help please - True Image - creating DVD image

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

Can someone please tell me how to make an image (for disaster recovery
purposes) on DVDs (not on CDs) using Acronis True Image 8?. I have
studied the user's guide and researched on the web, but I cannot figure
out how to do it. I have Windows XP Media Center and a brand new HP
Pavillion with a LightScribe DVD writer and Nero Ultra 6 (which does
have the ability to write UDF DVDs).
I need to install many things on my computer so I can get back to work,
but first I want to have a good image of Drive C before I do. (I
already installed the additional hardware and basic software that I
use).
Thanks in advance, Bob

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

Once you have the application open
click on create an image
click start now
follow the prompts
when the choice comes up as to where to create it to.......use the little
explorer window that shows up to point it to your DVD drive and at the
bottom type in a file name...........and away you go.
be prepared to have a few DVD's handy
peterk

--
Never trust a computer you can't throw out the window. - Steve Wozniak
<artist@talon.net> wrote in message
news:1126824155.149587.84250@g43g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
> Can someone please tell me how to make an image (for disaster recovery
> purposes) on DVDs (not on CDs) using Acronis True Image 8?. I have
> studied the user's guide and researched on the web, but I cannot figure
> out how to do it. I have Windows XP Media Center and a brand new HP
> Pavillion with a LightScribe DVD writer and Nero Ultra 6 (which does
> have the ability to write UDF DVDs).
> I need to install many things on my computer so I can get back to work,
> but first I want to have a good image of Drive C before I do. (I
> already installed the additional hardware and basic software that I
> use).
> Thanks in advance, Bob
>

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

artist@talon.net wrote:
> Can someone please tell me how to make an image (for disaster recovery
> purposes) on DVDs (not on CDs) using Acronis True Image 8?. I have
> studied the user's guide and researched on the web, but I cannot
> figure out how to do it. I have Windows XP Media Center and a brand
> new HP Pavillion with a LightScribe DVD writer and Nero Ultra 6
> (which does have the ability to write UDF DVDs).
> I need to install many things on my computer so I can get back to
> work, but first I want to have a good image of Drive C before I do. (I
> already installed the additional hardware and basic software that I
> use).
> Thanks in advance, Bob

So you don't have to use so many DVDs to hold your image you might consider
buying an external USB hard drive and imaging to it. My hard drive is 80GB
and I have a 200GB USB external drive that can hold several images of my
hard drive. It only cost $200 and that was a couple years ago so it should
be cheaper now.

--

Darrell R. Schmidt
B-58 Hustler History: http://members.cox.net/dschmidt1/
-

 

[Ed]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

On Fri, 16 Sep 2005 10:00:58 -0700, "Darrell S" <dumbwid@fox.com>
wrote:

>buying an external USB hard drive and imaging to it.

I had been thinking of doing just that but don't understand one thing.
If I am using a USB device for image backup and I have a system
failure where the OS will not boot, then how does one access the USB
device if, I am told, that USB devices can not be accessed until
windows has booted?

Regards,
Ed

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

Many Imaging program CDs are bootable and capable of accessing
a image set on USB media. Personally, I have dedicated partition on
one of my internal SATA drives that holds my most recent image. I
also burn it to DVD-R media to store off the PC. If & when I need
to roll back to a image, I boot my Tools CD-R and recover from that
disk partition - It usually takes only 4-5 minutes for recovery. From
my perspective, never rely on a magnetic media as your only recovery
point. Except as someone pointed out to me, streaming tape where
you have multiple full and incremental backups to choose from. But
after years of doing corporate backups on Unix servers, I can tell you
that tape has some problems of it's own.

"Ed" <fake@fake.com> wrote in message
newsjomi1p1c9b8e8apod8pas640gumejns28@4ax.com...
> On Fri, 16 Sep 2005 10:00:58 -0700, "Darrell S" <dumbwid@fox.com>
> wrote:
>
>>buying an external USB hard drive and imaging to it.
>
> I had been thinking of doing just that but don't understand one thing.
> If I am using a USB device for image backup and I have a system
> failure where the OS will not boot, then how does one access the USB
> device if, I am told, that USB devices can not be accessed until
> windows has booted?
>
> Regards,
> Ed

