User's Guide
Copyright © Acronis, Inc., 2000-2009. All rights reserved. “Acronis” and “Acronis Secure Zone” are registered trademarks of Acronis, Inc. "Acronis Compute with Confidence", “Acronis Startup Recovery Manager”, and the Acronis logo are trademarks of Acronis, Inc. Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds. Windows and MS-DOS are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. All other trademarks and copyrights referred to are the property of their respective owners.
Table of Contents 1. Introduction .............................................................................................................. 9 1.1. What is Acronis® True Image Home? .................................................................................. 9 1.2. Acronis True Image Home basic concepts ........................................................................ 10 1.3. New in Acronis True Image Home 2010...........................................................................
5. Getting to know Acronis True Image Home ............................................................. 32 5.1. Program workspace .......................................................................................................... 32 5.2. Acronis One-click Backup .................................................................................................. 33 5.3. Main screens ...................................................................................................................
9.3.9. 9.4. 9.4.1. 9.4.2. 9.4.3. 10. The backup process................................................................................................................................ 77 Fine-tuning your backups .................................................................................................. 77 Backup options ....................................................................................................................................... 77 Local storage settings..................
13.4. 13.4.1. 13.4.2. 13.4.3. 13.4.4. 14. Examples of backup scheduling scenarios ...................................................................... 117 Full backups with automatic deletion on quota violation .................................................................. 117 Full backups with automatic deletion when backup storage is filled................................................. 118 Full backups to Acronis Secure Zone with automatic deletion ..............................................
20. Transferring the system to a new disk ................................................................... 165 20.1. General information ........................................................................................................ 165 20.2. Security............................................................................................................................ 165 20.3. Executing transfers........................................................................................
24.3.1. 24.3.2. 25. 25.1. 26. Functioning principles of Information wiping methods ..................................................................... 196 Information wiping methods used by Acronis .................................................................................... 197 Startup Parameters ............................................................................................... 198 Description .........................................................................................
1. Introduction 1.1. What is Acronis® True Image Home? Acronis True Image Home is an integrated software suite that ensures security of all information on your PC. It can back up the operating system, applications, settings and all of your data, while also securely destroying any confidential data you no longer need.
1.2. Acronis True Image Home basic concepts This section provides general information about basic concepts which could be useful for understanding how the program works. Backup According to Wikipedia, "backup refers to making copies of data so that these additional copies may be used to restore the original after a data loss event. Backups are useful primarily for two purposes. The first is to restore a state following a disaster (called disaster recovery).
Snapshots While creating disk images, Acronis True Image Home uses "snapshot" technology that allows creating even system partition backups while running Windows with files open for reading and writing without the necessity to reboot the computer. Once the program starts the partition backup process, it temporarily freezes all the operations on the partition and creates its "snapshot". Snapshot creation usually takes just several seconds.
To enable booting to the recovery environment, it is necessary to ensure that the BIOS boot sequence includes the rescue media. See Arranging boot sequence in BIOS (p. 192). Scheduling For your backups to be really helpful, they must be as "up-to-date" as possible. This means that you should run backup tasks on a regular basis, say once a day. Though creating a backup task in Acronis True Image Home is quite easy, it would be very tedious remembering to do the same thing every day.
Support of dynamic/GPT disks (provided by separately purchased Acronis Plus Pack) – operations with dynamic/GPT disks expand the range of hard drive configurations supported by Acronis True Image Home. Dynamic disks offer greater flexibility for volume management and may provide benefits in computers with more than one hard drive. GUID Partition Table (GPT) is a new hard disk partitioning scheme providing advantages over the old MBR partitioning scheme.
Acronis True Image Home also enables creation of a bootable CD-R/DVD-R that can back up and recover a disk/partition on a computer running any Intel- or AMD- based PC operating system, including Linux®. The only exception is the Intel-based Apple Macintosh, which is currently not supported in native mode. 1.4.3.
1.5. Customer technical support Users of legally purchased and registered copies of Acronis True Image Home are entitled to free technical support. If you experience problems installing or using Acronis products that you can't solve yourself by using this guide, then please contact Acronis Technical Support. More information about contacting Acronis Technical Support is available at the following link: http://www.acronis.eu/homecomputing/support/.
2. Acronis True Image Home installation and startup 2.1. Installing Acronis True Image Home To install Acronis True Image Home: Run the Acronis True Image Home setup file. Before installation, you can check for a newer Acronis True Image Home build on the Acronis Web site. If available, the newer version will be offered for installation. In the Install Menu, select the program to install: Acronis True Image Home. Follow the install wizard instructions on the screen.
Run the Acronis True Image Home setup file. In the Install Menu, right-click on the program name and select Extract. Select a location for the setup file and click Save. Recovering or updating the existing Acronis True Image Home installation with using the .msi file must be done from the command line as follows: 1. Choose Start Run 2. Type cmd. 3. When the command-line interpreter window opens, type the following command: msiexec /i path_to_msi_file\msi_file_name.
If you use Windows Vista, select Start Control panel Programs and Features Remove. Then follow the instructions on the screen. You may have to reboot your computer afterwards to complete the task. If you have Acronis Secure Zone on your computer, remove it before removing the program itself because removing Acronis True Image Home will not remove the zone. 18 Copyright © Acronis, Inc.
3. General information and proprietary Acronis technologies 3.1. The difference between file archives and disk/partition images A backup archive is a file or a group of files (also called "backups" in this guide), that contains a copy of selected file/folder data or a copy of all information stored on selected disks/partitions. When you back up files and folders, only the data, along with the folder tree, is compressed and stored.
Generally, a differential backup will be recovered faster than an incremental one, as it does not have to process through a long chain of previous backups. A standalone full backup might be an optimal solution if you often roll back the system to its initial state or if you do not like to manage multiple files. If you are interested in saving only the last data state to be able to recover it in case of system failure, consider the differential backup.
2) In some cases when you create a new full backup task at a new destination, the backup gets the name "MyBackup_mm_dd_yyyy.tib". If a backup is split (either automatically, e.g. due to the 4GB file size limit on FAT32 disks or when configuring a backup task), the constituent backup files (volumes) are named as follows: MyBackup_mm_dd_yyyy1.tib…MyBackup_mm_dd_yyyyN.
When you create Acronis Secure Zone, an icon appears under My Computer in the Other section. Double-clicking on the Acronis Secure Zone icon opens the zone and you can view all the backup archives it contains. You can also open the zone by right-clicking on its icon and choosing Open in the shortcut menu. Double-clicking on an archive opens it and shows all backups (full, incremental, differential) belonging to the archive.
3.5. Acronis Startup Recovery Manager 3.5.1. How it works The Acronis Startup Recovery Manager lets you start Acronis True Image Home without loading the operating system. With this feature, you can use Acronis True Image Home by itself to recover damaged partitions, even if the operating system won't start up for some reason. As opposed to booting from Acronis removable media, you will not need a separate media or network connection to start Acronis True Image Home. 3.5.2.
You can change the width of a column by dragging its borders with the mouse. 3.7. What is Try&Decide™? The Acronis True Image Home Try&Decide feature allows you to perform potentially dangerous operations such as software installation or opening e-mail attachments without putting your PC at risk. It does this by creating essentially a controlled, secure, temporary workspace that is insulated from the rest of your computer.
Acronis True Image Home can recover and validate only its own zip archives. If a zip archive was created by a file archiver program, it cannot be recovered and validated by Acronis True Image Home. 3.10. Acronis Nonstop Backup Acronis Nonstop Backup provides easy protection of your disks and files, and allows you to recover both entire disks and individual files and even their versions from disaster.
Acronis Universal Restore technology provides an efficient solution for hardware-independent system restoration by replacing the crucial Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL) and mass storage device drivers. Acronis Universal Restore is applicable for: 1. Instant recovery of a failed system on different hardware 2. Hardware-independent cloning of operating systems 3.12.1.1. Limitations in using Acronis Universal Restore 1.
