Backup/Image Software Recommendations?

So now that I've got my DCS system up & running satisfactorily (after admittedly too much $$$ spent and copious amounts of tweaking) it's time to think backup, especially my Win10 drive... any recommendations out there for what gamers/simmers are using to back up systems nowadays? Something that works well w/ SSD's and is suitably configurable so I can ensure it's not running in the background (to keep the system as lean as possible for DCS)?

Acronis True Image seems to get some positive reviews... anyone have a recommendations they're happy with? Unhappy with? tried & true? thanks!

More detailed research seems to net that the Acronis solution has a heavy footprint on the system...so maybe not.

Anyone use the built-in Windows 10 backup/system/restore point capability? Reliable? Dependable?

Maybe I'm overthinking it but after all the work getting this system running well and seeing some recent horror stories on these forums about seemingly innocuous driver updates screwing up some peoples performance I'm terrified of some automated (or unforeseen) Oculus or nVidia update introducing something I can't rollback from so I'm keen to figure this out sooner rather than later...

I use both and I like both, Acronis can do more, a lot more, but for 0 pennies the Win10 backup software is OK too.

It depends what and how you want to Backup.

Using Acronis WS 12.5 with an Ultimate Lic for all modules.

I use both and I like both, Acronis can do more, a lot more, but for 0 pennies the Win10 backup software is OK too.

 

It depends what and how you want to Backup.

 

Using Acronis WS 12.5 with an Ultimate Lic for all modules.

Right on - interesting and good to know thanks for the feedback. I'm pretty much just interested in taking/making sporadic restore points (mostly of the C:/ O.S. drive) so I can

a. rollback to a previous safe restore point say if a driver, firmware update or service pack or something introduces instability, poor perf, etc.

b. restore the whole C: (O.S. drive) if the SSD gets corrupted or hosed somehow (I have 2 SSD's one dedicated to the O.S. the other to games/sims/everything else so I would deem this as pretty rare/catastrophic)

I don't think I want/need fancy incremental backups or anything like that, especially if it introduces background processes that would impact perf (given I'm trying to maximize available resources for VR). Just be able to take a backup occasionally and I update a driver that sucks have the ability to easily rollback to a previous stable image.

I think I need to understand better if the Win10 backup mechanism is able to image (and if need be restore) the whole bootable C: drive or is it just a "Windows only" restore point?

Here's what I do with Acronis. I turn off everything but the manual backup process. I turn off malware protection, live backups, and I don't even schedule an incremental backup. I manually do a full backup. It's saved me right now because it looks like there is a WMR bug with 1903 vs 1809 version of Windows. And I've been booting back and forth between the two thanks to Acronis.

What I *hate* about Acronis is that it won't let me get rid of the system tray icon. I *know* it's a small thing, but I hate when vendors assume I want something for my own good. And remember, I've turned all the services off and yet i can't get rid of the icon. This is all in Acronis 2018 version.

I've used them for years and it works.

Here's what I do with Acronis. I turn off everything but the manual backup process. I turn off malware protection, live backups, and I don't even schedule an incremental backup. I manually do a full backup. It's saved me right now because it looks like there is a WMR bug with 1903 vs 1809 version of Windows. And I've been booting back and forth between the two thanks to Acronis.

 

What I *hate* about Acronis is that it won't let me get rid of the system tray icon. I *know* it's a small thing, but I hate when vendors assume I want something for my own good. And remember, I've turned all the services off and yet i can't get rid of the icon. This is all in Acronis 2018 version.

 

I've used them for years and it works.

EXCELLENT! Your scenario is the exact one I want to defend against and it's good to hear to you can drastically slim down all of that Acronis "heavy footprint". All I want is manual backups and the ability to reliably restore when $%^&** Facebook decides I need an unsolicited Oculus update.

As for the system tray icon... trust me I feel your pain ... I can't for the life of me get the Asus mb/system update app to NOT load on start up but that's just the OCD in me talking. :D

Good stuff thanks!

EXCELLENT! Your scenario is the exact one I want to defend against and it's good to hear to you can drastically slim down all of that Acronis "heavy footprint". All I want is manual backups and the ability to reliably restore when $%^&** Facebook decides I need an unsolicited Oculus update.

