Yep. I hadn't updated my archive after changing from V5.3 to V6. So I booted to my secondary and restored the archive. Booted back to Primary and it was back on 5.3 Then did a restore, but by mistake restored one of my 5.3 chains. Worked fine, but... So I restored my V6 chain and was back where I wanted to be. So works like a champ.
Very good, thanks for testing and reporting. I am thinking of possibly using MV6 in its default daily snap mode and using RIR for general quick restores since MV6 does not have auto hourly snap capability (I may settle for doing my own custom schedule in MV6 for the hourly snaps, will see how things go down the road). Thanks again its good to know.
Peter if you run "chkdsk /f /v" you'll be able to see what file is corrected. In the virtual machine that I tested it I did not see any errors... Have you tested how RDR behaves after a defrag? e.g take a snapshot, uninstall a big app, defrag/consolidate and then restore with RDR? Panagiotis
Since I put in the new build I haven't seen any errors since then. I will test the defrag, as the disk needs it anyway. Pete
Sorry, Pete... I still can't get my head wrapped around your experience. If you're running the v6 TRIAL (I assume you are), you cannot have a v6 LOCAL RECOVERY MEDIA... it won't let you create one unless it's licensed. If you try and create an external RECOVERY MEDIA (UFD/CD/DVD) with v6, (at least on my system) it only creates a v5.3 RECOVERY MEDIA (maybe due to old leftovers on my system after unINSTALL of v5.3?). So I really don't understand how you're able to use LOCAL RECOVERY v6 MEDIA (and RDR) to do your SYSTEM volume restore above. And from what I've seen, any v5.3 restoration attempts do not see (as valid) v6 images. At the moment I'm pretty confused. Anyone doing testing, pls chime in for help, would be greatly appreciated.
What is RDR, I thought it was RIR (raxco instant recovery)? Or are you now talking about something else?
Macrium calls it RAPID DATA RESTORE... nothing to do with Raxco. It's the new DIFFERENCE restoration method (DELTA Restore) that's new in v6... the same method as AXTM but not the same implementation (no TRACKING file).
HI Froggie I am not using Local Recovery Media, you are correct the trial won't allow that. What I am using is Recovery Media on a USB drive and it is indeed V6 Build 640 with the RDR restore now default. Pete
HI Panagiotis To do this test, I didn't uninstall any big packages as it has license implications. What I did instead was Remove the IR secondar snapshot. That was 32gb So what I did, was 1 Take a snapshot 2. Remove the IR seconday snapshot 3. Defrag Then I did the RDR restore. It took longer then normal, although not as long as a full restore. Restore was perfect, booted into the secondary IR snapshot just fine, and then back just fine. No disk errors. Also I had turned on Incremental Retention and set it to three, so what I had was base image 00 and incrementals 03,04,05. Pete
I used the word "reformat". Once Macrium has formatted the USB drive once, it won't do it again so you can re-use that drive for anything. Don't need to clean it up when Macrium needs to update it. In fact, I use the same thumbdrive for my 4 computers. I let Macrium on each computer update the same PE on that thumbdrive. The PE accumulates the drivers for all the computers. Nothing gets deleted.
That article was for my situation, a thumb drive which never had an mbr. From now one it's good to go. One other additional question. I have a new 512gb usb 3.0 external SSD drive, I use with a new laptop. If I make it so I can use the RE, can I have an image on it, boot to it, and then restore the image from the same drive? Pete
Pete, if you make the new drive BOOTable and put the Macrium PE on it, you can also save your images there without problem. The PE itself is BOOTed to from that drive, but creates a RAM disk when installed and the RAM disk becomes the disk that things are running from (the SYSTEM per say). I don't think there's a problem... as long as the disk is prepared properly (MBRed, partitioned <made ACTIVE> then the Macrium PE made there). PS- thanks for the additional info on your use of v6. My problem was that I failed to remove the old v5.3 PE files when I unINSTALLed v5.3. With that cleaned up, the v6 TRIAL makes v6 UFD and CD/DVD PEs just fine. Thanks again! Edit: correction above in the creation of the BOOTable USB HDD. It looks as though preparing the drive will require special handling... hold off 'til I run my test.
Of course, there are anomalies... If you use your SSD/HDD, it will have to be one of the following ways. Because Macrium requires a FAT32 formatted partition to build its PE in... 1. If you build a single partition SSD/HDD, it will have to be FAT32 and any image storage will be in smaller FAT32 pieces per image (I think it has a 4gB file limitation). if you do this, make the single partition the ACTIVE partition. 2. You can build a 2-partition SSD/HDD with (1) 500mB (need enough for largest PE build) FAT32 partition and (1) 499.5gB NTFS partition which would allow single image files to be saved. If you do this, make the FAT32 partition ACTIVE and save all your images. somewhere on the NTFS partition. If you try and do this with a UFD instead of a USB-based SSD/HDD, Windows may bitch if you try and create 2-partitons on the UFD. I believe if Windows thinks the UFD is REMOVABLE, it will limit you to only (1) partition (this I have tested). If Windows thinks the UFD is FIXED (a lot of the newer ones are but it's still a mixed bag), it will probably allow you the same flexibility as a USB-based SSD/HDD. PS- also, you'll never be able to get your SSD max speeds across that USB3... maybe a li'l faster than a good HDD if you're lucky.
Thanks Froggie Strange, but when I built the Thumb drive, the whole drive was NTFS. That's what Macrium said to do in there knowledge base article, and it works. And yes that SSD usb drive is FAST.
Well I put it to the test. For some reason, I can't explain, I installed AX64 Build 1.4.48 and was playing with hot restores. Sure enough I got a failure, and couldn't boot into either IR snapshot. Booted the MR RE, leaving RDR default on. In 6 minutes restore time, I was back to all is well status. Dang this is exceptional.
That is really strange. When I used their "Other tasks/Create bootable Rescue media" function, it would not allow selection of anything other than FAT32 formatted USB accessible partitions. Now that I think of it, though... that may have only been for REMOVABLE devices (the UFD I was playing with), not for FIXED USB-connected devices. I'll recheck this... sorry if I led you wrong.
That is very interesting, so if AX64 hot restore fails you can go to MV6 and do a delta restore. Then, if you need to recover any individual files from a later AX64 snap you can do this no problem. Might be a better combination for me than RIR since the snaps are (with AX64) stored on an external drive rather than on the c drive as with RIR. So use MV6 with a 1x daily snap and AX64 (since I have it may as well use it) for hourly snaps. Very interesting indeed.
I apologize for a deviation from the current discussion, but I have a relatively quick question. I just purchased a new Win 8.1 PC with a 128 GB SSD and a 1 TB HD. Where do you recommend I install Macrium; on the SSD (C drive) or the secondary HD? I doubt that I will image the secondary drive as it will primarily contain my data and games. (I will separately backup the data/picture files.)
Hi Alex! it will work from both places very well. I would put it where the rest of your applications are installed.