4. Preparing for disaster recovery 4.1. How to prepare for disaster as best as you can Let us remind you of Murphy's Law: "Whatever can go wrong will go wrong" (and at the worst possible time, in the worst possible way). And some people say that Murphy was an incurable optimist. So be warned – your computer may crash and will eventually crash (and maybe just at the worst possible moment).
spare drive, please, at least validate the image in the recovery environment. A backup that can be read during validation in Windows, may not always be readable under Linux environment. When you use the Acronis True Image Home rescue media, the product creates disk drive letters that might differ from the way Windows identifies drives. For example, the D: drive identified in the standalone Acronis True Image Home might correspond to the E: drive in Windows.
2) If you purchased the program after downloading it, you absolutely must create a bootable rescue CD (or other rescue media, for example, a USB stick) following the recommendations given in the User's Guide or program's Help and then make sure this rescue media is bootable on your computer. You must configure your computer so as to enable booting from the rescue media and make your rescue media device (CD-ROM/DVD-ROM drive or USB stick) the first boot device. See Arranging boot sequence in BIOS (p.
2. When the command line appears, type "vga=ask" (without quotes) and click OK. 3. Select Acronis True Image Home (Full version) in the boot menu to continue booting from the rescue media. To see the available video modes, press the Enter key when the appropriate message appears. 4. Choose a video mode you think best suitable for your monitor and type its number in the command line. For instance, typing 338 selects video mode 1600x1200x16 (see the below figure).
After you find the optimal video mode for your hardware, you can create a new bootable rescue media that will automatically select that video mode. To do this, start Acronis Media Builder, select the required media components, and type the mode number with the "0x" prefix (0x338 in our instance) in the command line at the "Bootable media startup parameters" step, then create the media as usual. 4.3.
5. Getting to know Acronis True Image Home 5.1. Program workspace Starting Acronis True Image Home takes you to the Welcome screen. This screen provides quick access to backup and recovery features, as well as highlights any issues with your system's protection. Your system is considered fully protected when it is backed up and a bootable rescue media is created.
Acronis True Image Home uses wizards, which guide you through many operations. Like the main program window, wizards also have the sidebar listing all the steps (both required and optional) needed for completing the operation. For example, see the Backup Wizard screen shot below. The completed steps are marked with green checkmarks. The green arrow shows the current step. After you complete all the required steps and come to the Finish step, the program displays the Summary screen.
If you choose to not use the One-Click Backup shortcut, Acronis True Image Home will offer to perform One-Click Backup during the first start after installation, as well as schedule subsequent full backups – see the screen shot below. The Acronis One-Click Backup tool performs only full backups of the system partition; scheduling an incremental or differential backup is not possible. In addition, it does not support backup of drives protected by BitLocker Drive Encryption in Windows Vista.
Clicking Cancel will cancel One-Click Backup. If you decide to use this feature later, select Tools & Utilities on the sidebar and then choose One-Click Backup in the right pane of the screen. In case the archive storage location is a USB flash drive, the backup will begin automatically when the device is plugged in but only if a scheduled backup has been missed. The USB flash drive must be the same as the one used for all previous backups; if you plug in another flash drive, the backup process won't start.
column. The assigned backup ratings may be helpful, for example, when sometime later you will need to consolidate the backups stored in an archive – it will be easier to choose which backups to keep after consolidation. For more information on manual backup consolidation see Consolidating backups (p. 160).
5.4. Options screen Acronis True Image Home has options related to its appearance and various program functions. To view or edit the default options, choose Tools & Utilities Options in the main program menu. The Backup options item provides for making settings to be used by default in any backup task. You can modify the settings depending on your backup needs. For detailed information on the backup options and possible settings see Fine-tuning your backups (p. 77).
The Feedback option allows you to quit the Acronis Customer Experience Program, if you decided to join it during Acronis True Image Home installation or join the program by selecting the Yes, I want to participate in the program radio button. If you want to know more about the Customer Experience Program, click the Learn more link.
6. Creating backup archives 6.1. Preparing for your first backup First of all you should decide where to store your backups. Acronis True Image Home supports quite a lot of storage devices. For more information see Supported storage media (p. 14). Since hard disk drives are now quite inexpensive, in most cases purchasing an external hard drive for storing your backups will be an optimal solution.
backing up large volumes of data (for details see The difference between file archives and disk/partition images (p. 19)). You might think it would take a while to make a copy of your entire hard disk, but the proprietary technologies used in Acronis True Image Home ensure that image creation is quite fast.
Thereafter you will always be able to recover that basic system state after trying new programs – if you don't like them or if something goes wrong. The easiest way of backing up the system partition is using the One-Click Backup either during the first start of Acronis True Image Home after installation or later. This tool is intended for backing up only the system partition and MBR.
6.3.2. Backing up an entire system disk When your backup storage device has enough free space, it is advisable to back up the entire system disk. Such a backup is most suitable for recovering your system and applications both when you need to recover them on the original hard disk drive or a new one, e.g. after your hard drive failed. Incidentally, if your system disk contains several partitions, an entire disk backup also provides for recovery of any individual partition.
4. Select the system disk as the source for backup by checking the appropriate disk box (this will select all partitions on the disk, including the hidden ones). 5. Choose a target archive for the backup being configured – you can either add a new backup to an existing archive or create a new one. Choose the backup location and assign a name to the backup to be created. It is better to use meaningful names, e.g. Disk1_full.tib. 6.
4. Carefully read the Summary of actions to be performed during backup and click Proceed if you are satisfied with the backup task settings, otherwise click Options on the Summary screen to change the settings. 5. The first optional step offers to schedule the backup task. Scheduling together with a backup method and automatic consolidation rules allows implementing a desired backup strategy. For more information see Examples of backup scheduling scenarios (p. 117). 6. Choose a backup method.
4. As your project will take several days, it is reasonable to back up the project files at least once a day by setting an appropriate schedule, so click Options at the Summary step to be able to create a schedule. 5. Select the Daily scheduling option. If you think that your work results will be safer being backed up more often, select Run the task every x hour(s) until the end of the day box and specify the interval in hours.
3. When you are connecting to a networked computer, in most cases you will need to provide the network credentials (user name and password) to access a network share. To do this, select the Use NT authentication box and enter the user name and password into the appropriate fields. Pressing the Test authentication and connection button allows testing the ability of the computer to connect to the selected network share.
7. Acronis Nonstop Backup 7.1. What is Acronis Nonstop Backup Acronis Nonstop Backup is a new Acronis True Image Home feature that provides convenient protection of your disks and files, and allows you to recover from disaster both entire disks and individual files and even their versions. By default Acronis Nonstop Backup will protect your system partition, though you can select other partitions and disks to be protected too.
Changing Acronis Nonstop Backup settings The Acronis Nonstop Backup options window allows you to change the settings of Acronis Nonstop Backup. Protection management - select the partitions on your computer to be protected by Nonstop Backup. To add a partition, select it on the right pane and click Protect on the toolbar. To remove a partition from protected ones, select it and click Remove protection on the toolbar.
To change the default Nonstop Backup storage click the Change link located to the right of the current storage line, then select a new storage among acceptable ones and click Create Storage and Make Active on the toolbar of the Nonstop Backup storage selection window. Having finished the settings click OK and Acronis Nonstop Backup will start protection with the new settings. Acronis Nonstop Backup remains enabled after restarting Windows and even after switching the computer off. 7.3.
After you activate the old storage, Acronis Nonstop Backup will consolidate the old backups according to the algorithm it uses for consolidating backups and will then start to back up changes on the selected partitions again. When the need arises to recover some data, your actions will differ depending on what you want to recover - partitions or files/folders. A partition is recovered using the Recovery Wizard. If you need to recover a data partition, it is easier to do in Windows.
7.5. Recovering files protected with Acronis Nonstop Backup You can recover files from Acronis Nonstop Backup Storage using both the Recovery Wizard and Acronis Time Explorer. Recovering files using the Recovery Wizard 1. Choose Recovery on the sidebar, then click the Disk backups tab on the right pane. 2. Select the backup archive from which you want to recover files at the Nonstop Backup Storages area. Right-click on the backup and choose Recover in the shortcut menu to start the Recovery Wizard. 3.
