Acronis True Image - Recommended settings?

[Fjodor2001]

Hi,

For those who use Acronis True Image as backup solution, I just wonder what settings you use for your scheduled backup tasks?

In my case, I intend to have:

A) Monthly backups of the OS and all data on the drive that the OS is installed on (except the data that is backed up daily)
B) Daily backup of the most import data (e-mails, documents etc)

Now, I have some questions about what settings to use for those backup tasks. So far I have considered the following two options:

1. Choose "Incremental + Create a new full backup after e.g. 30 incremental backups + Delete previous backup archive". Also do not configure any "Automatic consolidation".

2. Choose the same settings as in 1), but do not select "Delete previous backup archive". Instead configure an "Automatic consolidation" option.

Which of the configurations above whould you recommend?

Also, what is actually meant my "consolidation" of backups? Are the backups that don't fit simply deleted? If so, how does that work togethether with the "Delete previous backup archive option" mentioned above? Do you normally only use one of them?

Thanks!

 

[George P Burdell]

I use the bootable version of Acronis to image my OS drive every 2-3 weeks. I keep the last two images (both from full backups). I may start doing weekly incremental backups using Acronis from within Windows, but I'll stick to the bootable version for full images.

Aside: Acronis 2010 bootable seems much faster than earlier versions (or I was doing something wrong). 2009 and earlier would run for 30-40 minutes to backup a 40GB OS (and extra time to verify image), while Acronis 2010 images and verifies in less than 10 minutes.

 

[Fjodor2001]

Seems like your backup strategy is very different from mine. ^_^

BTW: How come you do not backup from within Windows? Doesn't the bootable version of Acronis require you to manually boot from a backup CD or similar? That does not sound as convenient as a "configure and forget" solution?

 

[Miramonti]

Set and forget scheduling of acronis is what makes it great and is what has saved my @ss many times. I use 'incremental' (don't know anything about 'consolidate' feature in my 2007 version). This way if I have 20 increments, I can go back as far as I need to in order to return to state before any issues began. I'm more of a backup hawk tho...I run it on 2 main partitions 2x a week, while running windows system state backup 2x a week as well. This way if I can't boot or system is screwed up for some reason, I only have to go back a couple days at most.

When I get up to that many, I run a full verified backup to dvd, then erase all the increments and start over.

As for Acronis' System State backup, it sucks and I schedule Windows to do this instead. Reason is that you have to be in windows to restore it, which defeats the value of a system state backup when windows won't boot.

The most increments I've gotten up to and restored is 29, and restoring from it worked fine w/o issues.