Drive Snap: Drive Snapshot Frontend

Drive Snap 0.97 beta. A Graphical User Interface for Drive Snapshot and MBRWizard. Help file now added.

Note: MBRWiz detects primary partitions but doesn't doesn't display the drive letters in logical drives in extended partitions which isn't necessary backing up and restoring system or primary partitions.

http://artco.adsl24.co.uk/markymoo/Drive Snap.7z

 

this is really fantastic work you have done..Keep up the good work and I hope you advance more into publishing your own inventions

 

Is this program for use with Drive SnapShot? http://www.drivesnapshot.de/en/

 

Yes, it's a compact GUI to easily select and automate 99% of the command line options of Drive Snapshot and MBRWizard, that are not selectable from there own program interface, and some other improvement's of it's own. No install needed. It has features of MBRWhisky and a few more. Every option available is working. Drive Snap doesn't connect to the net. It can be run from Windows and also from a recovery cd such as BartPe. The requirement is Drive Snapshot has to be in the same folder as Drive Snap. MBRWizard is already included. You can use it to take regular or scheduled backups and repair your drives.

 

Well, blow me down markymoo

Just when i thought you might not ever get around to finishing it you finally open the spicket

Complete with a scheduler and other useful features. Hey, NICE INTERFACE!!

Thanks a whole whole bunch my friend, this is gonna be a MUST*HAVE, especially for some of us DOS illiterates like me

EASTER

 

The interface has some problems.

 

Hi markymoo, looks very interesting! Hav´nt tried it yet but I will...I gather that you can use this together with FDISR and if you have a lot of snapshots you could exclude $ISR \1 etc to reduce the size of the image and only image the snapshot you are in...With a restore in BartPe you will then be back to the imaged working snapshot and in win you´re then able to restore back from archives as usual...Right ?
(no probs in GUI here)

 

Yes, first thanks for letting me know. It works in different resolutions correctly. The reason could be you have large fonts selected? What display configuration do you have? I tested it in 5 different resolutions and it displays fine.

 

markymoo,

As I've mentioned before, very slick. It makes DS even easier to use and the command line readout is a winner. The Scheduler tab is an excellent addition.

 

Kaupp,

Do you use a laptop with a display setting of 120 dpi?

 

Hello EASTER. Oh i just had too many ideas so i had to narrow it down or i never get to some sort of completion.

Talking of DOS. I plan on putting in a DOS auto restore image feature. You pick the image(s) you want to restore and then it burns a bootable cd with the location knowledge of where your image location on your drive and then auto restores your system. You use cd rewritables so you not using up lots of cds for when you want to decide on restoring another image name. No files on the cd except in the boot part so no need to load necessary CD-ROM drivers so loading faster. What you think?

Thanks for the kind words. I hope you think the same after using it .

Hello osipi. It should help making backups less painful. It should run fast on your system. The exclude folders and files should cut down the image size somewhat. I never thought of using it for excluding FDISR as i don't use FDISR but that is very interesting to point out. I have used FDISR in the past for a short duration, are the $ISR folders not hidden if i remember rightly? If you have FDISR maybe you can test and enable hidden system files and excluding that folder in Drive Snap. It could be a permission thing if it doesn't work. Yes that is correct about Restoring from BartPE. I will make a BartPE plugin for Drive Snap shortly.

 

I think that is fantastic. I have a CD that knows where a certain image is located. I just have to change a filename (in Windows) from 080503.sna (or whatever) to brian.sna, boot to the CD and the image is restored automatically. Similar to what you are planning but you will have gone one step further.

This is my simple batch file

G:
CD \
snapshot restore HD1 auto brian.sna -Y

 

Don't you worry about that, we're on a roll now.

Yeah that scheduler is da' bomb.

I'll be setting up to run actual images/restores real soon. If anything crops up you should know about we'll pass it along for you.

Very nice job!!

