"Rollback RX" and "Image For Windows"... perfect together??

[Froggie]

Yup, that's the big question we've been trying to answer in the following thread... ---Imaging a Rollback RS protected disk

Greetings all! Since the effort has grown and the topic is specific, I decided to start a separate thread concerning the compatibility of the Image For Windows product from TeraByte United and Rollback RX. If you were able to get through the above 218 post thread, you'll have noticed quite a bit of testing going on concerning various disk archiving applications, trying to find one that will successfully archive a Rollback RX protected partition/disk.

The most recent testing included the SUBJECT application from Terabyte United. My testing to date has shown that with some minor "tweaking," Image For Windows can successfully archive and restore a complete RBRX managed partition.

After many inquiries I have decided to document the procedure I used to perform the above mentioned task.

DISCLAIMER: This procedure worked for me and fullfilled my immediate requirements of being able to archive a RBRX protected environment while actively running on the same system being archived. IT MAY NOT WORK FOR EVERYONE. Take appropriate caution if you decide to try the process out. It's all very unsupported so be aware.

The document is a STRAWMAN... a DRAFT. Do not consider it final in any way until it's been vetted a bit by folks on this forum who are familiar with its function. I welcome comments, criticisms, suggestions for change... anything that may improve the document.

Here it is... keep in touch!

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/17664826/RBRX%20luvs%20IFW.pdf

[Owl]

Originally Posted by Froggie

My testing to date has shown that with some minor "tweaking," Image For Windows can successfully archive and restore a complete RBRX managed partition.

Can I just amplify that for new readers not familiar with the prior discussion:

As far as we can tell, at present Image For Windows is the only app that can successfully archive and restore a complete RBRx managed partition (including the full library of snapshots) from within Windows while Windows is running.

There are plenty of ways of doing it if you are prepared to boot a different environment for the disc imaging operation.

We are all duly grateful for the effort Froggie has put into testing this, and also Nexstar.

[Owl]

Originally Posted by Froggie

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/17664826/RBRX%20luvs%20IFW.pdf

Brilliant!

[pvsurfer]

Froggie,

A teriffic accomplishment, absolutely - also quite entertaining in your own inimitable way! ...I do have some questions:

Page 9.

I use only the FULL backup option. When backing up a full disk and or partition in UNUSED SECTORS mode (RAW, sector-by-sector, All sectors), any CHANGES ONLY backup will be quite large due to the RBRX database activity along with deletions and additions… I’m not sure there’s much gained in this mode with this option but YMMV

I'm not sure what you're getting at here - perhaps that there's not much to be gained by selecting Backup (Changes Only)? .....ie., don't bother doing incremental/differential backups? If I interpreted your point correctly, I can only comment that my DS differentials from outside of Windows are (usually) much smaller than a full backup!

Page 10. How come you don't select the entire HD 0 (incl. MBR)?

Page 16. Pray tell, why didn't you use the Restore (Automatic) option? As I'm not yet familiar with IFW, doesn't it allow the initiation of a restore from within Windows and then 'take over control' by automatically rebooting into DOS to perform the actual restore (ala DS)? ...or am I missing something here?

Thanks!
pv

[Owl]

Originally Posted by pvsurfer

I'm not sure what you're getting at here - perhaps that there's not much to be gained by selecting Backup (Changes Only)? .....ie., don't bother doing incremental/differential backups? If I interpreted your point correctly, I can only comment that my DS differentials from outside of Windows are (usually) much smaller than a full backup!

I'm not sure how you can do an incremental backup on a raw image? Only by reading the whole disc and comparing each sector byte-for-byte with the previous image to decide which sectors to re-image? Very, very slow.

[Froggie]

Originally Posted by pvsurfer

Froggie,

I do have some questions:

Page 9.
I'm not sure what you're getting at here - perhaps that there's not much to be gained by selecting Backup (Changes Only)? .....ie., don't bother doing incremental/differential backups? If I interpreted your point correctly, I can only comment that my DS differentials from outside of Windows are (usually) much smaller than a full backup!

That's why I said "your mileage may vary." The "1" time I did a "Changes Only" backup, my image was only a slight bit smaller than the original baseline I took. I really didn't pursue it that much but may in the future. If you guys are gonna play, post your experiences and I'll be happy to update the document to reflect our collective experience.

Originally Posted by pvsurfer

Page 10. How come you don't select the entire HD 0 (incl. MBR)?

