Seeking Windows Drive Imaging Software Advice

[SubZero]

I have in the past always used Norton Ghost 2003 for DOS and it has worked without fail for all of the time I have used it. It has been one of the most reliable programs I have ever purchased and is still very fast and works great on booting disk outside of Windows environment.

But with transitioning to Windows 7 on many machines and introduction of many new devices, SSD and USB based thumb drive, etc. I am force too seek more up-to-date solution.

I would ask for helpful advice on which programs might be best for me to use.

I have used Acronis True Image in the past, and it work ok but not as efficient as Norton Ghost 2003 for DOS, but the program gets larger and larger over years and they push the Plus Pack pretty hard, so in order to get full function you mostly need purchase both the main program and the plus pack.

So Acronis cost more and is getting jammed with many features I do not wish to have to use or even pay for. In addition I have reliability problem with my versions (not upgrade to 2012 yet) and Windows 7 Professional 64 bit and Home Premium 64 bit.

My choice is to upgrade to 2012 and pay extra for plus pack for each machine or seek alternatives.

I have been testing O&O Drive Image Professional 5.6.18 (received free from person I know who got full versions in a giveaway) and have made a boot CD and run it through scenarios only to have mixed results.

Typical tests involve archiving image of boot HD then removing boot HD and replacing with other boot HD of different size that has plenty of space available to be restored to, some machine IDE, some SATA.

Also after creating image, sometimes boot HD has change of partitions, sometimes making boot partition some smaller but still big enough and splitting reclaimed space to second or even third partition into that drive.

I take 500 GB IDE drive with 1 large NTFS partition, change to 300 GB with second partition at 200 GB, or second and third at 100 GB each, for example.

Or I take out IDE with intent to restore to 1 TB SATA drive to boot.

With Norton Ghost 2003 for DOS, that actually still does work, if I boot to floppy or CD and point imaging files to a FAT32 partition with enough space on it for the multiple 2 GB split image files. If I wish to use USB thumb drive or external USB or eSATA drive, Ghost 2003 for DOS does not properly see them so cannot be used.

Acronis does not work properly under Windows 7 level OS but works ok but less flexibly on Windows XP systems. Though it is not as forgiving on drive and partition changes, it work on most scenarios that are the more typical one. Like taking IDE or SATA drive out and replacing with one of same size or larger and only same number of partitions.

I would prefer a straight-forward product that allows me to create boot disk (almost always CD/DVD for now) and execute a complete image from outside of Windows to ensure all files are closed and able to be fully captured in their frozen state and then restored later from same boot media.

I would like program that can save imaging files to external USB device such as thumb drive or USB 2/3 drive for later accessing.

In testing, O&O Drive Image 5.6.18 Professional has a good interface and makes process fairly simple. It will ask you questions when it encounters anomalies like to say "Imaged drive was bootable. Would you like to make target drive bootable as well?" and "Target drive is smaller but does have sufficient room. Would you like to perform a file restore instead of a sector restore?"

This is good to have and would seem on surface good solution. But in some situations, such as wiping disk from Linux install and seeking to make it Windows 7 bootable, strange result can occur. Recycle bin corrupt message, missing Quick Launch on taskbar, Computer Management shortcut on Start Menu not properly pointing to the program file, etc.

If I stick to basic (image to other drive, wipe out boot drive, restore image to same boot drive) it works fine. But complex scenario seem to confuse it.

If you might have some helpful information and comment and advice, I would welcome it.

Thank you for helping.

[DrageMester]

If you’re going to run your drive imaging software outside Windows (on bare metal), you might want to consider CloneZilla which is free.

I’m using it as an alternative/additional system image method in addition to Acronis TrueImage Home 2011.

CloneZilla can resize partitions according to the documentation, but personally I have only tried restoring to the original partition.

CloneZilla uses a text-menu based interface, but if you’re used to running the old Ghost software, this shouldn’t be a problem.

[SubZero]

I thank you for reply

Sadly I see this:

Limitations:

* The destination partition must be equal or larger than the source one. 