1. Choose Recovery on the sidebar, then click Recover data from nonstop backup on the right pane to open Acronis Time Explorer. 2. Select the partition and then the folder that contains the files you want to recover on the directory tree in the left pane. The right pane lists the files in that folder. Select the files to recover. When selecting multiple files you can use the Ctrl and Shift keys like in Windows Explorer.
7.6. Managing Acronis Nonstop Backup storage Inevitably the Acronis Nonstop Backup Storage becomes full after a period of time which depends on the selected Nonstop Backup storage and the number and composition of partitions protected by Acronis Nonstop Backup. When your selected Acronis Nonstop Backup storage fills up, you can choose another storage without losing the previously backed up data. One more way of managing the Acronis Nonstop Backup storage is cleaning up the data you do not need anymore.
8. Online backup Acronis Online Backup might be unavailable in your region. To find more information, click here. The main reason for using Acronis Online Backup is that you will be able to keep your data secure by storing off-site. Because your files are stored elsewhere, they are protected even if your computer gets stolen or your house burns down. So the risk of data loss as a result of theft, fire, or other natural disasters is practically eliminated.
8.2. Recommendations on selecting data for storing online Because online backups are relatively slow, you should think over what data to back up. First of all consider backing up your personal data that cannot be recovered if lost as a result of fire, computer theft, etc. Before proceeding with a backup, estimate how long it will take to back up your data.
If you already registered the computer, select it from the list of registered computers, then click Continue. By default your current computer is selected for registration. When the computer connects to the online storage, the Online storage screen with your storage space quota appears. If you have performed backup on this computer before, you will see how much Online storage space is occupied by the backed up files and folders.
is selected by default, the online backup task will start immediately. Otherwise it will run according to the schedule you set. To schedule online backups, click the Edit schedule... link. For instance, you may want the backups to be performed at night in order to not interfere with your web surfing. For more information see Scheduling tasks (p. 111). When you finish scheduling and click OK, the schedule information will be shown above the Edit schedule... link.
Acronis Time Explorer will be opened with the Online Storage tab selected. 2. This window also allows choosing the computer from which you backed up the files and folders you need to recover. Select the computer by its name on the directory tree under Online Storage in the left pane. 3. By default the state of the Online Storage after the latest backup is displayed, so the latest versions of the files and folders will be recovered.
of Time Explorer will show the times of backing up all its versions kept on the Online Storage. Choose a version by its backup time, then right-click on the file in the right pane and choose Open in the shortcut menu. Acronis True Image Home will recover the file version to a temporary folder and then will open the file using the associated application. 8.5.
3. Select the folder containing the files you want to manage in the left pane. The right pane lists the files in that folder. 4. If you want to delete some versions of a specific file, select the file and click View Versions on the toolbar. This opens the File Versions window. Select the version you want to delete and click Remove on the toolbar.
8.6.2. Storage connection speed One more option gives you the ability to "throttle" the bandwidth allocated for data transfer to the Online Storage. Set the connection speed that will allow you to send e-mail or surf the Web without annoying slowdowns while online backup is running. To do this, select the Limit transfer rate to: check box and set the connection speed (8 Mbps by default).
You can: Delete versions that are older than the specified time period - 3 months by default. Specify how many versions of your files must be kept on the Online Storage. This will allow you to return to a previous file version if your changes in a file turn out to be erroneous. By default Acronis True Image Home will keep 10 versions of your files, though you can specify any other number. 8.6.4.
9. Additional backup features 9.1. Making reserve copies of your backups When you choose the My Data backup type for backing up selected files and folders, you can create reserve copies of your backups and save them on the file system, a network drive, or a USB flash drive. In addition to enhancing the archive security with replication, this feature allows you to copy a set of documents, for example, to a USB stick for working on them at home.
1. When you come to the Backup options step while configuring a My Data backup task in the Backup Wizard (or select that step after completing all the required steps), choose Backup reserve copy and then select the Create a reserve copy of my backups box (if it is not selected in the default backup options). 2. Choose how to duplicate the project file(s) on the USB stick. If you need to save space, choose duplicating as a zip file.
9.2. Archive to various places Now Acronis True Image Home offers much greater flexibility. You can save full, incremental and differential backups to different places including a network share, CD/DVD, USB stick, as well as any local internal or external hard drive. You cannot use Acronis Secure Zone as one of the places for storing a part of backups belonging to the same backup "chain", because such backups may be automatically deleted during automatic backup archive consolidation in Acronis Secure Zone.
To complete the backup, you may either try to free some space on the disk and click Retry or select another storage device. To choose the latter option, click Browse in the information window. The Browse for Location window appears. The left pane shows the storage locations available on your computer. After you select a disk in the left pane, the program shows the free space on that disk in the right pane.
made sure that the new system and all your applications operate normally and made one more incremental backup naming it "DiskCWindowsVista". After working under Windows Vista for some time you decided that you would like to try Linux as well. Before creating a partition for Linux you perform an incremental backup of the system disk and name it "DiskCBeforePartitioning", and so on.
belonging to the same backup "chain" to various places, Acronis True Image Home may prompt you for the locations of previous backups during data recovery, in the case when the selected backup archive does not contain the files you want to recover (or contains only a part of them). 9.3. Backup Wizard – detailed information Here we give detailed information on all steps of the Backup Wizard. Let's go through all the steps: 1. Start Acronis True Image Home. 2.
a larger image file because it copies both used and unused hard disk sectors. In addition, when configuring a sector-by-sector backup of a complete hard disk you can include in the backup unallocated space on the hard disk by selecting Back up unallocated space. Thus you will include in the backup all physical sectors on the hard drive. My Data - select the file category(ies) to back up: documents, finance, images, music, and video.
News Folders User Settings Address Book For Microsoft Outlook Express Mail Folders Address Book (select Windows Address Book). Acronis True Image Home provides backup of IMAP (Internet Messages Access Protocol) mail folders for Microsoft Outlook. This means that you can back up folders stored on a mail server. For Microsoft Outlook Express and Windows Mail only local e-mail folders backup is available.
If you want to change the location of added backup files, browse for a new backup location after clicking the Browse button, otherwise leave the location the same as that of the existing archive. The "farther" you store the archive from the original folders, the safer it will be in case of disaster. For example, saving the archive to another hard disk will protect your data if the primary disk is damaged.
9.3.3. Scheduling By default, the Do not schedule option is chosen so the task will run after completing the wizard and clicking Proceed. However, you may wish to schedule the task being configured by choosing one of the scheduling options. For more information see Scheduling tasks (p. 111). 9.3.4. Backup method Select whether you want to create a full, incremental or differential backup.
If you choose (2) or (3) by selecting the Create a new full backup after box, the next backups will be incremental (or differential) until the specified number of incremental (differential) backups is reached. After the selected number of incremental or differential backups is made, the next time a new full backup and a set of subsequent incremental (differential) backups will be created; this process will then continue until you decide to change it.
9.3.5. Selecting what to exclude This step will be present only for the Disk and Partition Backup and My Data backup types. It enables you to exclude unnecessary files from your backup in case you just want to exclude certain file types without creating custom categories. You can exclude hidden or system files and folders, as well as files matching the criteria you specify. You can add your own criteria by clicking Add.
9.3.6. Selecting the backup options Select the backup options (that is, backup file-splitting, compression level, password protection, etc.). The settings of the options will be applied only to the current backup task. Or, you can edit the default backup options and local storage settings if you want to save the current settings for future tasks. For more information see Fine-tuning your backups (p. 77). 9.3.7.
a maximum archive size By default there are no limits set and automatic consolidation is not performed. To enable automatic consolidation, you must select at least one of the limits and either leave its default value or change it according to your needs. If limits are set, then after creating a backup the program checks the archive for quota violations, such as exceeding a pre-set maximum number of gigabytes set aside for backups and, if any limitation is exceeded, consolidates the oldest backups.
9.3.9. The backup process Clicking Proceed after completing all the optional steps you need for configuring the current backup task will start the task execution if you have configured the task to be started manually, by choosing the Do not schedule option at the Scheduling step, or having selected the Run task now box for a scheduled task (to select the box, you should return to the Finish step). Otherwise the task will run when the scheduled time comes.