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

"Darrell S" <dumbwid@fox.com> wrote in message
news:6TCWe.730$GQ4.85@fed1read05...
> artist@talon.net wrote:
>> Can someone please tell me how to make an image (for disaster recovery
>> purposes) on DVDs (not on CDs) using Acronis True Image 8?. I have
>> studied the user's guide and researched on the web, but I cannot
>> figure out how to do it. I have Windows XP Media Center and a brand
>> new HP Pavillion with a LightScribe DVD writer and Nero Ultra 6
>> (which does have the ability to write UDF DVDs).
>> I need to install many things on my computer so I can get back to
>> work, but first I want to have a good image of Drive C before I do. (I
>> already installed the additional hardware and basic software that I
>> use).
>> Thanks in advance, Bob
>
> So you don't have to use so many DVDs to hold your image you might
> consider buying an external USB hard drive and imaging to it. My hard
> drive is 80GB and I have a 200GB USB external drive that can hold several
> images of my hard drive. It only cost $200 and that was a couple years
> ago so it should be cheaper now.
>

It is a good idea to have two different backup methods. USB drives are prone
to failure from heating problems. You should also have a backup onto optical
media. I use both. When needed hopefully one of them will be good. Test them
periodically to make sure.

Kerry

 

[Ed]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

On Fri, 16 Sep 2005 20:38:33 -0400, "R. McCarty"
<PcEngWork-NoSpam_@mindspring.com> wrote:

>Many Imaging program CDs are bootable and capable of accessing
>a image set on USB media.

I use Ghost 2003 which the recovery can be booted from DVD #1 of the
backup image or from an emergency 3 1/2 floppy which has the Ghost
program on it. I just did a test boot from the 3 1/2 floppy and
plugged a thumb drive into a USB port and nothing happened so.... I
assume I don't have USB support outside of Windows or Ghost made the
emergency boot floppy without some needed goodies in the autoexec.bat
and/or Config.sys files. I'll have to look deeper into the PDF manual
(I hate on screen manuals).

>never rely on a magnetic media as your only recovery point.

Actually, I don't have much faith in any media, even optical. I can
make good CD's and DVD's all day long but let me do an Image backup on
one and its a shot in the dark if it will pass the integrity test. Its
as if the computer knows this is an "IMPORTANT" Burn and finds all
sorts of ways to make a bad CD or DVD.

>I can tell you that tape has some problems of it's own.

I had a streaming tape backup back in the Windows 3.1/80286 days.
Again as with the optical drive, it knew the difference in an
"IMPORTANT" backup and just plain archiving and would always find a
way to have problems with the "IMPORTANT" backup.

But I have invented a weather creation device out of my systems. All
I have to do is start a 1 1/2 hour long Ghost backup session and half
way through it, there will be an electrical storm. Never fails.

I had thought of doing a Raid setup but have read too many posts
dealing with this problem or that problem associated with such a
setup. I had thought of doing backups over a network to another
machine but as with a Raid setup, have read too many posts covering
problems associated with Ghost and/or True Image network compatibility
problems. Anyway, If I can get Ghost to acknowledge a USB port
outside of windows, then I just might opt for a USB HD.

Regards,
Ed

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

On Fri, 16 Sep 2005 21:50:27 -0700, "Kerry Brown"
<kerry@kdbNOSPAMsys-tems.c*a*m> wrote:

snip
>>
>
>It is a good idea to have two different backup methods. USB drives are prone
>to failure from heating problems. You should also have a backup onto optical
>media. I use both. When needed hopefully one of them will be good. Test them
>periodically to make sure.
>
>Kerry
>

" USB drives are prone to failure from heating problems." That's new
to me, can you provide references please. I have been using USB
external drives for years without problems. I'm not suggesting you
are wrong but would certainly like to know whether I am at risk.

I am aware the heat dissipation from external drives are dependent
upon the enclosures. Assuming the enclosure is suitable why would
temperature problems be any greater than when housed in a computer
casing, say a laptop casing for example?

