Summary: After installing the application there's a critical step you need to take first, before even thinking about backing up.
Once you've installed Acronis True Image Home, the first step may not be what you might expect. Rather than thinking about what to backup, we need to first prepare for a restore.
(Second installment in the "Backing Up" series.)
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The scenario you want to be ready for is when your machine won't boot. Even if you have a backup, it's no good to you if you can't boot your machine and run software that would restore that backup.
Your first step, then, is to use Acronis' built in wizard to create a bootable CD.
(Downloadable mp4 - 5,647,195 bytes)
Transcript
Now that you've installed Acronis, there's actually a very important first step that you need to take before even backing up your machine.
And that is to create a Bootable Rescue Media.
What this wizard does is it creates a bootable CD, or the image of a bootable CD, that you would use in the case where you want to restore from a backup, but your machine won't boot.
In most cases, what you'll do is run through the wizard fairly quickly. The default options are pretty much what you want.
I have it create an ISO image.
And, in this particular case, that's my only option since this machine has no CD burner.
Once you've created the ISO image, you would then burn it to CD using a tool like Image Burn.
In this particular case, it's now asking me where I want to put it and what I want to call it.
I'm giving it a name, Acronis Rescue CD ISO.
These are a summary of the options that I've selected.
It's a fairly quick process to actually create the image.
All it's really done is created a 65 megabyte file.
Once completed, you can then, as I said, use a tool like Image Burn to write that to CD. I'll actually show that as a separate step later.
But, to reiterate, the important take-away here, is before even considering what and how and whether to backup, make sure that you create a bootable rescue media that you would use in the worst case when your machine doesn't boot.
Related:
The "How To Backup" Series
Installing Backup Software The first installment in our backing up series is to install backup software. We'll install Acronis TrueImage Home 2009.
Creating Bootable Rescue Media using Acronis TrueImage Home After installing the application there's a critical step you need to take first, before even thinking about backing up.
Making a Full Backup using Acronis TrueImage Our first step after installing Acronis and creating rescue media is to create a full backup.
Scheduling Automatic Backups with Acronis TrueImage Now that we've created our first full backup, it's time to let Acronis do it's job automatically - we'll schedule an automatic backup task.
Restoring A File Using Acronis TrueImage Home We have our backup program running, now it's time to try restoring a file from that backup.
Restoring An Image Using Acronis TrueImage Home Your machine has crashed, and the hard disk reformatted or replaced - it's time to restore your entire machine from an image.
What do I do with incremental backups when restoring? If you've been backing up regularly you'll probably have a full backup and a collection of incremental's. We'll look at how they're used.
Acronis TrueImage Home - Backup Software Acronis TrueImage Home is a cost-effective, easy to use, reliable backup software solution.
Article C3836 - August 11, 2009
I use Acronis but it is my understanding you can boot from the cd the software comes on. Why do you need to make a cd?
18-Aug-2009
Posted by: Terry Metcalf at August 18, 2009 10:19 AM
Acronis TI bootable CD does not work on my Toshiba laptop with SATA drive unless I change the properties of the drive in the BIOS (to non AHCI) and then I fall into other problems when I want to restart after replacing an image file for my C:.
Posted by: Henk at August 18, 2009 12:49 PMThere is a workaround though by not using a bootable CD--but then Windows on C: must still boot!
I too have tried to use Acronis on my Toshiba laptop without any sucess. It will not make proper backups on an external drive or my network drive. Their support personel were unable to solve the problem. In fact they did not even find a discussion thread on their own forum that was slightly helpful for over three months and it had been posted by one of their own personel. I am glad Acronis works for you but I have given up and gone to using Ghost which I use on my desktop computer. Ghost has work perfectly on the Toshiba. I asked Acronis for a refund but they will only keep sending me back to the same support personel that cannot solve the problem. I am not impressed with Acronis.