* Recovery Clonezilla live with multiple CDs or DVDs is not implemented yet. Now all the files have to be in one CD or DVD if you choose to create the recovery iso file. 

Is good free option but miss some important needs

Thank you for helping

[olyteddy]

Do you have a SeaGate or WD drive? They both offer a free version of Acronis as long as you have one of their drives connected. It doesn’t even have to be the drive(s) you are cloning. I’ve used the WD version on Win7 Ultimate and it worked.

[SubZero]

[QUOTE=olyteddy;2617535]Do you have a SeaGate or WD drive? They both offer a free version of Acronis as long as you have one of their drives connected. It doesn’t even have to be the drive(s) you are cloning. I’ve used the WD version on Win7 Ultimate and it worked.[/QUOTE]

Thank you for reply

I have internal seagate and external WD.

Would you explain the name of the programs to be downloaded?

Thank you for helping

[olyteddy]

for WD: http://support.wdc.com/product/downloaddetail.asp?swid=119
for Seagate: http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/support/downloads/discwizard

[cholla]

I’m using AcronisTI Home Version 11 (build 8.101 ). I have Vista 32 OS.
It has worked fine for me.
There is an additional partition on Windows 7 that seems to be the problem.
Member AllanDeGroot got Clonezilla to work for him . You might even PM him for help.
You might give this thread a read .

Cloning Software

[AllanDeGroot]

I’ve used Clonezilla more times than I can count, but I tend to always use it working directly from “local disc to local disc”.

Doing all of my Cloning to a drive of equal or larger size.

I work with a lot of windows 7 systems and depending on how a windows 7 installation was handled initially there MAY be an “unlettered” 100mb system reserved partition at the beginning of the volume.

So Far As I Know, Clonezilla is the only FREE cloning program that will correctly copy that 100mb partition and create a working Windows-7
installation.

You can get Clonezilla HERE:
http://clonezilla.org/downloads.php

Choose the top option and have a blank CD-R ready
(the downloader will automatically open your disc burning application)

I always run it in “Beginner mode” (Hey, it does what I need it to)
work directly from local disc to local disc, and when it asks if I want to copy the boot loader you say “Yes”

As for resizing partitions in place, most times the built-in windows Disc Management does the job,

IF you need to shrink an OS partition and there are unmoveable files
what I find works best is to turn off system restore, run Ccleaner, defrag
and optimize the drive (Auslogics defragger) reboot the computer, resize the partition and then turn system restore back on.

I used to get nervous doing this type of operation and lived in terror of the power going out (II live “out in the sticks”) but not anymore, I got a UPS in August.

AD

[ka6]

I have been using Image for Windows (http://www.terabyteunlimited.com) in both trial and purchased form for some time with excellent results. It’s a $39 program, but well worth it to me. Extremely small footprint (only a few MB) and reliable. I previously used the Acronis freeware enclosed with Seagate/WD drives, but on several occasions, it failed and was corrupted, even though I did a validation.

They also offer Dos-based imaging, plus a boot-manager prog that will image as well (BootIt Bare Metal).

Give them a try, restore and see if it fits your needs. As I say, works well for me with Win7.

[coolcolors]

I use and have Acronis True Image 2011 and it has worked fine for me to make backup images of my laptop HDD to USB HDD without any problem as well as my desktop to another drive without problems as well. I do know there is a limit to what processor the program will work on and it will tell you if you go to use it on a older CPU it will say it is incompatible with the CPU type. When I do image I check all the boxes of the drive and then do a full image backup. But I do run the program from a cd and that has worked fine for me instead of running from the software on hd. Running the program from the cd works better and less chance that a floppy disk will cause problem or fail at some point. I used ghost on floppy in the past and it eventually failed when running from a floppy…

Ghost 2003 DOS is what I used for some time but after failing floppy disk and it breaking up the image into multiple images file parts didn’t make sense to me when Acronis would make one large file image is alot safer and easier to locate and know where it is at and retrieve. That is the biggest advantage and plus it works on network as well. All I need is just the cd and boot from the cd and then create a image from the option it gives me.