9.4.1.2. Pre/post commands You can specify commands or batch files to be executed automatically before and/or after the backup procedure. For example, you may want to remove some temporary (.tmp) files from the disk before starting backup or configure a third-party antivirus product to be used each time for scanning the files to be backed up before the backup starts.
process, though in the case being considered this will most likely not be an issue, because the files will not be too large. The encryption settings are available only for password-protected archives. If you try to recover data from a password-protected archive, or append an incremental/differential backup to such an archive, Acronis True Image Home will ask for the password in a special window, allowing access only to those who know the password. 9.4.1.5. Backup priority The preset is Low.
9.4.1.7. Error handling Ignore bad sectors The preset is disabled. This option lets you run a backup even if there are bad sectors on the hard disk. Although most disks do not have bad sectors, the possibility that they might occur increases during the course of the hard disk's lifetime. If your hard drive has started making strange noises (for example, it starts making quite loud clicking or grinding noises during operation), such noises may mean that the hard drive is failing.
When backing up to removable media, you can make this media bootable and will not need a separate rescue disk. The Acronis One-Click Restore is a minimal addition to your backup media, allowing one-click data recovery from an image archive stored on this media. This means that when booting from the media you click "recover" all data will be recovered to its original place automatically. No options or selections such as resizing partitions will be available.
You may want to be notified when the free space on the backup storage becomes less than the specified value. To enable such notification, select the On insufficient free disk space box, then specify the free space threshold value in the below fields. When this option is enabled, Acronis True Image Home will monitor free space on your backup storage.
Creating backups directly on CD-R/RW or DVD+R/RW might take considerably more time than it would on a hard disk. 9.4.2.5. Backup reserve copy The preset is disabled. You may want Acronis True Image Home to make reserve copies of your backups in a certain location each time when you choose the My Data backup type for backing up selected files and folders. To enable creation of reserve copies, select the Create a reserve copy of my backups check box and then choose the method for making reserve copies.
9.4.3. Creating a custom data category for backups To add a custom data category, click Add New Category in the Files to back up screen of the Backup Wizard, select the folder (data source) and provide a name for the category. You can include in the category all files in the selected folder or apply filters to select the specific types of files that you wish or do not wish to back up.
10. Data recovery with Acronis True Image Home The ultimate purpose of data backup is recovery of the backed up data when the original is lost due to hardware failure, fire, theft or just erroneous deletion of some important files. There may be various reasons for recovering your system - from unstable operation after installing a new application, driver or Windows update to complete failure of the system hard drive or replacement of the old hard drive by a new larger one.
3. Select Recovery Disk and Partition Recovery in the main menu and then choose the image backup of your system partition (or entire system disk) that you want to use for recovery. Rightclick on the backup and choose Recover in the shortcut menu.
One more recommendation - it is highly recommended to install the new hard drive to the same position in the computer and use the same cable and the same connector as for the original drive (though this is not always possible, e.g. the old drive may be an IDE and the new drive may be a SATA). In any case, install the new drive to where it will be used. 10.2.1.
destination disk number, then click Cancel, start the Recovery Wizard again, repeat the above steps, and select the destination disk. 7. Clicking Accept will return you to the "Settings of partition ..." screen. Check the partition type and change it, if necessary. You should remember that the system partition must be primary and marked as active. 8. Proceed to specifying the partition size by clicking Change default in the Partition size area. By default the partition will occupy the entire new disk.
Assuming that you have got the information, let's proceed with recovery of a system disk using the rescue media. Attach the external drive if it contains the backup archive to be used for recovery and make sure that the drive is powered on. This must be done before booting from Acronis rescue media. 1. Arrange the boot sequence in BIOS so as to make your rescue media device (CD, DVD or USB stick) the first boot device. See Arranging boot sequence in BIOS (p. 192). 2.
the original size. Usually there is no free space after the partition, so allocate all the unallocated space on the new disk to the second partition, click Accept and then click Next. 9. Carefully read the summary of operations to be performed. If you do not want to validate the backup, click Proceed, otherwise click Options and select the "Validate backup archive before recovery" box before clicking Proceed. 10. When the operation finishes, proceed to MBR recovery.
6. Carefully read the Summary. After making sure that you have made the correct settings, click Proceed, if you do not need to change the default recovery options, otherwise click Options. 7. The Options step allows setting the recovery options, for example, to check the file system after recovery. For more information about the recovery options see Setting default recovery options (p. 101). After setting the recovery options click Proceed.
at least once. If Microsoft Outlook is launched for the first time after recovering the E-mail information, it may malfunction. If you use Microsoft Outlook Express and recover its mail folders, accounts, etc. from My E-mail backup on another PC or after performing a so called "clean install" of Microsoft Windows, please, do not forget to switch to your identity after recovery by selecting File Switch Identity in Outlook Express and then double-clicking on your identity in the list of the dialog box. 3.
1. Start the Recovery Wizard by selecting Recovery program menu. Disk and Partition Recovery in the main 2. Select the archive. Data recovery directly from an FTP server requires the archive to consist of files of no more than 2GB. If you suspect that some of the files are larger, first copy the entire archive (along with the initial full backup) to a local hard disk or a network share disk. See notes and recommendations for supporting FTP servers in Supported storage media (p. 14). 3.
Copyright © Acronis, Inc.
11. Additional recovery information 11.1. Recovery Wizard - detailed information The below description of the Recovery Wizard refers to recovering partitions/disks from image backups. If you need to recover files and folders, see Recovering files and folders (p. 91). 11.1.1. Starting the Recovery Wizard Start the Recovery Wizard by selecting Recovery menu. Disk and Partition Recovery in the main program 11.1.2. Archive selection 1. Select the archive.
When recovering a backup of Windows Vista system disk containing restore points, some of your restore points (or all of them) may be missing if you boot from the recovered system disk and open the System Restore tool. If the archive is password-protected, Acronis True Image Home will ask for it. The partitions layout and the Next button will be unavailable until you enter the correct password. 2.
box when you need to resize a partition or disk greatly increases the amount of disc swapping, so we recommend to copy all CD/DVDs to a folder on a hard disk and recover from this folder. Use Acronis Universal Restore Using Universal Restore (provided by separately purchased Acronis Plus Pack) allows recovering an image of your system partition on a computer with dissimilar hardware.
1. Acronis True Image Home creates scheduled tasks using the signature of the source hard disk. If you recover the same disk signature, you don't need to re-create or edit the tasks created previously. 2. Some installed applications use disk signature for licensing and other purposes. 3. If you use Windows Restore Points, they will be lost when the disk signature is not recovered. 4. In addition, recovering disk signature allows to recover VSS snapshots used by Windows Vista's "Previous Versions" feature.
You will have to select between: OK – all existing partitions will be deleted and all their data will be lost. Cancel – no existing partition will be deleted, discontinuing the recovery operation. You will then have to cancel the operation or select another disk. Note that no real changes or data destruction will be performed at this time! For now, the program will just map out the procedure. All changes will be implemented only when you click Proceed in the wizard's Summary window. 11.1.6.
Using this feature, you can redistribute the disk space among partitions being recovered. In this case, you will have to recover the partition to be reduced first. These changes might be useful if you are going to copy your hard disk to a new high-capacity one by creating its image and recovering it to a new disk with larger partitions. 11.1.8. Assigning a letter to the recovered partition Acronis True Image Home will assign an unused letter to a recovered partition.
same result you will get if the recovery is unsuccessful. To recover the "lost" partition, you will have to recover it from the image again. 11.2. Setting default recovery options To set the recovery options to be used by default during any data recovery, select Tools & Utilities Options Recovery options. You can always restore the default recovery options to the values preset during installation of Acronis True Image Home.
You can set default filters for the specific types of files you wish to preserve during archive recovery. For example, you may want hidden and system files and folders, newer files and folders, as well as files matching selected criteria not to be overwritten by the archive files. While specifying the criteria, you can use the common Windows wildcard characters. For example, to preserve all files with extension .exe, add *.exe. My???.exe will preserve all .
to the original location (to the same dynamic volume) to another dynamic disk or volume to unallocated space of the dynamic group to a basic disk If a dynamic volume is recovered to unallocated space of the dynamic group, the type of the recovered volume will be the same as it was in the archive. Manual resizing of dynamic volumes during recovery to dynamic disks is not supported. If you need to resize a dynamic volume during recovery, it should be recovered to a basic disk.
