Help for a Newbie to Imaging

Hello Acronisites:

I know that I should understand what is going on, and that all should be clear when I have worked my way through the Help files. But I'm missing something somewhere...

What I would like to do, is pretty basic, but I need it to work.

I have just reinstalled WinXP Home, SP2, and loaded Acronis (Trial, for now -- and if it works, reliably, will turn into a purchase).

I would like to be able to use a disk image, so that when needed, I can use a bootable CD (or DVD) and on one shot, put the C:\ drive back into the situation that it is now.

Thus, I will have reinstalled Windows, with the current drivers, etc, the present desktop, the present registry, and all that, by going through Acronis, instead of reformatting, installing Sp1, Sp2 , updates, and all.

1. I have created the bootable disk on a CD-R. It does boot, just fine.

2. Now, I would like to clone my disk, or image the disk or mount my disk (I am not sure if these all mean the same, or have different meanings), to CD's or DVD, whichever will hold what I now have on the system.

But, silly old me, I am not sure of the choices that I should follow. This is what I select:

* Backup entire disk or partition
* Disk C: (there is a D:\ but I want to leave that completely alone)

Now I am asked for a file name. This is a surprise, as I figure that if I burn this to a DVD, that is all that will be there, NO?

So I go to the Help file. I follow it step by step, as above. I get to the choice: Selecting Files. Here I get the following message:

I would like to "backup a disk or partition", so I guess that I need to "use image backup."

But where is that in my step-by-step?

Clarification will be greatly appreciated!

Thank you.

Pdr

 

"But where is that in my step-by-step?"
Should be the second window in the wizard - "Select Backup Type".

 

Hello pdr,

I would like to stress that TI Help is not enough for a beginner to rely on. You really should download the User's Guide from the Acronis site and go through it. Penalties may come quite high if you err within imaging software.

 

Thanks for the quick responses.

I will take a look at that Guide. If then I still need help, I'll be back here again.

pdr

 

You are most welcome, anytime.

This Forum is on 24/24

 

Now that is a fact I can attest to!

 

Hello pdr,

Thank you for choosing Acronis Disk Backup Software.

We are sorry for the delayed response.

Please note that for this purpose we recommend that you use Backup Wizard of Acronis True Image 9.0 Home and create the image archive of the system partition ("The entire disk content or individual partition" option in the "Backup"). We also recommend that you take a look at Acronis Public Knowledge Base and this article providing the illustrated instructions on Acronis True Image 9.0 Home installation and usage.

Please also take a look at this FAQ article explaining the difference between Clone Disk and Backup approaches in details.

Thank you.
--
Aleksandr Isakov