 

As for the system tray icon... trust me I feel your pain ... I can't for the life of me get the Asus mb/system update app to NOT load on start up but that's just the OCD in me talking. :D

 

Good stuff thanks!

Asus Update Icon....easy.:

- Go to Install/Remove Software - > Choose Asus Ai Suite uninstall -> Popup shows up with a selection of Asus Ai Suite Tools you want to uninstall, choose Updater and click Uninstall.

To Acronis:

It has never let me down either when I had to rely on it's functionality. I used it for Servers mostly, Exchange and SQL modules as well, all that stuff. It always recovered what it should when it needed to.

Its GUI got improved and overall it has less bugs in the management interface than the previous years. I can now safely delete old jobs and they are GONE...LoL...that wasnt always the case.

I have dealt with their Support a few times. That part got worse when it moved away from Germany. The software got better.

I do not backup my System with it, just folders and VM's. I reinstall from a fresh USB copy and hardly ever use an image for my own needs. I just need the raw data, no mail, no databases.

With backup software you easily overdo the whole idea and end up in data chaos, I make a full backup once a week and an incremental one every day and also only keep that stuff for 2 weeks. I call it my standby fast access backup.

I wish they had something like Apples Time Machine, that is by far the most user friendly, full featured backupsoftware I have seen that is included and embedded in the OS and Firmware.

Acronis is very fast, it's a well optimized software. I like that too

...

I wish they had something like Apples Time Machine, that is by far the most user friendly, full featured backupsoftware I have seen that is included and embedded in the OS and Firmware.

...

I concur. Only when it doesn't want to work anymore, it's sometimes really difficult to fix it.

For my Windows machine I use AOMEI which works pretty well.

Asus Update Icon....easy.:

 

- Go to Install/Remove Software - > Choose Asus Ai Suite uninstall -> Popup shows up with a selection of Asus Ai Suite Tools you want to uninstall, choose Updater and click Uninstall.

 

^^ THIS!! ^^ :thumbup:

Sounds like you pretty much can't go wrong with Acronis for $50... even if I only use a fraction of the features regularly...

Thanks for the input all!

EXCELLENT! Your scenario is the exact one I want to defend against and it's good to hear to you can drastically slim down all of that Acronis "heavy footprint". All I want is manual backups and the ability to reliably restore when $%^&** Facebook decides I need an unsolicited Oculus update.

 

As for the system tray icon... trust me I feel your pain ... I can't for the life of me get the Asus mb/system update app to NOT load on start up but that's just the OCD in me talking. :D

 

Good stuff thanks!

If you decide to go that route, post here. I'll give you the KB article that shows you what to turn off.

And that's exactly how I use it. Full backup on demand. And Restore whichever. Their universal boot/restore is pretty good too.

If you decide to go that route, post here. I'll give you the KB article that shows you what to turn off.

 

And that's exactly how I use it. Full backup on demand. And Restore whichever. Their universal boot/restore is pretty good too.

Oh please post...purchased, downloaded and installed True Image 2019 earlier today and got a full C: backup and bootable rescue restore setup on a USB stick. I like it... Straightforward enough to use but yeah damn there’s a lot going on in the background LOL. This evenings research was going to be how to now lean things out. If you have a KB article I’m all ears!

How to disable Active Protection: https://kb.acronis.com/content/60190

Services to kill: https://kb.acronis.com/content/60222/

One final thing. If you need to grab a file, just double click on the backup file and you can grab individual files from it. Also, I set my back OPTION, Advanced, to validate the backup after the backup. Small price in time for a piece of mind.

How to disable Active Protection: https://kb.acronis.com/content/60190

 

Services to kill: https://kb.acronis.com/content/60222/

 

One final thing. If you need to grab a file, just double click on the backup file and you can grab individual files from it. Also, I set my back OPTION, Advanced, to validate the backup after the backup. Small price in time for a piece of mind.

Excellent thank you. That autorun utility looks like a helpful one to have regardless of Acronis...

This is great info thanks again for passing along!

I dont know how big the Home Users product footprint is as I am using ( I check3d what its actually called ) Acronis 12.5 with a Universal License ( downgrade from Server lic with everything ). it just works great, even on a WS/Gamerig w/o dedup and such gimmicks.

