Solved Backup Questions

Hi everyone.

I currently have a Carbonite subscription which is ending soon, and I don't plan to renew it.

After doing some reading, it seems I should make a disk image of my hard drive (about 100GB used out of 1TB). So, I bought a 2TB external hard drive for the image (so I'd have room to grow!), and a 32GB thumb drive for a bootable. Then I bought Acronis True Image (the name changed the following day after I bought it!), but couldn't get it to work so I got a refund and pulled the software off my computer.

I researched other software, but haven't found another backup solution. Some softwares have such horrible user reviews (Idrive, AOMEI, etc) I'm afraid to try them.

What I'd really like is a simple, all in one solution that creates the disk image on my external drive, and saves the image and my files to the cloud, with incremental backups. Basically, set it and forget it. But there seems to be very few softwares that do this, and the few I've found that do don't have good reviews from users.

So, I thought maybe instead of an all in one software (that doesn't seem to exist), maybe I could use one software to create the image, and then another (cloud backup) to get it into the cloud along with my files.

Does this seem like a good solution? If my hard drive crashed or just didn't boot up, or I had ransomeware on my computer, how would I get my image out of the cloud and onto my computer? I'm clueless as to how this works. And what about the bootable? Should I store that in the cloud too? Or would I just use the thumb drive for that?

I'm using Windows 10, and I've read that I can use Windows Backup and Restore to create a disk image, but I've also read that has been phased out (perhaps that's why it still says Windows 7?). So I'm not sure that's a good option either. And I don't use OneDrive.

I was thinking maybe I could use EaseUs ToDo Backup to create the image, and then use a separate cloud service like Mega or PCloud or IceDrive to store the image, in addition to storing it on my external drive. Would that work? The EaseUS software seems to have decent reviews, and from what I've read it's pretty easy to use.

Or do I need to make a disk image at all? I've got my Windows disk and key, but if something happens to them, then what?

I don't mind paying for software if it's the right solution, as long as the price is reasonable. In fact, I planned to buy software rather than use any free version because support is important to me and often freeware leaves out important features like encryption.

Last, my pc is both my home computer and my business computer, so I need a solid solution or if something happens I'm in trouble on both fronts!

Thanks for your help!

Bastet said:

Have you tried Macrium Reflect free?

Macrium Reflect Free Trials

Macrium Reflect - Incredibly powerful software that allows you to create and schedule effective backups

www.macrium.com

Yes, an image backup is essential in case of hardware failure or serious Windows problems which prevent booting. You can just restore the image or in the case of HD failure just replace the drive & then restore the image.
You can use the Windows installation disk to clean install Windows but you’d have to reinstall all your programs & personal files which could take days depending on how many files & programs you have.
You should create Macrium’s boot USB in case of HD failure, you can then use this to boot the PC after replacing the drive in order to restore the image.
You can create a schedule to image the PC.

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Hello!

Thank you for your reply. I've looked at Macrium, but I've read it's difficult to use for non-techies. Do you think this is so? If I have detailed instructions that walk me through it, maybe I can do it. That's what I did with Acronis. I got on YouTube and followed a step by step walk though. But, Acronis had a very nice and user friendly interface.

Once I've made the image, should I store it in the cloud as well as on my external drive? And can I store my files on my external drive with the image, or should I only store the image on the external drive?

Thanks so much for answering!

Bastet said:

Once the backup schedule is set then it’ll backup automatically.
You should store the image on the external hard drive, you could copy the image to cloud storage also If you wish.
Yes I store File History files as well as other files on the same drive.
Here’s their knowledgebase:

Macrium Reflect KnowledgeBase - Knowledgebase 8.0 - Macrium Reflect Knowledgebase

knowledgebase.macrium.com

This is for ver 8 Which hasn’t been officially released for the free version yet but if you run the trial version & allow it to expire then you’ll have the free version 8.
How to create your first image:

Macrium Reflect Quick Start - Knowledgebase 8.0 - Macrium Reflect Knowledgebase

knowledgebase.macrium.com

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Ok. I was thinking it would be good to store the image in a cloud backup as well as on the external drive so I'd have an extra copy. Do you know of a cloud service that can upload an image and do incremental backups of it? I know this is possible with many services for files, but it seems not many services will do this for OS or images.

Also, do you know if there is information how to restore the image from a cloud service? I know I would need Macrium to make it work, but not sure how that works with an image in the cloud.

I will look at the knowledge base link you gave. Thank you!

