Perhaps I read it wrong, but I thought this thread was about a guy who grabbed the free download of version 7 and was unable to use it to save the True Image file to his USB connected HDD and that in order to make it all work, he would need to convert his drive to a dynamic one. If I'm wrong about his configuration and his needs, then I apologize.
FWIW... If you're contemplating buying Acronis, (1) buy from Newegg... it's cheaper. (2) Check out Casper XP 3.0, also. I've used both and they are excellent... Casper is faster than Acronis for 2nd and subsequent clonings of the same setup because it uses "incremental cloning"... and just rewrites files which have changed. (This is a feature which may have been added to Acronis v9) Both have a full-featured free trial period. 30-days for Casper, 14-days for Acronis. (I prefer Casper, but when I bought I HAD to be be able to make at least one "image to optic media" for one of my computers where the reinstallation disks were not included, so I bought Acronis.)
More FWIW.... You might want to check into 2 things... 1. Whether Casper XP 3.0 will clone to a USB drive, and 2. Vantec has a new product out.... a USB-to-SATA/PATA connector. It's hot-swapable and will eliminated the need for external HD "enclosures" and expensive external HDs. Reviews say it works just great. Microcenter has it for $19.95. If Casper XP with it's "incremental cloning" feature will work on a USB-connected HD, that would be a very fast and convenient backup system.
Hi guys Just getting back to my imaging efforts tonight. Thanks, GTS, for the info. You're right, the issue was that v 7.0 does not support dynamic discs; I cannot use TrueImage v 7.0 to image my current volumes because they reside on dynamic discs. I spoke to Acronis support and interestingly, they told me that the latest version of Acronis TrueImage Home version (9.0) does not support dynamic discs either! They told me that I need to use either Acronis True Image 9.1 Server for Windows or Acronis True Image 9.1 Enterprise Server in order to image a dynamic disc. The email was somewhat confused, but what I got out of it is that I have to figure out whether my external USB drive would be considered a dynamic disc or a basic disc.
No need, thanks for the info - it turns out that I actually do have to answer the question about whether my external drive is dynamic or basic. This is only me, though - I am sure this is an obvious one for techies, but I'm not a tech master like you guys are
Sheesh, I just want to back up my entire HD so that if something goes wrong, I can just restore with one click. This is from the Casper website "While Casper XP does support copying of Dynamic Volumes, it does not support cloning of Dynamic Disks. This means Casper XP will not allow you to copy an entire hard disk to or from a Dynamic Disk even if the Dynamic Disk is fully self-contained (e.g. defines a simple volume that is not striped, mirrored, or spanned across multiple disks). However, Casper XP does support copying of dynamic volumes to other volumes and Basic Disks where possible. " So it can copy but not clone. Okay.... Nowhere is the word 'imaging' used on the Casper site (at least not that I could see). Imaging...cloning...copying...backing up... I think what I want is an image - that's more than just backing up my data.
Yeah, Nik, it sounds like you're in a classic Catch-22: You need to clone or image your hd so you can delete the dynamic vol and change it to basic but you need a basic vol to clone or image your hd. You need to find a backup program or hard disk manager that works w/dynamic disks and has a free trial. You might look into Norton Ghost or Paragon or Partition Magic, which may have trials. Also, I found this, but you better be sure you know exactly what you're doing: HOWTO: Convert a dynamic disk back to a basic disk without data loss **Disclaimer: This ONLY works if you have NOT used ANY of the "new" features of dynamic disks such as extending a partition or software RAID. This is an expert-level procedure, so if you don't know what you are doing, you shouldn't be attempting this.** 1) Install dskprobe.exe on the system. (This is one of the utilities in the Win2K or WinXP support tools on the install CD, and can be installed by simply copying the .exe file to the hard drive.) 2) Run dskprobe.exe on the system. 3) Select the Drives menu and "Physical Drive. . ." 4) Double click on the drive that you want to convert back to a basic disk. Click the "Set Active" button next to that drive. 5) From the Sectors menu, select "Read" 6) Accept the defaults (begin sector 0, read 1 sector) and click "Read" --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 7) In the editor, go to the "01C0" line and the third bit should be a "42".Change that to a "07". --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 8 ) From the Sectors menu, select "Write". Confirm all dialog boxes. **Note: This is the step that will hose your box if you have not followed the above instructions correctly.** 9) Exit dskprobe.exe. Reboot 10) Run chkdsk on the affected logical drive(s). If any errors are found, do a chkdsk /f to fix them. Done. http://www.wilderssecurity.com/archive/index.php/t-92213.html H
Seems that way Harold. Thanks for that instruction set, I'll check it out. I am also cursing myself for partitioning my main HDD when I built this computer. I had this idea that a partitioned HD was always a good thing, but if I am doing weekly incremental imaging, it doesn't make much sense for me, since I don't need the performance gains that would accrue from keeping my OS on a separate partition. It is turning out to be hard to undo the partition process, and it looks like I'll have to buy Partition Magic for this one time procedure. I am just waiting for an email from Casper support. In the end I will simply throw money at this problem and pay for something that will do all of this with one click, like TrueImage Server. EDIT: Errrr.... maybe not http://www.acronis.com/enterprise/products/ATISWin/