Dedup is one of their best features, meanwhile it's very useable. But it requires a full blown SQL setup and best a ded. backup SRV with 1GB RAM per TB in dedup.....that would be too much for my personal needs ;)

Excellent thank you. That autorun utility looks like a helpful one to have regardless of Acronis...

 

This is great info thanks again for passing along!

Sooooo many useful utilities by SysInternals. Process Explorer, and ZoomIt. If you do *any* kind of technical presentations, ZoomIt is a MUST.

Have fun!

out of several backup utils I have tried acronis was the best , been using it for over 12 years now

out of several backup utils I have tried acronis was the best , been using it for over 12 years now

I have to agree. Late to the conversation but Acronis is excellent and well worth every penny. I use it in different ways on different machines and send the backups to everything from flash drives to my NAS boxes. I have only had to do a recovery from an Acronis backup once, but it worked flawlessly. If memory serves I have been using it for close to fifteen years.

Yeah I ended up pulling the trigger on Acronis True Image 2019 and it’s just as advertised. Ironically enough I’ve already put it to the acid test :doh:

After installing and taking a baseline (clean/stable) image (thankfully onto a rescue/bootable USB stick) I started messing around with disabling some of the background services and checking things off using the Autoruns tool mentioned above. Welllllllllll I mustve got super overzealous and managed to get Win10 into an unbootable state... tried like mad to reset the services I disabled in “safe mode’ but no dice. So I fired up USB stick and did a full restore...

Hey at least now I know it works lol... I’d definitely recommend it (and also recommend a bit more care using Autoruns)

Yeah I ended up pulling the trigger on Acronis True Image 2019 and it’s just as advertised. Ironically enough I’ve already put it to the acid test :doh:

 

After installing and taking a baseline (clean/stable) image (thankfully onto a rescue/bootable USB stick) I started messing around with disabling some of the background services and checking things off using the Autoruns tool mentioned above. Welllllllllll I mustve got super overzealous and managed to get Win10 into an unbootable state... tried like mad to reset the services I disabled in “safe mode’ but no dice. So I fired up USB stick and did a full restore...

 

Hey at least now I know it works lol... I’d definitely recommend it (and also recommend a bit more care using Autoruns)

I'm the "tech support" for my extended family. And we have some retail stores in the family. Wouldn't you know that on Black Friday, the POS server died. I raced over and had it recovered w/ no loss of data in about an hour. And like bitmaster said, it worked with MSSQL flawlessly.

Whew!

I just use Windows 10 system image utility and back everything up onto a 2TB external HDD. I only do it after a large download from DCS - terrain, large update, or new version. The drive is then unplugged and put back in the drawer.

Takes about three hours to back up the entire image as everything is completely overwritten each time.

Never had cause to use it in anger yet, but it is an insurance policy against a very poor internet connection.

I'm the "tech support" for my extended family.

There should be a support group for us. I am the 'IT Guy' for family, friends and neighbors. If I was willing to charge them for my time I would be quite rich. ;)

same here, cry

I use "ROBOCOPY" command in my own scripts for weekly backups on my synology NAS, and I boot on a linux usb key every 3 monthes to do a full backup with "DD" command.

You also have the possibility to use COBIAN BACKUP 11, wonderfull tool, but no more supported.

I've also used Acronis in the past, it did a perfect job and saved my ass :).

I once had a customer who told me to back up his files. All sorts of them in many different locations, Win98 likely back then iirc. He gave me sheet full of folder names that I had to back up.

Once I was done I asked him to verify I had everything as I was about to format the drive.

He was reading email on his new computer and briefly checked the files I copied, said yes and went on reading.

After I was done reinstalling the old machine for a different purpose he came over fom his desk and asked me where the South Africa holiday pics were. I asked him " WHICH PICTURES ?"

Long story short, he forgot to name them. I didnt back them up, all photos GONE.

We both learned from that disaster. I always tell everybody that I do a backup for " Tell me what and where !. LoL

Other Backup story:

I lately recovered a Tobit Groupware Storage node on a new server.

The restore went fine, what wasn't intended was to restore and re-process the OUTBOX :)

I sent out 5k mails in VERY short time until our mail-relay admin sent a mail asking "WTF ?"

ooops , hehe.

The boss said" Well done, cheap advertising" HAHA

many many years ago I used acronis to handle doing backup for 650 machines across 2 sites using the remote managment console , its great stuff