Introducing AX64 Time Machine - hybrid imaging/snapshot software

Thanks Froggie, that makes me feel much better actually, because it means that the problem is easier to reproduce. I'll send a new build to you and carfal for test soon. Thank you.

Isso

 

Mohamed, sorry missed your question. Please make sure that the laptop was on at any even hour, and automatic backup was selected. When you select it, it shows you the number of seconds left to the next backup. When it gets to 0 the backup will start.

If it still doesn't work, please send to me the logs by clicking on top left corner, selecting About.. then Collect Logs. Thank you!

Isso

 

Dear Isso,

With so many posts, one is bound to miss one or two. No worries!

Please reread my post #838 on page 35. It appears that the clock doesn't start winding down unless AXTM is manually started, then one can see the clock winding down. However, I was assuming that once I start the PC, the clock will automatically start winding down and on completion of 3600 seconds, it will take an snapshot without any input from the user.

Am I wrong in my assumption?

Does one has to manually start AXTM on each reboot?

Best regards,

Mohamed

 

Dear Mohamed,

I just re-read your post. Do I understand it right that you enable "Automatic hourly backups", but don't see the counter appearing next to it? unless you close and reopen the program?

The program should start automatically with system on reboot, if "Automatic hourly backups" option is selected. Do I understand it right that it doesn't for you?

Thank you

Isso

 

Also, why would it take another immediate snapshot right after the one hour snapshot without any input from the user?

See steps 4 and 9 of post #838 on page 35. These immediate snapshot were taken without any user inputs.

Best regards,

Mohamed

 

Hi Isso,

I installed the program on 22-03-2013. I set to "Automatic hourly backups" and I took the initial backup. The program took another immediate backup without my input.

Yesterday, when I checked the AXTM image sub-directory, I was surprised to see no further images were taken, even I left the computer on for more than one hour during 22-03-2013 and yesterday.

Then I manually started the AXTM and as soon as I started AXTM, it started to take an image. While it was taking an image, I installed Firefox 2.00 and then the program immediately took another image without my input.

Here are the steps once again:

1. I installed the AXTM v1.0.0.886 beta on 22-03-2013.
2. Set it to, "Automatic hourly backup".
3. On 22-03-2013 I took an image of 19.6GB (initial image). Start time 03:44PM and finish time 04:04PM. A total of 18 minutes.
4. The program immediately took another image of 37.1MB. Start time 04:15PM and finish time 04:16PM.
5. Almost, on a daily basis since then on, I have been leaving the computer on for more than one hour daily.
6. Today, I checked the image directory. No images were taken at all since the images on installation.
7. So I manually started AXTM. As soon as I started the AXTM, it immediately took an image of 1.54GB. Start time 07.41AM and finish time 08.01AM. A total of 20 minutes. Too much time.
8. While the above was taking place, I installed Firefox 2.00.
9. The program then immediately took another image of 40.3MB. Start time 08.01AM and finish time 08.02AM.

Best regards,

Mohamed

 

Has anyone noticed the 1%-50% or so ofan incremental backup taking much longer than the 51%-100% and in fact the 76%-100% being quicker than the 51%-75% stage?

I may be imagining things but that is what i believe I have been seeing ever since I first started seeing this issue. And whilst it seems that I am not the only one experiencing (what I thought was just due to my system) issues no one has mentioned seeing the above.

Just wondering if, others are seeing it, whether it is important or a possible pointer to an issue?

Back to the benchmarking...

 

Dear Isso,

Started the computer, waited it was fully started but AXTM didn't start automatically. So, I manually started AXTM. As soon I started AXTM, the clock showed 1192 second but the AXTM automatically right then started to take snapshot. It started at 10:39 PM and stopped at 10:42 PM with 425MB. It again took an automatic snapshot at 11:00 PM and stopped at 11:01 PM with 28.7MB. Weird!

Emailed the log as Aladdin AXLogs.

Best regards,

Mohamed

 

Balders, this is a guess on my part but I think I'm close based on simnilar observations.

That 1-100% is representing a FULL disk scan during the incremental... it will be extremely fast as it checks over the portion of the disk that hasn't changed but will slow to copy disk blocks in areas that have changed. That's why the rate varies so much over the full incremental snapshot. it will be very fast out towards the end as that area of the disk because that area probably hasn't been used yet, or at the very least, not recently.