3. Click the My Disks link below Recover on the Welcome screen to start the Recovery Wizard and then choose the image of the system disk for recovery. As drive letters in the standalone Acronis True Image Home may differ from the way Windows identifies drives, you may need to specify the path to the image file by clicking Browse and selecting the disk and folder that stores the image. 4. Choose Recover whole disks and partitions and select the Use Acronis Universal Restore box. 5.
12. Try&Decide The Try&Decide feature allows creating a secure, controlled temporary workspace on your computer without requiring you to install special virtualization software. You can perform various system operations not worrying that you might damage your operating system, programs or data. After making virtual changes, you may apply them to your original system. If you make changes that you want to keep, you might want to commit those changes to the system.
Because of this, you can safely install system updates when they appear. When Windows Update informs you that updates for the system and Microsoft applications are ready for installing, turn on the Try&Decide mode and then proceed to install the updates. If you encounter any sort of problem, discard the changes and leave your real operating system and applications untouched.
When your computer reboots for whatever reason while working in the Try&Decide mode, before booting of the operating system starts, you will be shown a dialog offering you two choices – stop the mode and discard changes or continue working in the mode. This will allow you to discard the changes that have resulted in a system crash. On the other hand, if you reboot, for example, after installing an application, you can continue working in the Try&Decide mode after starting Windows.
Please note that while working in the Try&Decide mode you will experience slowing down of the system performance. Furthermore, the process of applying changes could take considerable time. *** Please be aware that Try&Decide cannot track changes in disk partitions, so you will be unable to use the Try&Decide mode for virtual operations with partitions such as resizing partitions or changing their layout.
You can always restore the default settings for the Try&Decide options by clicking Reset settings to default. 12.2. Try&Decide usage examples The Try&Decide feature can help you in a variety of ways; here are some examples: There are cases when the installation of antivirus software cripples the functionality of some applications; in fact, some programs might even refuse to start after antivirus installation. The Try&Decide feature can help you to avoid such problem. Here's how: 1.
they started using the computer. To do so, log on and discard the changes made during the Try&Decide session. It is well known that the "Add or Remove Programs" component of the Windows Control Panel cannot give a complete guarantee of cleanly uninstalling applications. This is because most applications do not provide enough information for it to be able to uninstall them without a trace.
13. Scheduling tasks 13.1. Creating scheduled tasks You can schedule a new task in the Backup Wizard or Validate Wizard in the Scheduling step. It is also possible to create a scheduled task by clicking Create Backup Task or Create Validation Task on the toolbar of the Tasks and Log screen. If the backup archive you want to validate is password-protected , Acronis True Image Home will ask for it. 1. Perform task running scheduling.
If you schedule a task for performing backup to a USB flash drive, two more check boxes appear on the scheduling screen – If missed, run the task when device is attached and Run task only if the current device is attached. Selecting the first box will let you perform a missed backup when the USB flash drive is attached if it was disconnected at the scheduled time.
You can also specify the task Start date. If you want to run a task only at the first occurrence of the event on the current day, select the Once a day only box. 13.1.3. Setting up periodical execution If you choose the Periodically option, set the Start time and specify the interval between backups in hours and minutes. You can also specify the task Start date. Copyright © Acronis, Inc.
13.1.4. Setting up daily execution If you choose daily execution, set the Start time and days on which you want to execute the task: Every day Every weekday Every х days – once every several days (specify the interval). If you want the task to be repeated several times per day, select Run the task every x hour(s) until the end of the day box and specify the interval in hours. You can also specify the task Start date. 114 Copyright © Acronis, Inc.
13.1.5. Setting up weekly execution If you choose weekly execution, set the Start time, specify the task execution periodicity in the Run the task every x week(s) on: box (every week, every two weeks, etc.) and select the days on which to execute the task. You can also specify the task Start date. 13.1.6. Setting up monthly execution If you select monthly execution, set the Start time and days on which to execute the task: On the – on the specified day (e.g.
You can also specify the task Start date. 13.2. Importing scheduled tasks when upgrading When you upgrade from a previous Acronis True Image Home version and already have scheduled tasks, during the first start the upgraded Acronis True Image Home will automatically find those tasks and add them to the list of tasks shown on the Tasks and Log screen on the Scheduled tasks tab. The tasks are executed according to their scripts.
displays all scheduled tasks along with their name, status, schedule, last run time, last result, and owner. By default you see only your own tasks, but you have the option to view or manage tasks of other users. To do so, select Tools & Utilities Options Appearance from the main program menu. Then choose Filter and unselect the Show only tasks created by the current user check box. You can change the task parameters by editing them.
b) At the "Backup method" step choose the "Full" method and unselect the "A new full backup overwrites the previous one" check box (selected by default). c) At the "Automatic consolidation" step it is necessary to select the "Number of backups exceeds" check box and set a limit of five backups, then finish configuring the backup task. The program will create full backups starting from the nearest Saturday and will accumulate the first five backups in the archive.
b) Open the default backup options by choosing Tools Options Backup options in the main menu. Click on Error handling and select the When not enough space in ASZ, delete the oldest archive box. c) When you come to the Scheduling step while configuring a backup task, select the Weekly option, leave the default value "Run the task every 1 week", then select a day of the week for making backups, e.g. Saturday. d) At the Backup method step choose the Full option. This will result in creating only full backups.
d) Similarly create the third backup task with the same settings except the backup archive name. The start date should be two weeks later. When all three tasks run, they will implement exactly the backup scenario you want. This approach can be used for implementing any similar backup strategy. For instance, if you want to keep backup chains for two weeks, create two scheduled tasks each running every 2 weeks.
14. Managing Acronis Secure Zone The Acronis Secure Zone is a special partition for storing archives on the same computer that created the archive. For more information see Acronis Secure Zone™ (p. 21). When you select Tools & Utilities Manage Acronis Secure Zone in the main menu, the program searches for the zone on all local drives. If the zone is found, the wizard will offer to manage it (resize or change the password) or delete it. If there is no zone, you'll be prompted to create it.
3. Select the partitions from whose space the zone will be created. 4. In the next window, enter the Acronis Secure Zone size or drag the slider to select any size between the minimum and maximum. The minimum size is about 50 MB, depending on the geometry of the hard disk. The maximum size is equal to the disk's unallocated space plus the total free space on all partitions selected at the previous step. When creating the zone, the program will first use the unallocated space.
5. Then you will see a list of operations to be performed on the partitions (disks). 6. You can set a password to restrict access to the zone. The program will ask for the password at any operation relating to it, such as data backup and recovery, mounting images or validating archives on the zone, resizing and deleting the zone. To set a password, click Options on the Summary window. Acronis True Image Home repair or update will not affect the password.
14.2. Resizing Acronis Secure Zone 1. If you want to resize the Acronis Secure Zone, select Tools & Utilities Zone in the main menu. Manage Acronis Secure 2. Select to increase or decrease the zone size. You might need to increase it to provide more space for archives. The opposite situation may arise if any partition lacks free space. 3. Select partitions from which free space will be used to increase the size of Acronis Secure Zone or that will receive free space after the zone is reduced. 4.
2. Select Change password. 3. Enter the new password and confirm it or select Do not use password protection. You can also select a secret question that will be asked in case you forget the password. 4. To perform the password change operation, click Proceed in the final wizard window. 14.4. Deleting Acronis Secure Zone 1. If you want to remove the Acronis Secure Zone, select Tools & Utilities Manage Acronis Secure Zone in the main menu and then choose Remove Acronis Secure Zone. 2.
15. Creating bootable media 15.1. Creating Linux-based rescue media You can run Acronis True Image Home from an emergency boot disk on a bare-metal system or a crashed computer that cannot boot. You can even back up disks on a non-Windows computer, copying all its data into the backup archive by imaging the disk one sector at a time. To do so, you will need bootable media that has a copy of the standalone Acronis True Image Home version installed on it.
