Introducing AX64 Time Machine - hybrid imaging/snapshot software

Froggie, I've just reproduced this problem, will fix in upcoming version, thank you for pointing it out.

Isso

 

Panagiotis,

I totally agree, in fact the second should imply the first. I also tend to think that only the first (simple) option would be ok for now. Later we can add manual Lock/Unlock feature.

Thank you!
Isso

 

Isso... you need to take some time off to EAT

 

I decided to lose some weight

 

Kudos to you dear Carfal.

I have now fixed my five machines, due to many, many thanks to you and for this reason I couldn't reply earlier as I was busy playing or rather repairing these machines.

Windows OS plays havoc with {GUID}. Every time, anything happens to Windows OS, a new {GUID} is created and sometimes the new {GUID} is not created. So in the past based on suggestions on the members on this forum (especailly Brain), I have used the Reagentc.exe command. You have posted three Reagentc.exe commands rather than two commands, and the middle one did the trick on my four machines. The one which I have highlighted in red below.

Reagentc.exe /disable
Reagentc.exe /setosimage /path c:\recovery /target C:\Windows
Reagentc.exe /enable

I have used before the first and the last command together, but never together with the middle command. This did the trick for four of my computers.

The fifth computer didn't have the "C:\Recovery\{GUID}" folder. I copied it from a different computer. But the above three commands didn't worked. I further searched on the WWW and found the following two commands:

dir/s/ahs c:\recovery\winre.wim
reagentc /info

The above two command gave me the {GUID} information. Created a new folder under C:\Recovery\ with the new {GUID} and copied the two files (boot.sdi and Winre.wim) in this new {GUID}, and ran your three above command. SUCCESS.

Thanks again and best regards,

Mohamed

 

Dear Isso,

I feel your pain. HDS is a very unethical company. Not one year, but many, many years where they modified the "Recovery Environment" and never put it back for even those people who tried their software for just only 14 days. They had this problem since inception, from v6 or v7 and went up all the way until the recently released v10. Even when I tried their v10 on my messed up machines with their new demo key, it didn't fix my "Recovery Environment". Thus, they had this problem for many, many years.

Rollback Rx has other massive problems too, but they have a geek following. They make their money two ways and make bugos of money:

1. "Loss Leader", selling Rollback Rx very cheap, but selling the yearly "GOLD Support" with it, which the support sucks and everyone knows.

2. Drive Vaccine Rx, which is sold to large corporations, Universities, Colleges, Schools, and so forth. This is where their big, big money comes from. This is sold from their Israel office (Israel means, "Ever Lasting God" the name of Jacob).

You are right that there is NEVER a perfect program:

1. For this reason the new but cash strapped companies, go bust trying to achieve a PERFECT Program. In the end, they never this objective and go bust.

2. They try to have a GEEK following, like SD (Shadow Defender), and forget that the BIG, BIG Money is from large companies. The Geeks (individually) take up lots of resources and in the end, most of them want the program for FREE.

3. The FATIGUE Factor, which in your case is setting in now very quickly. You need to come out with a BETA and soon with the real McCoy, even it is not PERFECT. Only God (allah/elohim) is PERFECT. And, this BETA should work with machines who still have or had Acronis products on their systems.

4. While you are still waiting for PERFECT, new and new competitors are coming out and taking your market share. One such example is Tootwiz Time Machine (TTM), which is now in BETA phase.

Where is your NICHE in the market?

Best regards,

 

That is very excellent news Mohamed, congrads.

 

As I said above perfect is not attainable but 2 things are very important in spite of, or perhaps because of, this.

1: The developer MUST be comfortable with the release of any product he is producing. Putting it out there just to begin making money when he or she knows its not ready for release is def unethical.

2: Once the product is released great care, especially in the beginning days, must be made to inform users of problems as they are discovered, and where possible, information should be made available as to how best to deal with the problem while it is being fixed in the next version (HDs fails miserably in this as do others). If any temporary workaround or precautions need to be implemented all paying users should be provided with detailed instructions regarding the problem and how to carry out the fixes.

I understand your concern about speed and loss of market share but an excellent product with excellent support will do quite well over time. Especially if it has a loyal support base of knowledgeable individuals to spread the work through blogs and social media (as well as by other means).

Software, like restaurants, only need serve up one bad experience to lose a customer.

