I believe that SP uses a special driver (like AX64 TM) to track the changes to a volume dynamically... Macrium does not do this, I believe. Sounds like a driver conflict.

And I guess my bigger question would be... why does anyone want to run both? They are very similar apps... if you are testing, they SHOULD NOT be both active and installed at the same time. I have never had multiple imaging apps (of the same family) installed at the same time... how can you ever properly evaluate them with this type of side by side installation, danger lurks.

 

I agree completely. I've been scratching my head wondering why people do this.

 

The only one I can think of now is related to a FAQ already posted. My question is can you turn off AX64, the PC, or disconnect the backup drive during a merge? The question posted was can you do these during a backup.

Just thought of a 2nd one,,,,,

What happens when the PC crashes or a forced power off is done? (ans: backup takes longer but results in a normal sized snap)

 

Thank you Baldrick and Rollback Frog, for your respective replies to my queries...

 

I think SP modifies VSS to use its own VSS. Because when I uninstalled SP from a Vista PC, the regular VSS wouldn't work any longer and I had to reinstall it. So no surprise it causes some conflict.

 

Hi Cruise,

Please let me post the complete list along with the program release. The main change is GPT/EFI support. The rest are bug fixes and minor feature additions.

Isso

 

stapp,

Thank you for your suggestion. I'll add it to the FAQ. Basically you can leave System Restore on if you want, though it may increase the size of the AX64 backups a little.

Isso

 

Hi Robert,

Thank you! Your assumptions and TheRollbackFrog's reply are absolutely correct (thanks Froggie!).

Isso

 

Sorry, my bad. Will fix this. ralws277, thank you for pointing it, Baldrick - thank you for the explanation.

Isso

 

Hi Wendi,

Sorry it won't be fixed in upcoming release, because it requires quite a bit of work. You might want to run checkdisk from Recovery Media to overcome this problem. Just click on "Command line" button and run chkdsk from there. Sorry about this.

Isso

 

Hi ratchet,

Thank you. Could you please let me know what part of AX64 GUI you find confusing? We'll work on improving it.

For boot (recovery) media - no, sorry, you'll be able to run AX64 only from it's media. However there is a way to create a multi-boot USB stick with YUMI www.pendrivelinux.com/yumi-multiboot-usb-creator


Isso

 

ijskonijn,

As Froggie perfectly explained it's a driver conflict. The reason is SP driver that doesn't allow AX64 to communicate with its own driver. Basically it's a bug in SP driver.

Isso

 

bgoodman,

Thank you for your suggestion, I've updated the FAQ accordingly.

Isso

 

Folks,

FYI - on June 28th we will be holding a 50% sale of AX64 Personal license on BitsDuJour

http://www.bitsdujour.com/software/ax64-time-machine

Isso

 

Thanks Isso. Just have to patiently wait until Friday