Acronis True Image Home offers the following components: Acronis True Image Home full version Includes support of USB, PC Card (formerly PCMCIA) and SCSI interfaces along with the storage devices connected via them, and therefore is strongly recommended. Acronis System Report This component allows you to generate a system report after booting from the rescue media when both Windows and Acronis True Image Home full version cannot start.
When using 3.5" diskettes, you will only be able to write one component at a time (for example, the full version of Acronis True Image Home) on a set of diskettes. To write another component, start Bootable Media Builder again. 4. If you are creating a CD, DVD or any removable media, insert a blank disc so the program can determine its capacity. If you choose to create a bootable disc ISO image, specify the ISO file name and the folder in which to place it. 5.
If you do not have the boxed version of Acronis True Image Home, you will need to download a separate installation file from your Acronis account: Go to My Account section Log in; Register the serial number for your copy of Acronis True Image Home (if it is not registered yet); Click Registered Products; Under the registered products click on Bart PE & Safe Media to download the plug-in. Install the plug-in as follows: 1. Double-click on the downloaded file to start installation. 2.
Make sure you have the Acronis True Image Home plug-in enabled on the Plugins screen: Close the Plugins window and click the Build button to start the building process. If you want the image to be burned to CD, select the Burn to CD option and choose the necessary burner in the Device menu; After the image is created, burn it to CD or DVD. (If you did not check the Burn to CD option at the previous step.) After booting from the CD/DVD, you can find the Acronis True Image Home plug-in in Go/System/Storage.
Windows XP Professional with Service Pack 2 (PE 1.5) Windows Vista (PE 2.0) Windows Vista SP1 (PE 2.1) Windows 7 (PE 3.0) If you already have media with PE1.x distribution, unpack the media ISO to a local folder and start the Acronis WinPE ISO Builder by selecting it from Start Acronis Plus Pack for Acronis True Image Home 2010. The wizard will guide you through the necessary operations. Please refer to Adding the Acronis Plug-in to WinPE 1.x (p. 131) for details. To be able to create or modify PE 2.
4. Specify path to the folder with the Acronis Plug-in files. (Check the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Acronis\MediaAddons\Settings\BartPE for the plug-in location.) 5. Specify the full path to the resulting ISO file including the file name. 6. Check your settings in the summary screen and click Proceed. 7. Burn the .ISO to CD or DVD using a third-party tool or copy to a flash drive. Once a machine boots into the WinPE, Acronis True Image Home starts automatically. 15.3.2.
4. Specify path to the folder with the Acronis Plug-in files. (Check the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Acronis\MediaAddons\Settings\BartPE for the plug-in location.) 5. Choose whether you want to create ISO or WIM image. 6. Specify the full path to the resulting image file including the file name. 7. Check your settings in the summary screen and click Proceed. 8. Burn the .ISO to CD or DVD using a third-party tool or copy to a flash drive.
16. Working with vhd files 16.1. Converting tib images into vhd virtual disks and vice versa Conversion operations are not supported in standalone versions of Acronis True Image Home that start when booting from the rescue media. 16.1.1. Converting to Windows backup Users of the Enterprise and Ultimate editions of Windows 7 can convert a tib image of the system partition into the vhd format if they want to use the converted vhd file for booting the operating system.
The converted file will be saved to the default location, but you can select another one by clicking Browse. The file can be directed to any local storage supported by Acronis True Image Home, except the Acronis Secure Zone and CD/DVD. In addition, it can be directed to an SMB share. 4. Click Proceed in the Summary window.
Acronis True Image Home cannot convert vhd files containing dynamic volumes which were originally located on more than one disk drive (striped or spanned on two or more disk drives). 16.2.
1. Open Acronis Boot Sequence Manager by selecting Tools & Utilities Manager in the main program menu. Acronis Boot Sequence 2. Click Add on the toolbar of Acronis Boot Sequence Manager and browse for the required tib file, then click OK. 3. As actual booting is performed from VHD, the program needs to convert the selected tib file, so the appropriate dialog will appear. 4. Click OK if you want to save the converted file to the default location with the same name or browse for another location.
When you no longer need an entry in the list, you can remove it by clicking Remove on the toolbar. The Remove all button allows you to remove all entries related to virtual disks and restore the original booting configuration. 138 Copyright © Acronis, Inc.
17. Exploring archives and mounting images Acronis True Image Home offers two kinds of archive contents management: mounting for images and exploring for both images and file-level archives. Exploring images and file-level archives lets you view their contents and copy the selected files to a hard disk. To explore a backup archive, double-click on the corresponding tib file. You can also rightclick on the file and choose Explore in the shortcut menu.
2. Select the archive for mounting. If you selected an archive containing incremental images, you can select one of the successive incremental images (also called "slices") by its creation date/time. Thus, you can explore the data state at a certain moment. To mount an incremental image, you must have all previous images and the initial full image. If any of the successive images are missing, mounting is not possible.
3. Select a partition to mount as a virtual disk. (Note that you cannot mount an image of the entire disk except in the case when the disk consists of one partition). If the image contains several partitions, by default all of them will be selected for mounting with automatically assigned drive letters. If you would like to assign different drive letters to the partitions to be mounted, click Options. You can also select a letter to be assigned to the virtual disk from the Mount letter drop-down list.
It is strongly recommended that you list the forthcoming changes in the Comments section to this file. For you to be able to make comments, the optional Comments step appears in the wizard. 5. Having finished the settings, click Proceed to connect the selected partition images as virtual disks. 6. After the image is connected, the program will run Windows Explorer, showing its contents. Now you can work with files or folders as if they were located on a real disk. 17.2.
18. Searching backup archives and their content 18.1. Searching In addition to the ability to explore backup archives, Acronis True Image Home provides a search facility for tib and zip archives themselves, for files in tib archives only, as well as offering full-text search in the comments to archives. This facilitates searching for the information you need for using Acronis True Image Home and for recovering files from your backup archives. Here's how you can search for the data you need. 1.
The Backup contents area shows results of searches for files and folders in tib archives. Doubleclicking on a filename opens the file. You can recover the file by right-clicking on its filename and choosing Recover in a shortcut menu. This shortcut menu also enables you to open the file or the parent folder that contains that file. To help you better understand the search results, here is some information on the algorithms used by the Search feature. 1.
Google Desktop has a "Quick Find" window. This window is filled with the most relevant results from your computer. The results change as you type, so you can quickly get to what you want on your computer. Windows Search provides similar functionality.
2. Verify that the plug-in is installed. Right-click on the Google Desktop icon in your system tray and select Options in the context menu. Google Desktop opens the Preferences window in your browser. Make sure that Acronis Indexer (Acronis Backups) is selected in the Indexing Plug-ins area. 3. Right-click on the Google Desktop icon in your system tray once more and select Indexing ReIndex. Click Yes in the confirmation window that appears. Google Desktop will add all the new content to the existing index.
If you want to see all the search results, click the "See all N results in a browser" and you will see something like the screen shot below. Clicking in the browser window on a line related to the desired file version opens a small dialog with just two options: View and Recover. Copyright © Acronis, Inc.
Choosing View starts the application associated with this file type and opens the file. Choosing Recover starts Acronis True Image Home and you can then recover the file to a desired location. Google Desktop also provides for searching files in zip backup archives, created by Acronis True Image Home, though you cannot open or recover files from zip archives by clicking on a line with a filename in the browser window.
3. Click Advanced, select the File Types tab and then make sure that the tib extension is selected and ".tib IFilter" is shown in the Filter Description field. Select Index Properties and File Contents. Copyright © Acronis, Inc.
4. Click OK and while the Indexing Options window is open, check that the disks where you store your tib backup archives are shown in the "Included Locations" list. If the list does not contain those disks, the tib files will not be indexed. To include the disks, click Modify and select them in the window that appears. If you store backups on a network share, Windows Search can index them too.
Give Windows Search some time for indexing all tib files on your computer's hard disks and adding the indexing information to its index database. The required time depends on the number of tib archives and the number of files they contain. After completing the indexing, the Desktop Search will be able to search files in tib backup archives.
