disaster recovery iso file is too big to burn to disc

[jxb2]

Downloaded trial copy of Acronis 10. Delightfully simple and straightforward. Works perfectly right out of the box - did a test: created recovery disc, backed up C:, rebooted with recovery CD, restored C: to an external USB drive I'll reformat tonight to get rid of the test. Everything worked smoothly.

[abradaxis]

Is Acronis meant to be a replacement for the Retrospect, the disaster recovery process in Retrospect, or creating the bootable ISO CD. If Retrospect give a message that the ISO file is too big, what good would Acronis do. Thanks.

[nekr0phage]

There is limited free technical support for Retrospect, this has been standard for a very long time. The person you corresponded with is probably a customer service rep and likely does not have any training or experience troubleshooting the problem.

 

The response to this problem is repeated over and over again in this *public* forum. The makers of Retrospect cannot control what version of Windows you are using, or what extra stuff is rolled onto an installation/reinstallation/repair disc by vendors. That is why certain requirements have been identified in order to produce a usable DR image. Again, this is a public forum, as in user to user.

[buachille]

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The makers of Retrospect cannot control what version of Windows you are using, or what extra stuff is rolled onto an installation/reinstallation/repair disc by vendors. That is why certain requirements have been identified in order to produce a usable DR image. Again, this is a public forum, as in user to user.

 

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yes that is true, but what about retrospect using its selectors to select only the drivers that ship with a retail copy of windows (not oem). if they could do this then it wouldn't matter which windows disc you had.

[Gorby]

G'day. I understand your comments, however I am using a Microsoft installation CD - Win XP Pro SP2. This is NOT a vendor created 'resinstall' disk or whatever. From reading the instructions, this CD should be able to produce a correctly sized ISO. As I stated in my previous posts this is a clean install of Windows, applications, patches and Retrospect onto an empty hard drive.

 

I quite enjoy using Retrospect as it is easy to use, lots of features, etc. I used to work for CA, and had a lot of experience with ArcServe backup. The ability to produce a DR CD was an optional extra in ArcServe. One of the reasons I purchased Retrospect, was that DR CD production was built in.

 

Certainly not the only reason. In a small home business (backing up 2 laptops and a PC) Retrospect is far easier to use than ArcServe, and comes with the features I need, already licensed.

 

I know that I am able to recover from a failure of my PC, using Retrospect (as it is a good product). It just has the gloss taken off by the problems with this one misbehaving feature.

[nekr0phage]

Bauchille -

 

It would still matter what disc you use in the sense that you would need either a Pro or Home disc with the appropriate service pack. Using some sort of predefined selectors would be a good idea, but it would probably be more effective against applications rolled onto the disc - drivers might be needed during the restore. Also, it might still be necessary to have different selectors for different versions of Windows.

 

 

 

Gorby -

 

I saw your original posts, I don't know what to say in your case. I do know that I have used DR succesfully on seveal different systems, and I cannot think of a reason it why it does not work for you.

[jxb2]

Acronis is similar product to Retrospect. It is less sophisticated in large business network capabilities, but comparable and fully adequate for home/small business. Much more user-friendly.

 

FYI, I used virginal Win XP SP2 disc, and still had ISO too large. Inspection of the iso revealed no unusually large drivers/files.

 

Same Disaster Recovery disc creation with Acronis worked perfectly, as did the one that comes with Roxio 9 (I think it's just a repackaged Backup My PC program). I've stopped downloading trial backup programs and testing their DR function - simply paid for Acronis and am devoting time to more productive issues. Goodbye Retrospect. You used to be the best and I'm sorry to see you go downhill.

[buachille]

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Acronis is similar product to Retrospect. It is less sophisticated in large business network capabilities, but comparable and fully adequate for home/small business. Much more user-friendly.

 

FYI, I used virginal Win XP SP2 disc, and still had ISO too large. Inspection of the iso revealed no unusually large drivers/files.

 

Same Disaster Recovery disc creation with Acronis worked perfectly, as did the one that comes with Roxio 9 (I think it's just a repackaged Backup My PC program). I've stopped downloading trial backup programs and testing their DR function - simply paid for Acronis and am devoting time to more productive issues. Goodbye Retrospect. You used to be the best and I'm sorry to see you go downhill.

 

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jbx2,

 

can acronis make duplicate backups (open file backups in retrospect parlance). I use these for my data discs.