I looked up "cloud" in the Macrium forum. It can be done, but to restore I would need to download the image to an external drive apparently. I'm ok with that. I really just want to be able to store the image in 2 places - external drive and cloud.

This is why I haven't looked at Macrium. There are other softwares that will store directly to the cloud (most of those that do use Google Drive, One Drive, and Dropbox, and many use Amazon S3, and some will let you use any cloud service with WEBDAV) - both your image and your files. Ashampoo is one of them, but it's got bad user reviews. I've yet to find one that has mostly good reviews (I always expect a few bad reviews - especially if the software is popular or has many reviews).

I will peruse the Macrium forum a bit more today to see what I can find out.

Also, while I was researching yesterday, I came across a software (don't remember which one) and a comment where the commenter said it was professional software for professionals, and if someone is a non-techie they could end up wiping their entire hard drive with it by accident. The commenter recommended non-techies use something more user friendly. That is another concern I have with Macrium. But it looks like with version 8 they've improved their UI, so maybe I'll give it a closer look.

I've been researching for two weeks solid, and I really just want to get it done and move on!

Thanks!

Bastet said:

It can be daunting to try something like backing up a PC for the first time using software. If the in-built backup wasn’t deprecated & was reliable then no doubt that would be simpler.
Within the Macrium interface there’ll be two options under the drive containing Windows - Clone this drive & Image this drive, you would click on image & ensure all partitions are ticked so they’re included in the image. It will then guide you through running the backup by asking you for the destination for the image (your external drive) & whether you’d like to backup on a schedule (yes), this will then offer several choices in a drop-down menu. The most popular is ’Grandfather, Father & Son’ Grandfather is the First image, Father is Differential which are the subsequent images & are the changes since the full image. Son is incremental images but is only available in the paid version & contains only the changes since the last incremental backup so is much quicker.
I have the schedule set to run a Grandfather image on the 1st of every month, Father on every Monday & Son every Tuesday to Friday.

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Thank you for such a clear explanation! If you're not already, you should be making YouTube videos!

That said, coming from Carbonite, where I don't look at my backed up files ever and only think about backup when it's time to renew my subscription, this sound a little complicated and time intensive. But, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe it's just set it up once, and then forget about it? Only problem there is I'd probably forget about it forever, since no renewal notice would come.

I wonder if, after creating the image, I could back it up to a folder that syncs with a cloud service. Macrium wouldn't need to image the cloud directly. It would just put the image in a folder on my PC (this would be done AFTER I saved an image to my external drive). Then the cloud, which would be synced to the folder or have access to it, would upload the image from there.

Then, when I needed the image, I could use Macrium to boot my system, and then get the image from the cloud back to the folder (assuming my external drive didn't work for some reason).

Maybe???

Bruce said:

while maybe not a solution for the OP, or for everyone, I'll tell you the software I use.

once every couple of months I'll snapshot my system using Macrium.
this is my go-to when the system goes pear-shaped or to back out of some failed driver/Windows update.
if I'm changing PC's or simply want to refresh my system with a clean install of Windows, I don't use this backup image, I reload all software afresh.

then daily or so, I use a program called Vice-Versa, cost something like $AUD70 and I bought it about 15 years ago. I like it because it simply copies your files, as is, to your chosen location.

system imaging, while nice, is not critical in my opinion. it's your data files you want to secure.

I've also started to use OneDrive a lot, mainly to have access to my files regardless of my location and it's a good system as well.

I've found, with backups, you have to find a process that works for you, as there tends not to be a 'one size fits all' solution.

the important thing is that you at least do them!
regularly!
and check the files are in the target location, readable and recoverable!

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Hello Bruce.

All responses are helpful, so thank you for your input!

Here's a question. I read somewhere that making an image doesn't matter, because you would have to put in your Windows disk to restore windows anyway. That makes no sense to me. But maybe it does to you?

I thought with a disk image, once you get your system to boot, you could just upload the image (Ok, I admit I don't know where to upload it to, but I guess I'd figure that out when the time comes), and then everything is back on your computer and you're good to go - provided your image is a recent one of course.

For a while I considered BackBlaze (NOT the B2 service), but as I was looking at reviews for that someone mentioned that if you need your files from there, BB sends you a big zip file and then it's up to you to put everything back to where it was. And I thought, Holy moly!!! In this day and age there's got to be something better than that! And then I found out about disk imaging.