Copyright © Acronis, Inc.
19. Other operations 19.1. Validating backup archives The validation procedure checks whether you will be able to recover data from a particular backup, so when you select for validation… a full backup, the program validates the full backup only. a differential backup, the program validates the initial full backup and the selected differential backup.
3. After entering the correct password you will be taken to the Scheduling step, where you can schedule validation of the backup or leave the default setting Do not schedule. 4. Clicking Proceed will start the validation procedure. If you have decided to validate the backup archive on schedule, the validation will proceed according to the schedule you set. After the validation is complete, you will see the results window. You can cancel validation by clicking Cancel. 19.2.
19.2.1. E-mail notification To set up e-mail notification, select Tools & Utilities Options Notifications E-mail: Provide the e-mail address to which notifications will be sent as well as the outgoing SMTP server name and port. A user name and a password might also be needed if the SMTP server requires user authentication.
if the operation failed (check Add full log to the notification to add the full operation log to the message) during the operation when user interaction is required After setting up e-mail notifications, you can send a test mail message by clicking the appropriate button. 19.2.2. WinPopup notification To set up WinPopup notification, select Tools & Utilities (WinPopup): Options Notifications Messenger Provide the name of the computer to which notifications will be sent.
log is not available to users as it is intended for Acronis Support personnel to help in troubleshooting the issues users have with those features. It is included in Acronis System Report. To open the Tasks & Log screen, click Tasks & Log on the sidebar. By default, the screen opens with the Scheduled Tasks tab selected. The tab shows all scheduled tasks (if any).
When the Log tab is selected, the upper pane shows the calendar, while the lower one shows logs' contents. To view the logs for a specific period, select the period by clicking the right arrow buttons in the From: and To: fields of the Show for the period area. Clicking the arrow in the From: field opens a pop-up calendar where you can set the start day of the period by double-clicking the appropriate day. Then set the end day using the same procedure for the To: field.
19.4. Managing backup archives After a while you may wish (or be forced) to manage your backup archives, for example, in order to free up some space for new backups by removing the oldest backups or those you no longer need. As now Acronis True Image Home stores information about the backup archives in a metadata information database, you must manage backup archives (e.g. delete or move some of them) by using the program's tools and not Windows Explorer.
Convert to Windows backup - see Converting to Windows backup (p. 134) (this item appears only if an image backup in the tib format is selected) Convert to Acronis backup - see Converting to Acronis backup (p. 135) (this item appears only if an image backup in the vhd format is selected) Details - viewing detailed information on the selected backup 19.5.
3. The program displays a list of backups belonging to the selected archive with their creation date and time. The top backup is the full backup; the rest are incremental backups. Select the backups you want to keep and click Next. 4. By default, the program selects the same location for the consolidated archive and the original backup archive will be overwritten.
5. After choosing the new location click Proceed to start consolidation. In our example, when consolidation is complete, disk G will contain two new archives Disk1_backup2 and Disk1_backup4. Disk1_backup2 is a full backup and Disk1_backup4 is an incremental backup. You can make sure of this by starting the consolidation wizard again, selecting the archive Disk1_backup and proceeding to the next window. 162 Copyright © Acronis, Inc.
19.6. Removing backup archives You may want to remove backups and backup archives you no longer need. Because Acronis True Image Home stores information on the backup archives in a metadata information database, deleting unneeded archive files using Windows Explorer will not delete information about these archives from the database and Acronis True Image Home will consider that they still exist. This will result in errors when the program tries to perform operations on the backups that no longer exist.
4. When moving is complete, the path to the archive will change in the Path column of the Data recovery and backup management screen. 164 Copyright © Acronis, Inc.
20. Transferring the system to a new disk 20.1. General information Sooner or later, most computer users find that their hard disk is too small. If you just don't have space for more data, you can add another disk just for data storage as described in the following chapter. However, you might find that your hard disk does not have enough space for the operating system and installed applications, preventing you from updating your software or installing new applications.
Nevertheless, we do not recommend that you delete data from the old disk until you are sure it is correctly transferred to the new disk, the computer boots up from it and all applications work. 20.3. Executing transfers For best results, install the target (new) drive where you plan to use it and the source drive in another location, e.g. in an external USB enclosure. This recommendation is especially important for laptops. To start cloning, select Tools & Utilities Clone disk in the main program menu.
20.3.2. Selecting source disk If the program finds several partitioned disks, it will ask you which one is the source (i.e. the older data disk). You can determine the source and destination using the information provided in this window (disk number, capacity, label, partition, and file system information). 20.3.3. Selecting destination disk After you select the source disk, you have to select the destination where the disk information will be copied.
20.3.4. Partitioned destination disk At this point, the program checks to see if the destination disk is free. If not, you will be prompted by the Conformation window stating that the destination disk contains partitions, perhaps with useful data. To confirm deletion of the partitions, click OK. Note that no real changes or data destruction will be performed at this time! For now, the program will just map out cloning. All changes will be implemented only when you click Proceed.
Manual – you will specify the new size and other parameters yourself If you elect to transfer information "as is," a new partition will be created for every old one with the same size and type, file system and label. The unused space will become unallocated. Afterwards, you will be able to use the unallocated space to create new partitions or to enlarge the existing partitions with special tools, such as Acronis Disk Director Suite.
Along with the hard disk number, you will see disk capacity, label, partition, and file system information. Different partition types, including primary, logical, and unallocated space are marked with different colors. First, select a partition to resize and click Edit on the toolbar. This will open the Partition Settings window, where you can resize and relocate the partition.
Having provided the new location and size, click Accept. You will be taken back to the Change disk layout window. You might have to perform some more resizing and relocation before you get the layout you need. 20.3.7. Cloning summary The cloning summary window graphically (as rectangles) illustrates information about the source disk (partitions and unallocated space) and the destination disk layout.
21. Adding a new hard disk If you don't have enough space for your data, you can either replace the old disk with a new highercapacity one (data transfers to new disks are described in the previous chapter), or add a new disk only to store data, leaving the system on the old disk. If the computer has a bay for another disk, it would be easier to add a data disk drive than to clone a system drive. To add a new disk, you must first install it in your computer. 21.1.
Select a file system for the new partition. You may select a partition letter of your choice (or leave the default one) and input a label for the new partition in the corresponding field. Finally, select a partition type. Click the Accept button and you will be taken back to the Partition Creation screen. Check the resulting partition's settings and start creating another partition by clicking Create new partition again.
After you click Proceed, Acronis True Image Home will start creating new partition(s), indicating the progress in a special window. You can stop this procedure by clicking Cancel. You will then have to repartition and format the new disk or repeat the disk add procedure. 174 Copyright © Acronis, Inc.
22. Security and Privacy Tools Acronis True Image Home includes tools for secure destruction of data on an entire hard disk drive, individual partitions, as well as for erasing individual files and eliminating user system activity traces. These tools ensure the security of your confidential information, as well as maintain your privacy when you work with a PC, because they clean-up the evidence showing your actions (records in various system files) that you don't even know about.
3. By default the program will use the Fast method (see Hard Disk Wiping Methods (p. 196)). You can also choose one of the other preset data destruction methods from the drop-down list. Clicking Proceed after you select the desired method will start the task execution (if the Proceed button is unselectable, click Finish on the sidebar and select the Destroy the selected files and folders irreversibly box to enable the Proceed button). 22.2.
You can simultaneously select several partitions located on different hard disk drives or on several disks, as well as unallocated space on disks. Click Next to continue. If the disks and/or partitions you have selected include the system disk or partition, you will see a warning window. Be careful, because clicking OK in this warning window and then Proceed in the Summary window will result in wiping the system partition containing your Windows operating system.
After selecting or creating the disk wiping method click Next to continue. Acronis DriveCleanser will display the data destruction task summary. You can click Proceed after selecting the Wipe the selected partitions irreversibly box or click Options to select the post-wiping action on the partitions selected for data destruction, if the default action, namely, Format does not suit you.