[forkart]

Try using magiciso to burn iso file to cd. It may work properly.

http://www.magiciso.com/tutorials/miso-burniso.htm

[jelenko]

[quote

can acronis make duplicate backups (open file backups in retrospect parlance). I use these for my data discs.

 

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Acronis only creates/stores files in the Acronis file format [.tib] file. You can not read the file just with Windows Explorer. You can read the file thru Acronis.

 

While I've found Acronis to be a candidate for full disk back up and system restore, it's terrible at backing up data files - i.e., ones that need to be backed up often. Acronis simply makes a new .tib file for each backup. So, if you backup data files for 30 days, you will have 30 .tib files - and, of course, the many of the same files are copied over and over again. Retro shines in frequent backup of files.

 

There is no way to search for a file among the .tib files without browsing in each. Since Retro stores all files in one big bucket with snapshots for each backup session, you can search all files with Retro's 'Find File' function.

 

HTH

 

PS. Be careful with Acronis for full system backup/restore. It uses it's own Linux based boot disk. Newer hardware may not be supported. In their users' forum, it appears that Acronis support will build a version for individual users that supports their hardware if necessary, but I can't confirm. In any case, that just seems 'flaky'. I.e., it's not a general solution that should work for all hardware.

To get built in support for newer hardware, you may have to upgrade to a newer version [which costs $'s]

 

While nothing's perfect, Retro does build the boot disk [i.e., Recovery CD] using drivers installed on your system. [Recognizing there can be problems with RAID drivers built into motherboards]

 

[buachille]

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Acronis only creates/stores files in the Acronis file format [.tib] file. You can not read the file just with Windows Explorer. You can read the file thru Acronis.

 

While I've found Acronis to be a candidate for full disk back up and system restore, it's terrible at backing up data files - i.e., ones that need to be backed up often. Acronis simply makes a new .tib file for each backup. So, if you backup data files for 30 days, you will have 30 .tib files - and, of course, the many of the same files are copied over and over again. Retro shines in frequent backup of files.

 

There is no way to search for a file among the .tib files without browsing in each. Since Retro stores all files in one big bucket with snapshots for each backup session, you can search all files with Retro's 'Find File' function.

 

HTH

 

PS. Be careful with Acronis for full system backup/restore. It uses it's own Linux based boot disk. Newer hardware may not be supported. In their users' forum, it appears that Acronis support will build a version for individual users that supports their hardware if necessary, but I can't confirm. In any case, that just seems 'flaky'. I.e., it's not a general solution that should work for all hardware.

To get built in support for newer hardware, you may have to upgrade to a newer version [which costs $'s]

 

While nothing's perfect, Retro does build the boot disk [i.e., Recovery CD] using drivers installed on your system. [Recognizing there can be problems with RAID drivers built into motherboards]

 

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jelenko ,

 

thanks for the advice. very interesting to hear how acronis actually saves data.

 

i think i can live without retrospect creating a disaster recovery cd. if i had a total disaster i could just reinstall windows and then install retro, and then restore my c drive.

 

at the end of the day i've used various backup software, but i've never seen anything to match retrospect. but they should still fix this issue with the recovery cd, if for no other reason than to get the respect of their customers.

 

i run a business and if our product had a great big hole in it, i would be very keen to fix it so the money keeps coming in!!!!!

[Gorby]

The only interesting driver I'm running might be the NVIDIA video driver. It's ver 93.71. A previous post says that video drivers can be large. Ah! Could it be that I'm using a PC that is also used by my kids for games, rather than a server machine, which does not have sophisticated video drivers????!??

Other than that, I'm at a loss!

I'm not going to lose sleep over this missing feature, as I like the product. It is easier to use than ArcServe. I know that there were issues in producing DR CD's in ArcServe, it must be a tricky thing to do. However it is annoying that this stated feature does not work.

I first noticed this problem while I was still in the free support window. But I looked up the forum and read the FAQ's, so I decided to wait and do a clean install of windows, then do a Retrospect DR setup, to see if that fixed it. It didn't, and now I'm outside of the free support window.

Ce la vi!

[Gorby]

Thanks for that!

I purchased Restrospect after getting caught out after using the Backup in WindowsXP Pro. The Window XP backup sort of did the job (well, not really), but I want better automation, and I want the product to be able to restore single files, or the latest version without me having to know where they are on the backup. Retrosepct does that.

 

I have used CA's ArcServe - it's OK, but a bit tricky to use. Retrospect seems to be easier to use with more features in the base version.

 

Having spent money getting Retrospect, I won't be purchasing a product that supplies an inferior (seemingly) restore experience.