I could subscribe to a cloud backup service, like Mega, and have all my files automatically backed up. That's an easy one. It's getting the image into the cloud, so I have more than one copy in more than one place, that's hard.

I've been considering EaseUS Todo Backup. I just found out that as of August 25th, they now have internal backup to the cloud. They're using Amazon S3. They say on the website they give you 1TB of space. But, they don't have a page where you can see what it would cost to buy more. I don't even know if there are more options. Maybe it's still too new. This would get me started. And their reviews on TrustPilot are decent. They seem to have very good support, which is important to me. Thinking I'll see if I can find a walk-through on YouTube.

Bruce said:

having an image of your system creates a snapshot, a point in time, of your PC at the moment of the snapshot.
you don't need the Windows disc when restoring from a snapshot, although Windows may need to be re-activated, it all depends on what triggers MS into thinking what has changed (if anything).

you could upload the image once created but the upload, and subsequent download when required, would kill you unless you had a great internet connection. then of course you also need a PC to use to access this uploaded snapshot.

far better to have on hand an external USB drive with the image on, which can be booted to from the BIOS when the time comes. and this external drive can also be a backup medium. two birds - one stone!

I'd be considering, with your setup, having an external drive that you manage yourself.
depending on the importance you place on your data, maybe even getting two - one kept onsite for daily/weekly backups, and another kept offsite for safer storage and used for monthly backups - that sort of thing.

and adding some extra redundancy to the mix: also keeping some/all of your files in OneDrive or the ones you want to access remotely. horses for courses, and as I've said, each to their own, whatever gets the job done.

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Thank you, Bruce.

Yes, I understand that uploading/downloading an image can take several hours to many days, and sometimes even weeks! I believe I do have a great internet connection, though I have nothing to compare it to. But, my internet runs pretty fast most of the time in my opinion.

I was just looking at a video on YouTube about Ashampoo Pro 15, and the guy in the video says it can take anywhere from 15 minutes to two hours to create an image. I'm assuming that includes putting it somewhere - an external hard drive, or cloud, or wherever. That's amazingly fast compared to the other software I've looked at.

As for the PC to use after I download the image, I have read about that. But, I've also read that there is a way around it. I think that's what the bootable thumb drive or disk is for. EaseUS ToDo Backup allows you to access the image without an additional PC. At least, as I understand it. I believe Ashampoo does too. I'll have to check that out.

I do have a brand new, 2TB external hard drive. I plan to put the image (assuming I create one) on it, and all my files. And, as I've said, I also plan to store everything in the cloud as well. Storing everything on two external drives, and having one off site and then having to retrieve it for back-ups is just too much of a hassle. I will, however, unplug my external drive once I've got the image/files on it and then only plug it in for incremental back-ups.

I'm not crazy about OneDrive. I'm looking at other options for cloud backups.

Thanks again for your input. I'll look into the extra pc issue. If this gets too complicated I'll just scrap the whole idea and just do file backup on my external and in the cloud.

Rustys said:

To play devils advocate here and some are worst case scenarios.

Your computer crashes and you go to restore the computer and the 2 TB is not working now what?

Can not access the cloud backup with out a working system that can access the internet.


I agree have never like OnDrive although have used it for temporary storage.

The other thing that you have to think about is how much cloud storage do you need and depending on that how much cleaning will you need to do to keep form running out.


So how important is your data?
You have not done the cloud back up yet for what ever reason.
House is flooded and or worse destroyed and now the system and drives are gone now what?


Which is what I do.

I have three 1 TB USB HDD that I rotate through keeping the one off site rotating it in once a month (give or take).
Several thumb drive to store person files on and downloads.
Cloud for file transfers and some storage.

Have I had one of the drive(s) die yes.

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Hi Rustys. Thanks for your valuable input!

I never thought about the external not working, though I've read it's happened to someone. So, that's a good point. If that were to happen after an internal crash, hopefully the bootable media (thumbdrive) would get my computer working to where I could access the cloud. I'm not really sure how that works, but my understanding is that this is what bootable media does - it gets your computer to boot up if the hard drive crashes. Of course, from there I'm not sure what to do or what happens next.

As for storage, right now my external 2TB hard drive is blank because it's new. I only have one internal drive - C - and it's got about 100GB on it. So, at the moment I don't need a ton of storage. But, I do want the option for more because I use my computer for both home and business, and I don't know exactly what my future needs will be. So, for now I'd probably want around 500GB of cloud storage, but with the option of upgrading to more as needed. I like Mega because it offers up to 16TB on it's personal plan, and up to 10PB on it's business plan. I doubt I'll ever need even 16TB, but it's nice to have the option.