The aforementioned algorithms offer various levels of confidential data destruction. Thus the picture you might see on a disk or partition depends on the data destruction method. But what you actually see are disk sectors filled with either zeros or random symbols. 22.3. Creating custom algorithms of data destruction Acronis DriveCleanser gives you the opportunity to create your own algorithms for wiping hard disks.
Creating a custom method of hard disk wiping is possible after choosing "Custom…" from the dropdown list in the Algorithm selection window. In this case some new required steps appear in the DriveCleanser wizard and you will be able to create a data destruction algorithm matching your security requirements. Having created a custom method, you can save the algorithm you created. This will be handy if you are going to use it again.
Remove traces of file and computer searches on connected disks and computers in the local area network Clean the recently used documents list Clean the Windows Run list Clean the opened/saved files history Clean the list of network places to which the user has connected using network credentials Clean the Windows prefetch directory, where Windows stores information about programs you have executed and run recently Windows Vista does not store information on file and computer searches.
22.5.1. "Data Destruction Method" setting This setting defines the method of guaranteed data destruction to use for cleaning up a given component. By default, all components that have this setting have it set to Use common method. You can change the common method by clicking the Click to change this setting… link and selecting a desired method from the drop-down list (see Hard Disk Wiping Methods (p. 196)).
Upon entering the "Files" setting value, you can browse the files matching the search strings. To do this, click Show Files. You will see a window with the names of the found files. These files will be cleaned. 22.5.3. "Computers" setting The "Computers" setting is used for cleaning up the registry search strings you have used for finding computers in the local network. These strings keep information on what has interested you in the network. These items should also be deleted to maintain confidentiality.
22.5.5. "Commands" setting Here you can select the commands to remove during Windows Run List clean-up. This template can contain any command names or their parts separated by semicolons, e.g.: *help; cmd; reg* This will result in removing commands with names corresponding to or containing any of the names or parts of names you entered. 22.5.6.
23. Troubleshooting 23.1. General The below sections may help you in troubleshooting issues encountered during installation and use of Acronis True Image Home. Among other information the Troubleshooting chapter includes links to Acronis Support Knowledge Base (KB) articles intended for helping to solve issues with Acronis products.
6. Log in to Vista’s built-in administrator account and try to install the program: a. Click Start All Programs, then find and open the "Accessories" folder. b. Right-click on the "Command Prompt" item and select "Run as administrator". c. Type the following command line in to the opened window: net user administrator /active:yes Take note that there is a space between "Administrator" and "/active:yes". d. Log off the current account and log in to the “Administrator” account. e.
Properties and set the required Startup Type on the General tab, than start the service. Verify that the task can now be started. This recommendation relates to unscheduled tasks as well.
23.4. Recovery issues System and/or data recovery after a disaster is the most important operation performed with Acronis True Image Home. Indeed what's the value of a backup program that cannot recover backed up data? If you have problems with recovery, try the following actions: 1) First of all make sure that you have the latest build of Acronis True Image Home. You can download it through your Acronis account.
changes so that Linux can boot and load correctly. Below is the summary of typical situations that require additional user actions when the recovered operating system becomes unbootable. The machine BIOS is configured to boot from another hard disk drive (HDD). Solution: Configure the BIOS to boot from the HDD where the operating system resides. In some cases BIOS has two menus for setting the boot sequence: one for setting the boot devices priority and the other - for setting the HDD boot order.
Acronis product reboots in Windows Native Mode, but the cloning process finishes after a few seconds with no result.
delete Vista restore points, if you do not need them Copyright © Acronis, Inc.
24. Hard Disks and Boot Sequence 24.1. Arranging boot sequence in BIOS BIOS has a built-in setup utility for initial computer configuration. To enter it, you have to press a certain key combination (Del, F1, Ctrl+Alt+Esc, Ctrl+Esc, or some other, depending on your BIOS) during the POST (power-on self test) sequence that starts immediately after you turn your computer on. Usually the message with the required key combination is displayed during the startup test.
1. Configure the new hard disk as slave by properly installing jumpers on its controller board. Disk drives generally have a picture on the drive that shows the correct jumper settings. 2. Open your computer and insert the new hard disk into a 3.5'' or 5.25'' slot with special holders. Fasten down the disk with screws. 3. Plug the power cable into the hard disk (four-threaded: two black, yellow and red; there is only one way you can plug in this cable). 4.
the marked thread connected to pin #1 of the socket. A similar rule was used for connecting cables with the motherboard. Incorrect connection of the cable with either the hard disk or the motherboard does not necessarily damage the electronics of the disk or the motherboard. The hard disk is simply not detected or initialized by BIOS. There are some models of hard disks, especially the older ones, for which incorrect connection damaged the electronics of the drive.
24.2.4. Installing a SATA hard drive Most recently manufactured PCs use the SATA interface for hard drives. In general, installing a SATA hard drive is easier than an IDE drive, as it is not necessary to configure master-slave jumpers. SATA drives use a thin interface cable with seven-pin keyed connectors. This improves airflow through the PC case. Power is supplied to SATA drives through 15-pin connectors.
partitions on the new disk and format the partitions using Acronis True Image Home. See Adding a new hard disk (p. 172). Then configure your BIOS to boot from the SATA controller and boot from the SATA hard drive to ensure it works. 24.3. Hard Disk Wiping methods Information removed from a hard disk drive by non-secure means (for example, by simple Windows delete) can easily be recovered. Utilizing specialized equipment, it is possible to recover even repeatedly overwritten information.
24.3.2. Information wiping methods used by Acronis The table below briefly describes information wiping methods used by Acronis. Each description features the number of hard disk sector passes along with the number(s) written to each sector byte. The description of built-in information wiping methods No. Algorithm (writing method) Passes Record 1. United States Department of Defense 5220.
25. Startup Parameters Additional parameters that can be applied prior to booting Linux kernel. 25.1. Description Additional parameters that can be applied prior to booting Linux kernel Description The following parameters can be used to load Linux kernel in a special mode: acpi=off Disables ACPI and may help with a particular hardware configuration. noapic Disables APIC (Advanced Programmable Interrupt Controller) and may help with a particular hardware configuration.
Forces to use PCI BIOS, and not to access the hardware device directly. For instance, this parameter may be used if the machine has a non-standard PCI host bridge. pci=nobios Disallows use of PCI BIOS; only direct hardware access methods are allowed. For instance, this parameter may be used if you experience crashes upon boot-up, probably caused by the BIOS. pci=biosirq Uses PCI BIOS calls to get the interrupt routing table.
Backing up to a network share • 45 26.
Creating BartPE disc with Acronis True Image Home • 128 Full backups to Acronis Secure Zone with automatic deletion • 118 Creating bootable media • 16, 126 Full backups with automatic deletion on quota violation • 117 Creating custom algorithms of data destruction • 177, 179 Creating Linux-based rescue media • 126 Creating new partitions • 172 Creating scheduled tasks • 111 Creating WinPE-based rescue media • 130 Customer technical support • 15 D Data recovery with Acronis True Image Home • 85 Deciding
Introduction • 9 L Limitations in using Acronis Universal Restore • 26 Program workspace • 32 Providing a comment • 76 Proxy settings • 62 Purpose of Acronis Universal Restore • 25 Local storage settings • 81 R M Recommendations on selecting data for storing online • 55 Main screens • 35 Making reserve copies of your backups • 63 Managing Acronis Nonstop Backup storage • 53 Managing Acronis Secure Zone • 22, 121 Recovering a data partition or disk • 50, 90 Recovering a disk backup to a different cap
Scheduling tasks • 22, 57, 72, 111 Searching • 36, 143 Searching backup archives and their content • 143 Security • 165 Security and Privacy Tools • 175 Supported storage media • 14, 39, 71, 91, 93, 95 System Clean-up • 180 System Clean-up Wizard settings • 181 System requirements and supported media • 13 Selecting a disk/partition to recover • 97 T Selecting a hard disk • 172 Selecting a target disk/partition • 98 Testing bootable rescue media • 27, 28, 42, 85 Selecting archive location • 70 The bac
What to exclude • 74, 77 Windows Search and Google Desktop integration • 144 WinPopup notification • 156 Working with vhd files • 134 204 Copyright © Acronis, Inc.
