Macrium Reflect

Thanks Froggie, that's very helpful. Does one also need to create a new bootable CD every time it's suggested that the PE be rebuilt?

 

Make a new one if you are having problems with it. You can have Macrium install a menu that will boot Reflect without having to make another boot DVD. You just select it from a menu while the computer boots. It will like you are using a boot DVD.

 

Creating a Windows 10 PE bootable CD still fails for me. Any tips on what I can try?

For those for who this works: is your ISO always exactly the same size, or does it differ a few kilobytes (like I experience)?

 

Stapp, if your system uses an integrated BiOS (UEFI and Legacy-MBR), that BOOTable CD/DVD device needs to be repositioned in the area of the BiOS that's being used for the OS. It's usually available under both sections of the BiOS BOOT path, possibly with different names, since it can be used as both an UEFI and LEGACY BOOT device.

If you're OS is BOOTing through the UEFI section, that's where the CD device needs to be positioned before BOOTMGR. A lot of people position it that way in the LEGACY section of the BOOT path which will not work properly unless all the previous BOOT devices are inactive... which will not be the case with your UEFI system.

If all this is confusing (hopefully not), just post your complete BiOS' BOOT list and we can make suggestions based on that.

 

It'sMee222, when they suggest creating new BOOT media it's usually due to new functionality being offered in the updated REFLECT version or some new and great driver support in a new WinPE base (like PE10). Examples being the recently release "Indexed Incremental" operation or possibly some new and better was of data compression or FileSystem scanning (as they did a while back). It's basically up to you... if you think the changes will help with perceived problems you may be having, go for it. They will state clearly if the PE change is absolutely REQUIRED or just RECOMMENDED.

I always change the PE-base accordingly when recommended then replace the LOCAL BOOT function with it... I don't always recreate the external Recovery Media unless I think I need the new functionality or Macrium says it's required.

 

The issue may be that the Recovery Media, PE10, is being created with only a Legacy-MBR BOOT path included in the media itself. If it was, even if you had it in the right order while using UEFI BOOT, it won't load and the BOOT path will move on to BOOTMGR, usually the next item in the UEFI path. Macrium's gonna have to figure this out (hope you reported it on their Forum or through their Support Portal).

The BOOT menu item is exactly the same as the external Recovery Media item... nothing unique as far as DELTA RESTORE is concerned. Assuming your external Recovery Media worked, even if you started an "automatic" restore under LIVE Macrium, if you interrupt the BOOT process (use the BOOT menu F-key rather than the BiOS BOOT path) and force the use of the external Recovery media, it'll still go through whatever directives have been set up during the LIVE recovery process and be just as "automatic" as the HDD-based BOOT process would have been.

 

I have tried WinPE10 with the recent versions of Macrium. I always create an ISO file and then build the UFDs for UEFI or BIOS with Rufus. This has worked well in all my tests. The WinPE10 media created in a BIOS Windows 7 system boot in both UEFI and BIOS systems.

I did find a problem when creating WinPE 3.1 x64 ISOs, the USB 3.0 drivers were not included. Maybe this has been corrected in the latest update.

 

I tried the win 10 pe again after the latest update, formatted & created a recovery USB & booted from it, still just ends up on a black screen after the windows boot screen & circular dots. Left if for 10 minutes but still nothing.

 

anyone know an easy way in macrium reflect to create an incremental file and folder backup that will run every hour? The most frequent I see is once a day, but that won't give you enough previous versions if you are editing documents all day long.

I assume that once I hit the save button in MS Word, that reflect can backup the file with current changes, even if file is open?

 

In Macrium the minimum interval is indeed 1 day but you can change it to 1 hour in Task Scheduler. Later, when you go back to Macrium you will see that for that (now 1-hour task) the interval is greyed out.

 

@cloggy, that sounds like a great trick. I will have to try that out!

 

Don't worry ...it works..

 

Cloggy49's method works just fine... and if you wanna keep to the "script" as they say, you can always generate a separate DAILY operation in your DEFINITION script for each hour you would like the operation performed. Sure, it takes a small bit of time to set up, but the result is fully supported within the REFLECT environment.

During the "unofishul" BETA period last January, your specific item was brought up and Macrium stated they would consider that scheduling option in a future release of the product. Of course we haven't seen it yet

As far as MS Word is concerned, it uses a dynamic backup file at all times and that will get saved regardless whether you're issuing a SAVE or not. There's also a DEFAULT setting in Word that allows for real background SAVEs to occur as you are editing... you'll find it under "Options/Save." You're basically "good to go" if you're using MicroSloth WORD.

 

Do you have the recovery USB plugged into a USB hub? I had the same issue when trying to use a USB hub but it works fine when plugging directly into my Computers USB ports directly.

 

It wasn't plugged into a hub as I don't have one. I tried it with the ports on the top of the case which are 2xUSB 3 & 2xUSB 2 & also tried it on the USB ports on the back of the case. Same thing happened each time. There has only been one build of the windows 10 pe that has ever worked for me.

 

it does.

every time the backup is about to run, a window pops up and asks if I want to postpone the backup.
Is there a way to disable that pop-up?

 

thanks for info. I have an add-on in Word called SaveReminder, it has an option to set an automatic full save every x number of minutes, so the changes get registered in the original Word file.

That way, if you store your currently active documents in your Dropbox folder, like I do, then your changes will get backed up to the cloud, too. (But dropbox free edition only saves for you a limited number of previous versions, so it's not good to set SaveReminder to save too often, because then you are going to really limit how far back your previous versions go, in dropbox.)

 

In v.5 there is an option Edit Defaults - Advanced - Advanced backup options: Display backup notification delay for x seconds. I guess that there must be something similar in v.6 to disable this also.

 

thanks.
they sure hid that option well!

 

Does anyone know how do I edit the "Folders to Search" list that pops up in the recovery version of Macrium Reflect?

I have a couple of folders in my list that I don't use for backups anymore and would like to tidy up the list by rremoving these.

I have tried "deleting" the entries I don't want but they come back when I reboot into the recovery version.
I have also tried "deleting" the entries in the main program and re-building the recovery USB key but that didn't work either.

 

As some of you know, I am using the FREE version of Reflect and it is doing all that I want it to. However, I have a few simple questions about the paid version as my wife wants Folder Backup.

1. I assume that she can create a backup of a folder like QUICKEN, and have the whole folder backed up, with password protection to a USB ThumbDrive. Also, can this be named...say QUICKEN Backups, so it can be run ON DEMAND, and not hourly, etc. Also I assume that several of these can be ON the USB Thumbdrive unless it fills up.

2. What I like about the FREE version is that I have a Bootable WINPE Rescue madia and little is installed on my system. Can the non-free version be installed/used the same way without playing with boot menus and/uefi stuff?

 

Not sure if you can select a specific folder to back up but every snap/image can be mounted as a drive and all folders and contents existent at the time of the snap will be available.

 

All of the above may be done easily, and for ease of use, a DeskTop Shortcut may be created that she can just <double-click> and it will do her thing.

Reflect has to be installed to have her avail herself of the Definitions that will be used for her backkup (SOURCE folder, DESTINATION folder, how many backups to be kept, etc.)... but all she has to do is create her CD/DVD/UFD external Recovery Media (like yours) and keep it handy in case she needs it (emergencies). No BOOT menu needs to be added unless she would like complete AUTOMATIC recovery of one of her backups. She can manually recover all she wants with the external Recovery Media.

...and if all she wants to get back is a file or two, her backup image may be mounted under the LIVE Windows system and she will have access to all the files in that backup.