[Mr_Belvedere]

Perhaps PING can be of use?

[chef]

yay, great tools!

[cholla]

@ coolcolors , If your interested you can set up an external harddrive that Acronis will boot from & has the images on it. You don’t even need to use the CD . This is how I have mine set up.
You do have to go into the BIOS when you need to restore to change the boot order to the external HDD first.
There is a link in the thread I posted here .The thread it links to has a link to a guide by 'Mudcrab" on how to do this.

[AllanDeGroot]

I used to use Norton Ghost for cloning XP, but the version I had wouldn’t copy Vista systems, let alone a windows 7 system…

Clonezilla does it all.

THE thing I love about clonezilla is that it recognizes external drives.
I’ve used on both USB attached drives as well as eSATA drives.

Did I fail to mention above that Clonezilla is FREE and boots from a CD-R?

AD

[coolcolors]

[QUOTE=cholla;2617685]@ coolcolors , If your interested you can set up an external harddrive that Acronis will boot from & has the images on it. You don’t even need to use the CD . This is how I have mine set up.
You do have to go into the BIOS when you need to restore to change the boot order to the external HDD first.
There is a link in the thread I posted here .The thread it links to has a link to a guide by 'Mudcrab" on how to do this.[/QUOTE]

Going and having to reset the bios just to do a image back to boot from main HDD defeats the purpose of making a backup image. I used the F10 or F12 to boot from the cd and create a image of my image to my ext hdd and so far it has worked just fine. I rather not have to mess with the Bios just to do a simple HD image and image recover when the cd drive itself will suffice to do the process and all I have to do is reboot and I am back in business. The steps your doing is far to extensive to create a image to recover if the hard goes out or gets replace…

[AllanDeGroot]

I leave computers set to boot from CD/DVD first in the boot order as a matter of policy, so there is no “setting back and forth”

THE advantage of making a fully functional clone on another drive Vs “an image” of your system installation is that there is no simple way to test an image to see if it actually will restore your system

To test a Clone you simply connected it to the computer (with the original drive disconnected) and the computer will either boot your computer it or not… Once you know it works you KNOW that as of that point you have an immediate use backup, one you can implement just as fast as you can move the cables and reboot.

The backup clone on my desktop is bolted inside the case, I only connect power and data to it when making a clone.

the other “sneaky” thing I do is once I’ve tested the clone and verified that it works, it will be my system drive for the next month… until I make a new clone.

45minutes spent once a month and I know that I cannot have a serious “Crash” that will take me more than 90 SECONDS to fix.

[SubZero]

Thank you for all replies

I have much software to download and look into and will return to post when I have made progress on that

Thank you sincerely for helping with good information

[SubZero]

By the way, is Paragon Partition Manager still near top of best partition program? Or is there other that is best?

Some programs overlaps in function for both image and for partition and it is not simple to analyze for me at times.

Thank you for helping

[cholla]

@ coolcolors , I think you misunderstood some of what I do.
To create a backup image file I do that with Windows running as normal to the external HDD . For that I don’t need to go into the BIOS.
The reason I even need to go into the BIOS is a security measure of my own . I don’t have USB HDD set in the boot order or devices . That way no one can use a USB device to boot my computer . To do that they would need the BIOS administrator password.
If I put the USB HDD in the boot order even as a third device then I only need to hit F12 when I’m booting my computer. Then I can just select the external HDD .
Thing is the extra time or effort to enter the BIOS is not a problem since I try to never restore my OS. I usually manage to mess something up every year or two where I need to do a restore. So it’s not a frequent job for me.
@ AllanDeGroot , I have a second internal HDD . I would leave it connected but I think I have plenty of room on it to do a clone . I may give that a try.

[AllanDeGroot]

When in the rare instance I cannot manage a partioning task with the native windows disc management (XP, Vista & Win7) then the one I use is called “parted magic”

Available HERE:

Parted Magic

NOT to be confused with any other similarly named program.

AD