 

Hi Froggie

What you are saying makes a lot of sense to me.

Hi Isso

What are you seeing in terms of this profile on your test machines? Is it similar or different? If the latter then it may point to the issue in some way, perhaps. Either way it may be useful to benchmark times over each 'segment' and see if there is a definitive pattern or not based on system configuration/hardware.

Just a thought.

 

Got it, thank you Mohamed! Will return as soon as I have more information.

Isso

 

Hi Baldrick,

Yes, it's the same on my test machines, and that's ok. The reason is absolutely perfectly explained by Froggie above (I feel I can leave this forum already, Froggie will take care of this thread )

Isso

 

You betcha! And as soon as "we" release AX128 next week, the new incredible incremental snapshots will actually occur in NEGATIVE TIME... they'll actually finish before they begin!

What a product... WHAT A PRODUCT!

 

Hi Isso,

Thank you.

If one has an imaging server (drive) for backups, can one backup with AXTM more than one computer on this drive?

AXTM creates a sub-directory in the root directory called, "AXTM" for backups, so how would that work for more than one computer?

Best regards,

Mohamed

 

Hi Mohamed,

Yes, current version has that limitation for simplicity. You have two options:

1. Save into the same folder. The program will handle it just fine and will display the drives in a collapsible lists (see my post and screenshot here).
2. You mentioned a server, then you can just map a network drive to any folder on your server and use that drive as the backup destination.

In one of the upcoming version we'll add an option to specify any path.

Isso

 

found myself a bit shocked this evening - kicked off a defrag and a snapshot started to occur as part of th hourly backup. I was surprised to see it work fine - just slowly


How do you ensure a stable snapshot in such mad situations?

 

starfish,

Defragmenting is absolutely not a problem, because the backup is taken from a VSS snapshot that is not affected by defrag operation. However defragmentation makes the subsequent backup size much bigger, because it shuffles lot of data around.

Isso

 

I was surprised and a bit impressed that it continued - acronis would have timed out and given a warning about it

 

Dearest Isso,

Thank you for your response. Will try it now.


Best regards,

 

I'm running the latest version and today was the first time I tried using the restore function. I booted to a USB that had the recovery files on it; which was made using the current version. When I tried to select several of my automatic back ups to restore, I wasn't allowed to. AX64 wouldn't enable the restore function on half my backups so I had to restore all the way back to 2 weeks ago.

 

1000db,

Thank you for the information. I was able to reproduce this problem on one of my test PCs several days ago. I'll let you know when we release a fixed version.
What I did is unplugged the external backup drive while merging was in progress. Do you save backups to external or network drives?

 

No, the laptop I have AX64 on has an SSD for the main OS drive and a second internal normal hard drive that my data/backups are on.

 

Hmm, that's strange. I'll add some more logging to the browser to see what the problem is. Meanwhile may I ask you to drop me an email to info@ax64.com so I have a track of this problem? Otherwise I might just forget about our conversation (there are too many posts here). Thank you.

Isso

 

Folks, I've uploaded new version 930 to www.ax64.com, below is the change list.
Please update, because a couple of major bugs have been fixed.
(BTW when updating, don't uninstall the existing version, but install over it - to continue the existing backup chain)


- Added automatic backup folder detection to Backup Browser running in WinPE
- Added saving the last view state of the Backup Browser file list
- Added display of additional information for backup (for example if it takes longer than usual because of improper shutdown, etc)
- Added elapsed backup time display
- Removed UAC dialogs when Restoring, Deleting and Mounting backups
- Cleaning all registry items on uninstall
- Automatic deletion of terminated backup leftovers (.axtemp files) from the backup directory
- Added backup size display to the Browser
- Correctly cancelling the backup when the system is powered off during backup operation
- Somewhat improved the backup speed, especially for big drives
- Fixed intermittent very long backup times
- Fixed very hard to catch bug causing broken backups because of interference with defragmentation programs

 

Dear Isso,

Is it good to uninstall the older version first or just install it over the older version?

Best regards,

Mohamed