IFW always saves the entire Track0 (MBR plus the next 62 sectors) of the HD, even when you've only selected a single or multiple partition backup... that's why the "Restore first track" option is available at the option window during the restore. You'll notice (I showed it in the picture) that when you only select a single partition, IFW will gray out the sections above it and put a check in the MBR field... it's implied.

You'll also find out when you read the document that there's a distinct difference between saving an entire HD (explicitlty CHECKing its CheckBox) and saving all the partitions on that HD (checking each partition box separately) in one operation. You cannot restore a single partition from an entire HD backup... but you can if you check all the partitions on that HD when you save it. When you check individual partitions, IFW will gray out what it thinks is important, but only CHCEK partitions... let IFW worry about MBRs, etc.

Originally Posted by pvsurfer

Page 16. Pray tell, why didn't you use the Restore (Automatic) option? As I'm not yet familiar with IFW, doesn't it allow the initiation of a restore from within Windows and then 'take over control' by automatically rebooting into DOS to perform the actual restore (ala DS)? ...or am I missing something here?

No, that's not what AUTOMATIC does in IFW. A "Restore (Automatic)" looks at the image your restoring and tries to determine all it needs to know about the restoration process... specifically where it's supposed to be restored to, etc. As such it never offers you the OPTION screen necessary to select partition Activation or restoration of the first track. If it can't figure out from the backup image where things should go, it drops into "Normal" mode and goes through all the documented windows.

I will assume at this point (haven't tested it yet) that if your restoration is going to the same physical disk/partition it came from and there's been no change to the partitioning of that disk or the MBR, the "Restore (Automatic)" function should work just fine. All it does is save a few steps during the restoration process (where to restore it and whether you want any of the options I normally use).

Hope this helps...

[Froggie]

Originally Posted by Owl

I'm not sure how you can do an incremental backup on a raw image? Only by reading the whole disc and comparing each sector byte-for-byte with the previous image to decide which sectors to re-image? Very, very slow.

That's correct, Owl... although IFW seems pretty quick at this function (on the modern disks). It does that same thing for normal backups (not s-b-s) but the basic image is much, much smaller to deal with.

It may just be a time issue and the resultant image increase won't be that bad. When I get around to it I'll test it further.

[Froggie]

Originally Posted by pvsurfer

Froggie,

Page 9.
I'm not sure what you're getting at here - perhaps that there's not much to be gained by selecting Backup (Changes Only)? .....ie., don't bother doing incremental/differential backups? If I interpreted your point correctly, I can only comment that my DS differentials from outside of Windows are (usually) much smaller than a full backup!

PV, I ran a li'l test for you on the "test" system and your suspicions are correct... the "differential" (Changes only) backup is reasonably small.

The SYSTEM partition is 25gB and the "used" area is 4.1gB. The partition was prepared prior to RBRX installation with a full defrag and a ZEROing of all unused sectors prior to RBRX installation. Following RBRX's installation, a full RAW image of the 25gB partition (with IFW's STANDARD compression) was 2.66gB (it realy helps to prepare that unused surface prior to RBRX's installation). After a few days of installing/uninstalling things in RBRX (3-snapshots), I just ran a CHANGES ONLY differential backup with IFW... the result was a 315mB image... kinda what I expected.

So YES, a CHANGES ONLY option is very viable with the use of this product... as long as your adopted backup strategy doesn't allow the differential to get much over 50% of the initial backup, then the restore gets a bit unwieldy (lots of time).

Hope this helps!

[pvsurfer]

Originally Posted by Froggie

Hope this helps...

Yes it does - thanks Froggie for the IFW lessons and confirming that my DS observations (re differential raw images) hold true for IFW!

pv

[Owl]

You need to prove a successful restore from multiple levels of differential imagine (baseline + several incrementals) before it is demonstrated as viable.

I still have my doubts, because unless there is some magic sector flag that I'm not aware of (like the DOS archive flag) to quickly tell if a sector has been written to since the last backup, a differential raw backup can't be any faster than a complete one.

Without a time saving one is sacrificing ease of restoration to achieve reduced backup storage space, but I contest that it is only necessary to keep two alternating images. We have RBRx to look after multiple restore points, so the image is only needed for disaster-proofing, and two image "spaces" are needed so you don't obliterate your good image when making the next one. It the worst happened and one needed to recover but the latest image failed to restore, one has a second older image to fall back to. With a differential series, if the original image fails then the whole series fails.

Simple is good, especially in the panic of a disaster recovery, and unless the wonderful IFW makes a restore from baseline + differential images as smooth as from a straight raw image I would say it is a liability. Even if it does, I am dubious of the benefits.