How to backup a Rollback RX Disk?

[Masterblaster]

I just purchased a second HDD. I have RRX on my main drive. Do I need to do anything special when backing up a HDD with RRX installed on it?

[pvsurfer]

Originally Posted by Masterblaster

I just purchased a second HDD. I have RRX on my main drive. Do I need to do anything special when backing up a HDD with RRX installed on it?

Hi Masterblaster,

I'm kind of confused here so forgive me if I wind up telling you something you already know.

You can't install RBRx on your 2nd HDD (it only works on your C-drive). There are many ways to backup your 2nd drive and if it is mainly used for data you could probably just archive it (using a free archiver such as 7zip) to an external drive. If it will largely hold music/photo files (which are already compressed), you can just copy them to an external drive.

Re your main drive (with RBRx), I strongly suggest using a disk-image backup program (there are a great many of those). However, the presence of RBRx complicates the backup procedure, so it's important to understand how to use disk-imaging with an RBRx installation!

In order to backup your C-drive with RBRx and all of its snapshots you must first bootup into another OS (such as BartPE/WinPE/Linux) and run an all-sectors (sometimes called sector-by-sector, raw mode, maintenance mode or forensic mode) backup of your C-drive from that 'other' OS. This method takes more time (and space) then the next method, but upon restoring the image you won't have to do anything else. This method is a piece of cake with a relatively small C-partition (which I advocate for anyone using this backup method). I backup my C-partition using this method every week.

If you would rather do the more typical (just Windows' used sectors) disk-image backup from within Windows (with RBRx installed), you will wind up just backing up the current RBRx snapshot (all older snapshots will be gone). While on the surface this approach seems a lot easier than the above method, upon restoring this image you would probably have to perform a FIXMBR and you will definitely have to reinstall RBRx! But since most people don't restore very often, this approach may be preferable as it creates a smaller backup image than that above and therefore it's also the faster of the two methods!

Hth,
pv

[Masterblaster]

Thanks for the great post.
I was hoping for something a bit easier and more automated.

[pvsurfer]

Originally Posted by Masterblaster

Thanks for the great post.
I was hoping for something a bit easier and more automated.

That would be nice, but I can tell you for a fact - no such 'something' exists for RBRx users!

If you don't use RBRx (or similar products) there are simpler and automated drive-backup solutions available ...but not when using RBRx (unfortunately)...

pv

[tubby]

-Is it true that Rollback Rx ver 10.0 (due 6/11) along with Drive Cloner Rx, will allow Rollback with all it's snapshots to survive the imaging process?

tubby

[carfal]

That's what it says here.

So it must be true

[pvsurfer]

Originally Posted by tubby

-Is it true that Rollback Rx ver 10.0 (due 6/11) along with Drive Cloner Rx, will allow Rollback with all it's snapshots to survive the imaging process?

tubby

Someday (maybe) ...if and when it happens, I'll be one of the first in line!

[Baldrick]

Originally Posted by tubby

-Is it true that Rollback Rx ver 10.0 (due 6/11) along with Drive Cloner Rx, will allow Rollback with all it's snapshots to survive the imaging process?

tubby

If this is indeed the case then I will certainly seriously consider dropping Acronis TI (which I currently use only for full image backups).