Can Anyone Explain the "Screwy" Sizes of Incremental Image files?

I am a new user of True Image. I can not comprehend "what" Acronis is "doing" re Incremental files!!!

On a PC that uses 10 GB, the Complete tib file was 7 GB...perfectly normal and expected. Next I made the first Incremental file about 10 minutes later. I changed one txt file with 25 word change. The size of the Incremental *.2tib file was 193 MB! Then 10 minutes later I did another Incremental (*3.tib) with a minor change in ONE txt file and that Incremental file size was 508 MB!!!!!

I left the PC "on" and the next day with NO changes made by me, did a third Incremental file (*4.tib) which was 14.5 MB!!!

Then without making any changes, made a 4th Incremental the next day (*5.tib) and it was 560 MB!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Today without making any changes to the PC, I made a 5th Incremental image which was 107 MB!!!!

Can "anyone" explain "what" Acronis is "doing"?? I thought an Incremental file was to capture ALL changes since the most recent image file was made (I asked a separate question earlier, whether the Incremental file is "changes since the last Complete image" or is "changes since last Incremental image file was made"....and am waiting for the answer to that question. In any event, the Incremental file sizes should NOT be going UP and DOWN in size, should they, when NO changes have been made to the computer? The changes seem WAY TOO LARGE for just "changes since the last image file was made".

Confused and waiting for "answers"

Phil

 

Since this type of software is interested in sectors and not actual files I assume sectors are being changed.

 

Windows page file?

Tried doing incrementals on a non-system partition?

 

TI 8 doesn't image the page file so that's not it. Your ver 6 does.

Brian

 

Defrag program running in the background ?

 

From the manual

An incremental image created after a disk is defragmented might be considerably larger than usual. This is because the defragmentation program changes file locations on disk and incremental images reflect these changes.

 

Windows tries to rearange bootfiles etc. on its own, when the PC is idle. Maybe this has an effect on the image files?

 

Thanks for the responses. "No", I did NOT defragment the hard drive. Remember, the first Incremental I made immediately (less than 10 minutes)after the Complete was made and it was over 100 MB! Then I made another Incremental 10 minutes after the first was complete and it was over 500 MB!!! Yikes.

I use v8.

Have YOU observed the SIZE of your Incremental files? Do YOU see these large file sizes

To me, this is very strange, indeed.

Phil

 

I'm still new to TI but can you not Explore the new image to see what it contains?

 

Prior to creating an image TI creates a "thumbprint" of the in-use sectors and saves this, along with the data contained on these in-use sectors. The next time you create an incremental, TI will compare the current "thumbprint" with that saved in the previous incremental and save the data residing on those in-use sectors that have changed. Just opening and closing Windows apps (including TI itself) in between images is enough to register significant changes between thumbprints.

Regards

 

Menorcaman is correct. Just because YOU didn't do anything to cause changes, doesn't mean Windows hasn't done anything. If you CTRL-ALT-DEL and look at the running process list, you probably have anywhere from 25 to 50 different processes running in the background all doing Window's bidding. Everything from file indexing service to network services, virus monitors, firewall service, etc and the list goes on and on. Many of these services are not needed and can be disabled, but most people just go with the defaults and then install numerous other of their own third party items as well. These things are all sucking resources for a reason - to do stuff to your system. If you were to use a registry monitor such as can be found for free around the web, you can sit there and watch your computer doing many many things while you just sit there and stare at it.
I am not surprised at all by the incremental file sizes you are seeing. Let's face it, 100mb is nothing on todays multigigabyte drives. Windows swallows, chokes on, spits up and regurgitates a hundred megs with one hand tied behind it's back All while you're out walking the dog or getting a cup of coffee...

 

Hello Phil Pluta,

Thank you for choosing Acronis Disk Backup Software for Server.

Menorcaman is really correct. Incremental backup contains all data modified since the last preceding backup (full or incremental).

Thank you.
--
Irina Shirokova