I would hope (which is what I expect) that Isso will release a product that works as expected with a minimum of problems. I personally would like to have it released yesterday as I want/need something to replace Rx, but if its not ready, and if it causes problems for me, I will not look kindly on it and I suspect others will feel the same.

 

And another thing...

Many of your potential users will be using USB-based storage devices for purposes of warehousing their snapshots (probably why your trying to possibly detect a device change when these devices are loaded for use)... AND many of these USB-based devices will be FAT32 formatted due to the fact that they may also be BOOT deices for various operational environments. We all know that these FAT32 devices have an inherent design limit of 4gB files, which means a no-no for use with the current ATXM implementation (probably can't handle the baseline snap for many systems).

You may want to consider an option for "file parting" as far as maximum fie size is concerned... that way, no problem with these devices. (Yea, I know... I just ran into this restriction myself )

 

Yes, the first should be ok.
When is the beta coming?

Panagiotis

 

Dear Mohamed,

I appreciate this information, and I fully agree with your thoughts. Especially that the big money comes from corporations, and home users are largely getting used to free programs.
In fact that was my original goal - to release the program free for home use, gain some visibility and then release the corporate version. But we missed the deadline by one year, and at this moment I simply can't afford releasing free version. Yes, I noticed Toolwiz Time machine, and I also read the article about its developers who develop completely free products, and work not for money, but for their pleasure. They have my respect! Toolwiz however is a different type of product, closer to RolllbackRX in its idea. AXTM in its core is a fast imaging program, rather than a snapshot program (although the operation looks similar). And I'm positioning it as a backup solution, which neither RBX nor Toolwiz can be.

Regarding the market - the current version is certainly aiming home users. I'm targeting non-experienced users, who can just enable automatic backups and forget about it. More advanced users I guess will prefer manual backups.

Later, if time permits, I'm planning to release a corporate version.

For Acronis compaitbility - we'll work on it after the beta is released. I hope it won't be a too complex problem to solve, so I can make the production release compatible with Acronis.

Thanks again for your support!

Isso

 

Barry, thank you, I definitely agree. The problem is that lot of the developers can endlessly perfect their babies, which is disastrous for the business. That's why in software companies the developers often hate marketing people, who set ridiculous deadlines and require odd features. Now I'm working on both sides, trying to balance

 

Froggie, thank you for the idea, I'll add it to the list. If it doesn't require too much work we'll implement it in one of the upcoming versions.

Isso

 

Panagiotis, we should be finished with the functionality in about 3-4 days. Testing will take another 2-3 days or so. If testing is ok, then beta will be released in about a week from now.

Isso

 

Thanks. And another quick question. Do you plan to use the windows market? From what I can see from apple appstore and google play, is atht those markets are great for making known apps worldwide. Sooner or later the same will happen with the MS market. (Maybe by offering a trial there and pointing to your website for a full version).

Panagiotis

 

Thank you for advice. Frankly I'm not considering MS market at the moment, for two reasons: first, it's targeted to so-called Metro (Win 8 tablet style) apps. Although you can include a normal desktop app there, but only a link to your website. And second, some of my colleagues who've used it didn't notice any significant effect. So I'll wait until it gets more traction.

Isso

 

Just another KUDO...

While jumping in and out of an SSD test environment (Rollback RX - to TRIM or not to TRIM), AXTM was used to backup and completely recover my AXTM ALPHA test system... painlessly, I might add.

Thanks again for the effort, Isso.

 

So what did trimming do to R RX?

 

Wrong thread... see here on the RBrx forum...

RollBack RX on SSD

 

Great to hear it, thank you Froggie. I have one question though - the AXTM version that you've used isn't restoring MBR. Did you restore it manually?

Isso

 

I could either unINSTALL Rollback RX which would return the original MBR, or, what I chose to do is restore it with the "BootIce" tool via the "Active@ Boot Disk" (on USB)... quick and easy.

 

Got it, thank you. With upcoming AXTM version you won't need additional steps to restore MBR. I've put a "Restore MBR" checkbox on the restore dialog.

Isso

 

<Jeeesh...> You really know how to HELP a guy

 

+1 for the file splitting. A custom size choice in MB would be nice too!

Glad to see the beta close to release Isso. Do you guys ever sleep BTW?

 

CM969... it's both sleeping AND eating. When Isso shows up at the marketing booth, he'll look like a 5th grade student!