However, Mega does have a lot of bells and whistles I don't need - like chat. So, I'm not completely sold on them yet. I'm still looking at options.

How important is my data? Important enough for me to be here asking these questions! But, I've also learned that sometimes, in spite of your best efforts, things happen and you just have roll with the punches. So, if I lost everything, I'd start fresh. No other option. But, hopefully that will be prevented once I implement a new backup plan.

Regarding not having done the backup yet, I am backing up via Carbonite right now. My current subscription ends in November and I don't plan to renew. So I'm trying to find a better option.

If my house was flooded or destroyed I doubt my data would be the first thing on my mind. But, when I got around to it I would just consider it a catastrophic loss and start fresh with a new computer and hard drive. And once I had Windows installed again (I'd probably just buy the new version at that point), I would access whatever cloud backup I had to download my files. And I'd access Chrome to get my apps back. Not really sure how I'd use a system image in this case.

I know the files I've created are my main priority over creating an image. I'm going to look at cloud backup today.

Bruce said:

as a timing guide, when I take an image on my home or work PC, Macrium takes between 7 to 12 minutes.
the image on both systems ends up around the 45GB range.
the image gets created on to the 2nd internal drive.

and as to offsite backups, the file backup program I use, ViceVersa, backs up to a 2-bay NAS unit onsite.
it allows profiles to be used, so the daily profile goes to the NAS, and the weekly profile dumps to an external USB drive.
I have three of them which I rotate regularly.

and don't forget - offsite doesn't have to be a hassle to swap the drives, one of my offsites I keep at work and the other I keep in the car. so they are always dead easy to get to. but you could also use your neighbours house and any other location you frequently go to.

to some, all this may sound over the top, but trust me, you will live or die by your backups (or lack of).
they are literally your digital life insurance - you'll go ages (years) of never needing one, wondering why you waste all that time and energy doing them, then one day - POW - house burns down, you escape with only the kids and the clothes on your back (and the *** **** cat!) and think you have lost all those family albums, birth photos, wedding shots, tax records, video and music library, password list, documents etc only to remember that you did a backup last week and put the drive next door!

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Hi Bruce.

Yes, back-ups are very important. Even the minor things I have on my computer I wouldn't want to lose. That's why I'm looking into new options. ;-)

I could store an external drive in my vehicle, but that seems risky to me. What if my vehicle gets broken into? If I were going to store an external drive somewhere offsite, it would be in a safe deposit box. That would be safest I think.

I could also store them with relatives. But it would still be a hassle to go get the drives every time I need to do a backup.

Bruce said:

to me the security of the second location is not important, in fact any location doesn't matter, even the primary one of the original data.

the important consideration is that both locations are not effected by the same disaster.
having the original location in the PC, and the second on an external drive kept next to the PC, and a third in the car downstairs in the garage and a fourth next door at the neighbours is useless if they all get taken out by the same disaster - flood, earthquake, bush fire!

obviously they are extreme scenarios and you should absolutely try to protect yourself against the most common circumstances in the order of the chances of them occurring.
so for me, hard drive failure, theft and loss of property (either house or car) should cover 99% of the reasons I would ever want to restore data from any one of my backup mediums.

whatever gives you that warm and fuzzy feeling and will actually be able to restore your data come D-day is what you are chasing - and that can be a very subjective goal.

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Thank you, Bruce. You are absolutely right.

I'm just having such a difficult time finding the right software. I've given up on sending an image to the cloud at this point. As for creating an image on my external hard drive and sending files to the cloud, either the softwares seem too difficult, or they're enterprise solutions, or they have horrible reviews due to no support and/or bad business policies.

I want an easy, no hassle, set it and forget it solution that will let me easily restore my data (if not my operating system and apps). Beyond that I'd like excellent support by phone, or chat, and it would be nice if the company had an easy way for me to cancel if I want to.

Acronis had all that. I found it easy to use, and it seemed it would be easy to restore with it too. Their support was very helpful, and when I requested a refund it showed up in my bank account as soon as I was off the phone. I was truly blown away by that. Unfortunately, I only had the software for about 24 hours because it just didn't work on my computer. From reading reviews, it seems it hasn't worked for a lot of people.

So I guess that's my last criteria. The software has to to work!