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

"Edward W. Thompson" <thomeduk1@btopenworld.com> wrote in message
news:sjeni1tg3s5a9qeh0t3i8j71iki73risqq@4ax.com...
> On Fri, 16 Sep 2005 21:50:27 -0700, "Kerry Brown"
> <kerry@kdbNOSPAMsys-tems.c*a*m> wrote:
>
> snip
>>>
>>
>>It is a good idea to have two different backup methods. USB drives are
>>prone
>>to failure from heating problems. You should also have a backup onto
>>optical
>>media. I use both. When needed hopefully one of them will be good. Test
>>them
>>periodically to make sure.
>>
>>Kerry
>>
>
> " USB drives are prone to failure from heating problems." That's new
> to me, can you provide references please. I have been using USB
> external drives for years without problems. I'm not suggesting you
> are wrong but would certainly like to know whether I am at risk.
>
> I am aware the heat dissipation from external drives are dependent
> upon the enclosures. Assuming the enclosure is suitable why would
> temperature problems be any greater than when housed in a computer
> casing, say a laptop casing for example?

Given a suitable enclosure failure from heat related problems would be no
more likely than an internally mounted drive. Most external drive enclosures
I have seen do not dissipate the heat very well so as a rule of thumb hard
drives in external enclosures will have more heat related problems. External
drives do have the advantage in the fact that they can be turned off when
not needed. If only used for backups they should last a very long time.

My post was more about the fact that you should have a backup strategy that
includes more than one method. All storage media can fail over time.
Murphy's law applies double to backups.

Kerry

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

Kerry Brown wrote:
> "Darrell S" <dumbwid@fox.com> wrote in message
> news:6TCWe.730$GQ4.85@fed1read05...
>> artist@talon.net wrote:
>>> Can someone please tell me how to make an image (for disaster
>>> recovery purposes) on DVDs (not on CDs) using Acronis True Image
>>> 8?. I have studied the user's guide and researched on the web, but
>>> I cannot figure out how to do it. I have Windows XP Media Center
>>> and a brand new HP Pavillion with a LightScribe DVD writer and Nero
>>> Ultra 6 (which does have the ability to write UDF DVDs).
>>> I need to install many things on my computer so I can get back to
>>> work, but first I want to have a good image of Drive C before I do.
>>> (I already installed the additional hardware and basic software
>>> that I use).
>>> Thanks in advance, Bob
>>
>> So you don't have to use so many DVDs to hold your image you might
>> consider buying an external USB hard drive and imaging to it. My
>> hard drive is 80GB and I have a 200GB USB external drive that can
>> hold several images of my hard drive. It only cost $200 and that
>> was a couple years ago so it should be cheaper now.
>>
>
> It is a good idea to have two different backup methods. USB drives
> are prone to failure from heating problems. You should also have a
> backup onto optical media. I use both. When needed hopefully one of
> them will be good. Test them periodically to make sure.
>
> Kerry

Hmmm. I've used both my external USB hard drives for years and have no
problems. To protect the data on my USB drives I have them (and other
external devices) powered by a separate surge protector power strip which I
normally keep powered OFF until I want to access them. When I then turn on
that power strip it only ALLOWS me to power on my USB hard drives or my
printer which have their own power switches. My scanner and my TV/video
controllers don't have a separate power switch so they power up when I turn
the strip power on.

--

Darrell R. Schmidt
B-58 Hustler History: http://members.cox.net/dschmidt1/
-

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

On Fri, 16 Sep 2005 20:29:37 -0400 in
microsoft.public.windowsxp.general, Ed favored us with...
> don't understand one thing.
> If I am using a USB device for image backup and I have a system
> failure where the OS will not boot, then how does one access the USB
> device if, I am told, that USB devices can not be accessed until
> windows has booted?

I was concerned about that too. I bought Acronis True Image and made
a recovery CD before buying my external hard drive.

For curiosity, I popped in my Acronis CD, connected my USB external
hard drive, and rebooted. Acronis recognized the external HD and was
able to access an image on it with no problem. Of course, I didn't
actually do a restore, but now I'm confident that I could.

YMMV, as always. But from the boot-up messages on my machine, it
looks like the BIOS recognizes USB external hard drives. In principle
I suppose that means I could boot from the external HD if I wanted
to.

--
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA
http://OakRoadSystems.com/
"To put it bluntly but fairly, anyone today who doubts that the
variety of life on this planet was produced by a process of
evolution is simply ignorant -- inexcusably ignorant, in a world
where three out of four people have learned to read and write."
--Daniel Dennett, /Darwin's Dangerous Idea/ (1995), page 46

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

On Fri, 16 Sep 2005 20:38:33 -0400 in
microsoft.public.windowsxp.general, R. McCarty favored us with...
> never rely on a magnetic media as your only recovery
> point. Except as someone pointed out to me, streaming tape where
> you have multiple full and incremental backups to choose from. But
> after years of doing corporate backups on Unix servers, I can tell you
> that tape has some problems of it's own.

