Acronis True Image-horrible!

[Mystic]

I recently tried to install Acronis True Image backup software on my computer. It was a nightmare! I removed it from my computer and I will just use the built in Windows 7 backup software. At least it works.

I had wanted the Acronis True Image software because it has incremental backup. But the serial number for the software was like some kind of code used by a country for national defense, and the installation was as slow as molasses. It actually caused problems with my computer. Some programs would not start up until I had used CCleaner to fix the registry. It almost seemed that I had installed malware.

Acronis better keep an eye on Microsoft. If Microsoft ever includes incremental backup in the Windows 7 backup software I would have to say that Acronis is done.

 

[ToyotaNSaturn]

As for the serial number. In the email they send you, select it, hit Control + C. Then go to the box to enter serial number, then hit Control + V. Done.

Use Comodo backup, it's free.

I've had very good luck with Acronis drive imaging product.

 

[Colt45ws]

Ive been using Macrium Reflect.

 

[beast3300]

The windows7 back up thing works well. My favorite is still Norton Ghost 2002. It made back ups on DVD or CD and it could integrate it's own boot up utility in CD1 of your back up.

 

[tmorris1]

Never had a problem with Acronis. Fast and works great. What version are you using?

 

[Drew99GT]

I use Apricorn EZ Gig II - same thing as True Image. I'd never compute without it. Has been 100% flawless.

 

[friendly_jacek]

I made Acronis 2009 to work on vista but it was tricky and the sotware was very buggy. I wrote a review here

I use the 2003 Ghost for all my XP systems and it works great. My review here

 

[Nick R]

I just use an external harddrive and a Windows 7 Installation CD for my backup....

 

[KrisZ]

I use Acronis, on Vista though, and it works great, I can restore my system in 20min.
One thing to note is that the incremental backup sounds great on paper, but in practice (in my case at least) you end up using more storage space as all the increments have to be saved in order for the backup to work. I just do full backups, I keep three on the external drive, original factory and two most recent, when I do another one I delete the older one of the two.

 

[MysticGold04]

What about CloneZilla, anyone try that one? I've used it one time, just before I upgraded my hard drive once, just to make sure I had a good copy...

 

[Rand]

What I hate about macrum is ...

you image a 1 terabyte hd, you have to restore it to a 1TB partition even if its only 5% full.

for example I imaged a 550gig partition. HDD went bad.
My replacement hard drive was a 320gig WD RE2

There was only 100gig of data but I couldnt restore it.

Acronis doesnt have this problem.

The best way to use acronis is to make the boot cd

and just use that to boot off of to backup.. works flawless.
(except older versions with raid arrays)

 

[freeze12]

How about using DiscWizard that is free on Seagates website

http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/support/downloads/

 

[Drew99GT]

Another great free tool for imaging is Driveimagexl

 

[Drew99GT]

http://www.runtime.org/driveimage-xml.htm

I believe this uses the same basic format that Acronis uses - there are a few Acronis knock offs. It creates .img files just like Acronis - in fact, you can use Acronis to restore or browse through image files created by driveimage.

Windows 7 premium has imaging built in - that is the way to go.

 

[Mystic]

I decided to just stick to the Windows 7 backup software. At least it works.

 

[OilNerd]

Originally Posted By: Mystic
I recently tried to install Acronis True Image backup software on my computer. It was a nightmare! I removed it from my computer and I will just use the built in Windows 7 backup software. At least it works...


What version of Acronis True Image did you use?

 

[CBR.worm]

I have had really good luck with Acronis, but each version is getting more bloated and difficult to work with. Previously I used Ghost religiously.

I also like R-Image for exact copies and Altiris for deployment.

 

[Rand]

I agree the windows part of acronis is getting worse

but the rescue boot cd works to backup also and works flawless.


Windows doesnt compress the image very much, It was over 2.5x the size of my acronis image when I used it.