 

 

I'm going to have to stop posting here, as it seems there is no answer here. And I'm not going to pay for a support call!

[abradaxis]

I've spent significant time and learning investment in Retrospect, and have purchased it for my wife's business as well. Never had an problems previously with the exception of Retrospects never having provided a full disaster recovery solution contained "within retrospect." I never liked having to create the ISO file and go to another third party software package to burn my ISO file. But, all told, once I found a suitable, easy to use burning program, it became a non-issue. But now when I have a brand new Dell, right out of the box, with minimum software and data to deal with, the ordinary is now extraordinary. Suddenly my ISO file is too large, and no one knows what to do. I'm computer savvy, but don't want to have to dissect the I386 directory to find what's making it too big, the forum participants seem more intent on justifying why Retrospect should or should not have produced detail instructions to fix the problem, rather than just offering information on "how" to fix the problem, I can't, in good conscience, swing $70 just to have someone "possibly" find a solution to this problem, and I am genuinely pissed at Retrospect for leaving me in the lurch on this issue, which doesn't seem that arcane at all after reading this thread. They should at least produce some white papers (a la Norton) giving users guidance on solving the issue rather than having their technical stalking horses abuse the aggrieved users who find themselves caught with the problem, no technical help available from the forum, and a bunch of Retrospect apologists urging those of us with the problem to avail ourselves of paid technical support. As far as Im concerned, this shows a complete lack of customer sensitivity and outright greed on the part of Retrospect, Dantz, EMC, or whatever they are currently calling themselves as they worry more aout their corporate infrastructure and opportunities for growth, than the needs of their clients. I think I agree with others in this thread; it's time to go elsewhere.

[buachille]

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I'm going to have to stop posting here, as it seems there is no answer here. And I'm not going to pay for a support call!

 

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gorby,

 

if you do pay for a support call i am sure everyone here would appreciate it a lot if you posted their solution (if they have one). your post would available to all present and future people who have this problem.

[bvaandr]

Try buying a larger CDR - the standard 650 MB 74 min CDRs are too small, but the slightly larger 700 Mb 80 min CDR was able to accomodate my XP SP2 disaster recovery disk, for what it was worth (not much).

 

I don't think D.R. is a very reliable solution anyway. It has the added complication, for those that have not upgraded from their Win XP from SP1, that you have to go through a whole long complicated process to slipstream SP2 to create a new Windows install disk that matches the code of your original SP1 installer disk. Otherwise, any DR recovered volume is not bootable anway and none of your applications will be registered properly either. So then you end up reinstalling everything anyway. So much for Disaster Recovery.

 

Simply reinstalling Windows and then doing a limited recovery should work better. And if you really want a bootable backup that actually works - buy Norton Ghost.

[jelenko]

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I think I agree with others in this thread; it's time to go elsewhere.

 

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I know how you feel! Can't tell the number of times I have angrily and feverishly looked around for a better backup solution. If you find one, I'd appreciate a private message with what you've found.

 

EVERY application I've tried out ALWAYS had a bunch of issues/problems with some users. Of course, to know this there has to be a users forum - some don't even have a users forum and do charge for tech support.

 

From my own experience/use, Retro is, hands down, the best at backing up files. Period.

 

For Disaster Recovery, it's not bad/pretty good, with the DR CD being the weak link. At the same time, it ALWAYS has worked when first installing a fresh copy of Windows, then installing Retro, then doing a system restore. Of couse, this is essentially the same approach ntbackup [the backup utility in Windows XP] uses. But ntbackup has produced some 'funky' results when I've tested it. Nothing real serious, but some apps needed to be reinstalled, some config/settings missing. I was always able to fix the issues, but it does leave you wondering when there would be something serious that mere mortals couldn't work out.

FYI. There are several backup apps out there that simply act as an interface to ntbackup.

 

All the disk image apps have the same potential weakness of not supporting some hardware. For example Acronis can't see my SATA hard drives on an Intel 965P motherboard. [it worked fine with the nVidia chipsets for AMD 939 socket]

 

Even more philosophically, after I came to the conclusion there is no perfect app that does both file back up and disaster recovery, I've prioritized my requirements:

 

1. Absolutely, positively must be able to restore my 'data' - i.e., documents created or saved. It's a real pain to reinstall all the apps, but not being able to restore my documents - priceless.

 

2. Be able to easily restore config files

 

3. Be able to quickly do a full system restore quickly - even if it's a little out of date.