I did tape backups religiously in the middle to late 1990s, but more
often than not I found the tapes were unreadable a few months later.

Currently I backup to my external HD almost every day and
periodically burn a CD or DVD just in case.

--
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA
http://OakRoadSystems.com/
"To put it bluntly but fairly, anyone today who doubts that the
variety of life on this planet was produced by a process of
evolution is simply ignorant -- inexcusably ignorant, in a world
where three out of four people have learned to read and write."
--Daniel Dennett, /Darwin's Dangerous Idea/ (1995), page 46

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

On Sat, 17 Sep 2005 07:13:53 -0700 in
microsoft.public.windowsxp.general, Kerry Brown favored us with...
> External
> drives do have the advantage in the fact that they can be turned off when
> not needed. If only used for backups they should last a very long time.

Make that "turned off AND UNPLUGGED".

That reduces vulnerability to electrical surges. Even if you've got
surge suppresion, a nearby lightning strike can set up induction
currents in a power cord, if I recall correctly.

--
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA
http://OakRoadSystems.com/
"To put it bluntly but fairly, anyone today who doubts that the
variety of life on this planet was produced by a process of
evolution is simply ignorant -- inexcusably ignorant, in a world
where three out of four people have learned to read and write."
--Daniel Dennett, /Darwin's Dangerous Idea/ (1995), page 46

 

[anna]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

> On Fri, 16 Sep 2005 20:29:37 -0400 in
> microsoft.public.windowsxp.general, Ed favored us with...
>> don't understand one thing.
>> If I am using a USB device for image backup and I have a system
>> failure where the OS will not boot, then how does one access the USB
>> device if, I am told, that USB devices can not be accessed until
>> windows has booted?


"Stan Brown" <the_stan_brown@fastmail.fm> wrote in message
news:MPG.1d961452a19682f09897c8@news.individual.net...
> I was concerned about that too. I bought Acronis True Image and made
> a recovery CD before buying my external hard drive.
> For curiosity, I popped in my Acronis CD, connected my USB external
> hard drive, and rebooted. Acronis recognized the external HD and was
> able to access an image on it with no problem. Of course, I didn't
> actually do a restore, but now I'm confident that I could.
>
> YMMV, as always. But from the boot-up messages on my machine, it
> looks like the BIOS recognizes USB external hard drives. In principle
> I suppose that means I could boot from the external HD if I wanted
> to.
>
> --
> Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA
> http://OakRoadSystems.com/


Ed & Stan:
To the best of our knowledge, a USB external hard drive containing the XP
OS, including a cloned copy created from the Acronis or Norton Ghost program
(or from any other disk imaging program that I'm aware of), is,
unfortunately *not* bootable. I know there are many motherboard's BIOS that
appear to support this capability and from time to time we hear or read
reports of a bootable USBEHD containing the XP OS, but I've never come
across a confirmed demonstration that it is. And God knows, we've tried!

The cloned copy of the XP OS residing on the USBEHD can, of course, be
cloned back to a (non-defective) internal HD for restoration purposes.
Another reason to use, or at least have available, a bootable Ghost floppy
disk (or CD) or Acronis True Image bootable CD.
Anna

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

On Sat, 17 Sep 2005 13:09:48 -0400 in
microsoft.public.windowsxp.general, Anna favored us with...
> To the best of our knowledge, a USB external hard drive containing the XP
> OS, including a cloned copy created from the Acronis or Norton Ghost program
> (or from any other disk imaging program that I'm aware of), is,
> unfortunately *not* bootable.

Good to know. Luckily I'm not relying on that capability, since I
made a bootable CD.

--
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA
http://OakRoadSystems.com/
"To put it bluntly but fairly, anyone today who doubts that the
variety of life on this planet was produced by a process of
evolution is simply ignorant -- inexcusably ignorant, in a world
where three out of four people have learned to read and write."
--Daniel Dennett, /Darwin's Dangerous Idea/ (1995), page 46