EASTER

 

Hello Brian, thanks alot for you help testing out the earlier version and your valid input. I added a few more options since you saw it last. Right clicking on a image in the Restore window gives several options and Right clicking on the drives in the Volume window gives a lot of MBR and Volume options plus more bug fixes.

The Scheduler uses the Windows Task Scheduler and easy to setup as you never have to leave Drive Snap so no excuse for not taking sheduled backups. The schedules are saved in snap.ini and loaded back in. Drive Snap gets around the Task Scheduler limitation of not being able to use blank passwords. If you add a Task in Drive Snap you can see the scheduled tasks in Windows Control Panel/Scheduled Tasks. A password box pops up adding a schedule. This is the reason having to type your user account password so the task runs. If you dont use a password for Windows then just press Enter or Ok when the password box appears. For the security concious Drive Snap does not connect to the internet.The Run command in the Scheduler is to test the schedules immediately to ensure they will run ok when the schedule date arrives or can be just used to make a backup immediately of a scheduled backup. If you type the wrong password, just delete the Task and Add it again otherwise the Schedule will be added but won't run.

Looking at the size of the fonts on the screenshots posted this is probably the reason as you suggested. It not just with Drive Snap i have seen programs and websites distorted and text not fitting in boxes on the edge but resizing the windows bigger makes no difference. I suggest changing to a smaller resolution then everything gets bigger proportionately.

 

I love and hate 120 dpi. Actually, I avoid it.

 

I forgot to mention if you making a scheduled backup using the Scheduler

If it isn't immediately obvious...Choose all the needed selections in the Backup and Options windows prior to selecting Add in the Scheduler.

Maximum of 6 schedules allowed. Should be enough for everybody.

Running in a resolution of 800x600 on a 19inch monitor the fonts look huge about the size of 120DPI. This is one solution to see the interface correctly.

 

WOW
Nice
thanks for this effort
Has Tom Ehlert seen this ( is he still owner dev of DS.de ?)

Time to "go back" and check DS again.

 

If you downloaded Drive Snap between the hours of 6am and 4pm GMT 5th May during the first 10 hours of release or so then the Task Scheduler won't work correctly. I fixed a bug. Download it again and delete the old version. If you unsure just download it again.

Who knows, never informed Tom Ehlert.

 

I have a notebook with a 15.4-inch screen and a 1920x1200 resolution. It's quite understandable therefore why I have to increase the DPI from default to have a decent default text size.

I am not sure if it works for other Windows systems, but here is an how-to how to make your application DPI-aware for Vista:

http://www.rw-designer.com/DPI-aware

 

Doh, I completely forgot about that. Thanks!

 

Yes, they are hidden...How do you enable $ISR in exclusions ? Can´t see it, in XYplorer I do . Have "show hidden files and folders" enabled...

 

Thanks for that doctorow interesting link. It will be quite a job to resize my controls. I won't be able to do it overnight. I see now certain websites are 120DPI aware. Trying it out in 120DPI it was quite annoying as alot applications i use and tested didn't fit they scrolled off the right side and OK and Cancel buttons at bottom of windows didn't appear., resizing the window they still didn't show. MS Vista and 2008 Server has more support it seems.

 

osipi , I found a trial of FDISR 3.05 Trial on my Pc. It works for FDISR. It's as i remember. If you goto Folder Options/View in Explorer and untick 'Hide protected operating system files' and OK. $ISR will appear. You can then exclude $ISR in Drive Snap. I didn't have a big $ISR folder right now, but just to show it works . If you had a couple of GB in there it would really bring down the image size. As far as i am aware FDISR is not being continued so i think alot less using now. Thanks for that quite eye opening.

 

Mark, I'm getting a corruption message when trying to unrar your latest file.

 

@BrianK

I uploaded it again but working ok here anyway. I included authenticity record and recovery and test and then unpacked it, working fine. I downloaded, unpacked it from the server also. I would shutdown your browser and run CCleaner and restart the Pc. If it still happening something amiss. I had that one time doing it often and it turned out to be bad memory. Maybe a bad connection to your land at the moment.