Posted by: Bob at August 18, 2009 4:36 PMI have Acrois TI Home and I did made a rescue cd. How often, if ever, must a new rescue cd be made? The cd I made was done this past May '09. Unlike periodic, or regular, backups I was wondering if the rescue cd also needed refreshing. Thanks.
19-Aug-2009
Posted by: Michael at August 18, 2009 8:14 PM
A few questions: is the bootable rescue media for booting into your OS? What specifically is included in this image(entire registry, software settings, ...)?
65 MB image? Can you use a (at least 65 MB) 256 MB or larger USB flash drive to have this image written to and booted from?
On my Attache' 1 GB flash drive it has, I think, a partition that is recognized as a CD. On systems which do not have the capability(BIOS or otherwise) to boot from USB and/or Flash drives...would this "CD" ~partition be a viable option for storing a bootable image? When you write an image on a flash drive and make it bootable, can you write additional information or delete the image?
20-Aug-2009
Posted by: snail at August 19, 2009 10:01 AM
The "Downloadable mp4" gave me a 2 min video with no picture and no sound. It used Windows Media Player.
20-Aug-2009
Posted by: Dave at August 20, 2009 12:12 AM
I am looking for your video on "how to restore an entire system image" using Acronis. If I remember correctly, you mentioned that there is one available, but I simply could not find it. I am no techee and just received a PC with WinXP and some software already installed, however, I have no access to the installation CDs (not for XP nor for any of the other programs). I would like to find out the steps to creating the DVDs, which will allow me to restore the entire disk drive (all I have is one hard drive with one partition: "C:") in case of a complete disaster. I would very much appreciate your help on this issue.
23-Sep-2009
Posted by: Bracha at September 22, 2009 8:20 AM
Hi Leo,
Thanks for the new video on restoring a full image using Acronis. Now that I have all the required steps, I tried the backup procedure. I installed the Software and that was successful, however, when I tried to create the Rescue disk (I am using a DVD+R CD), the process fails. I must say that I poked around the Web to find some Software which would allow me to create a bootable version of my XP OS and found BartPE. I used this Software and was successful in creating the bootable DVD using the same media. In other words, it does not seem like a media problem, but rather a Software issue. Any idea what could be the problem and how to resolve it, as I would very much like to have Acronis Software as my backup solution.
Thanks again for all your help.
24-Sep-2009
Posted by: Bracha at September 24, 2009 4:04 AM
Hi Leo,
Thanks for your prompt reply. Basically, all I do is place the DVD in the drive and activate the menu option in Acronis which attempts to create the Rescue disk. When prompted, I select the DVD media as the target (instead of an ISO file, which is the only other option). Then, I see a "Processing..." window with a green bar for about 45 seconds. As the bar reaches the end, I get the following message:
Bad Media! Provide another media and try again.
If I try it on a DVD which I had previously used to burn BartPE, Acronis detects that the media is not empty and prompts me to Format it. When I accept, it attempts the operation once more and displays the same message as above. Is it possible that the Rescue Disk media is limited to a specific format, e.g. CD-R and will not accept DVD as a media for this purpose?
Once again, your help would be greatly appreciated.
29-Sep-2009
Posted by: Bracha at September 29, 2009 12:17 AM
Hi Leo,
Just wanted to inform you (and all readers) that I was finally successful with the creation of the Rescue Media and then went on to create my first full backup. However, I had to perform 2 changes before succeeding:
1. Modify the default archive size under: Tools->Options->Default backup options->Archive splitting. Set it to: Fixed Size 4.7 GB DVD Drive.
2. Use DVD-R and not DVD+R media. Unfortunately, Acronis was not able to write to the DVD+R media (though other software packages were successful).
Is the above limitation a known issue? If so, do you know if it will be addressed in any future version?
Anyway, I have it working now and hopefully the backup content is in good shape, just in case...
Thanks again for all your help.
Posted by: Bracha at October 2, 2009 3:32 AM