Imaging a Rollback RS protected disk

[Froggie]

Yes, we do wanna protect ourselves against hard disk failure. With that in mind, is there any safe Rollback Rx state (update BASELINE maybe?), other than following a complete unINSTALL of the product, that 3rd party imaging products may be used to backup hard disks safely for purposes of restoration, if necessary (I would like to use Acronis True Image)?

Any help, greatly appreciated...

[Jimmy]

interesting question,
as long as you don't install acronis secure zone it should be possible to install TI home
i read that in the FAQ
i wonder if it is possible to use the bootable cd from TI home to take an image from outside of windows.
probably its smart to delete the snapshots before you take an image or is it your intention to image c: with snapshots and all ?
Jimmy

[nexstar]

Hi Froggie! From within Windows it is possible to image the protected drive. You will get the current snapshot only (sometimes that's enough ) and if you restore the image then RB will not be installed. There is only one program I know of which can image the snapshots from within Windows and that is Image For Windows combined with its Phylock utility.

From outside of Windows (using a recovery CD) then a normal image will get you the state of the system when RB was installed (baseline snapshot). I can't remember off-hand what the RB situation is on restoring that image. I suspect that if the MBR has been backed up as well then RB may well be installed.

To image the system and all snapshots to put the system back exactly as it is then you need to create a 'raw' or 'all sectors' image from outside of Windows. This images all sectors on the drive, whether they are used or not, such that when you restore the image you have a system with all the snapshots and a fully-functioning RB. The down-side to this is the extra time and storage needed for the image. The image can still be compressed though so you should still end up with an image which is a fair bit smaller than the drive you are imaging.

A lot of imaging software now has the ability to create a raw image. I use Drive Snapshot but there are many others which can be used including, if I remember correctly, Acronis True Image.

HTH

Graham

[Jimmy]

thank you for this great feedback
Jimmy

[Froggie]

Greetings Nexstar! From your description of what apps may be compatible with RbRx as far as complete resporation of the volume as well as RbRx and its snapshots, is it safe to assume that Horizondatasys' own product, Drive Cloner Rx, is also *NOT* compatible with RbRx in terms of its ability to completely restore the above?

I guess I'm surprised that they would produce products which would not work together... purchasing from one market, RbRx, keeps you out of their other market, Drive Cloner Rx, and VisaVersa.

I guess I'll ask sales/support just to be sure.

[nexstar]

Hi Froggie. I haven't tried Drive Cloner Rx in its 'standalone' form so this may have changed but, the integrated version I tested didn't have an option to image all sectors. Without that you will not be able to create an image which includes all snapshots and a working RB on restoring the image.

In some ways, I don't have a problem with not having an in-built imager as the user can choose their own favourite without having to pay the extra for an imager they may never use. What I'd really like to see though is an option to wipe all unused sectors as the compression of the backup would be much more efficient. Only RB knows which sectors are really unused and so this would have to be done from within RB.

Graham

[Froggie]

Greetings all! Just to let you know, and don't try this without your techie Mommy near by, I tried a "from within Windows" Acronis True Image (I've used it for years without Rollback) of the protected partition, then followed that with a complete restoration of that partition. Acronis does image the MBR during this operation. Following the restoration, it looked as though the Rollback CONSOLE process (directed from the MBR) did it's thing then the system blew up with a "NTOSKRNL.EXE missing or corrupt." I looked and the file was indeed there. Not wanting to get too deep into this, I decided to "refresh" the restored Windows partition and even this would not complete due to the Rollback MBR. I then restored a non-Roillback MBR and was able to complete the Windows refresh. This basically got me back to where I was prior to the restoration, albeit with Rollback partially restored and some driver/app glitches accordingly.

After patching the system back together to an operational form, I uninstalled what was left of Rollback and reinstalled it. Things seem to be back very close to where they were. What did I learn... I will not image this system with ANY so called "imager" without knowing a lot about how that imager works, and clearly not doing it again without unInstalling Rollback. There's just too much going on at the sector/disk level by Rollback to trust almost anything in this regard.

Don't get me wrong... I love the concept of Rollback and what it provides. What I don't love is its inability to integrate successfully with just about any other important system disk utility (hard disk imaging, disk defragging, etc.). I dont know about you folks, but I feel protecting your system against hard disk failure is a lot more important than the "time machine" that Rollback presents.

Those that suggest just UnINSTALLING Rollback when you want to image are basically asking us to give up all current snapshots in the planning of the disk imaging... sometimes, due to what's going on, that's very difficult. My basic hard disk imaging plan included a weekly FULL and a daily INCREMENTAL update. To do this with Rollback in the mix requires me to manually uninstall Rollback on a daily basis to do the image successfully, which also means dumping all current snapshots DAILY to do the imaging. I'm not sure this is acceptable to me... I'm trying to come up with an successful alternate disk imaging solution in order to continue being a Rollback user... I really do love the product.

Some of Graham's (Nexstar) suggestions are being looked at but I'm not sure at this point I find them "usable" enough.

The saga continues...

[carfal]

Originally Posted by nexstar

To image the system and all snapshots to put the system back exactly as it is then you need to create a 'raw' or 'all sectors' image from outside of Windows. This images all sectors on the drive, whether they are used or not, such that when you restore the image you have a system with all the snapshots and a fully-functioning RB. The down-side to this is the extra time and storage needed for the image. The image can still be compressed though so you should still end up with an image which is a fair bit smaller than the drive you are imaging.

Nexstar's advice above is the only way to image with Rollback completely intact (Snapshots and all). There is no other way to image Rollback with all snapshots and MBR in working order......period.

I suggest that if this method is not acceptable then Rollback is not for you because there will never be a magical solution to image from within Windows and still achieve the above result. As mentioned, this is because of the sector level architecture of Rollback.

[nexstar]

Hi Froggie. The problem with what you did was restoring the MBR from the image you made. I've not found any software which can get the actual mbr from within Windows so what ATI got was, effectively, corrupt and doomed to failure. If you had restored the image and not restored the mbr (is this an option in ATI?) then the system should have booted but with just the current snapshot available and with RB needing to be re-installed.

If getting all snapshots from within Windows is the aim then Image For Windows coupled with their Phylock utility is the only way to do it. Even then, the mbr will not be correct. You would still have had to save the mbr previously from outside of Windows and restore it again after restoring the image. Fortunately, the mbr isn't changed after you install RB and so you don't need to save a copy of it each time you image.

If you only want to make sure you have the current system backed up then you can do this as you would with any other setup, just don't restore the mbr and be prepared to reinstall RB.

What I tend to do is to use Active Boot Disk (a commercial program) to boot into a gui environment and then image and restore from there using Drive Snapshot. But I don't do this daily as my data which changes daily is backed up locally and online with other software so I can always go back to a fairly recent image and then simply update my 'user data' afterwards.

Graham

[Froggie]

Carfal, Nextstar... thanks much for your input. Graham, in relation to the "Active Boot Disk"... have you ever tried their included disk imaging app, "Active Disk Image," with its RAW disk image option, as far as Rollback is concerned?

Just wondering if there's any hope there... :-)

Thanks again!