partitioning and backup strategy etc.
in [Freeware]
|
From: M.L. on 21 Jul 2010 12:53 >>How would imaging be any slower, on say a 2TB drive. Indeed it may >>well be quicker (if the drive is faster). >> >>(Let us assume that your install on both your system and a 2TB drive >>is identical (OS + apps)). >Sure, if you configure imaging s/w correctly and both disks in your >example have identical contents, I guess the time should be the same >or very similar. > >But some imaging s/w takes an image of the complete partition including >all empty sectors, others can be configured to only image used sectors. The better freeware imaging apps mentioned here from Macrium and Paragon do not image free space by default.
From: HTH on 23 Jul 2010 06:08 Robb wrote: >I have always installed most programs to D: >When I reinstall the operating system my programs are still sitting >safely on D:. If you installed your programs under 'C:\Program Files' and took a regular image of that partition, when you restored it the programs would also be there without any further tinkering. >Some programs do not need to be reinstalled at all, I just >need to create a shortcut and click on it. >Others do have to be reinstalled but Windows regards the installation as >an upgrade and doesn't delete or remove the existing data. Unnecessary, see above.
From: Franklin on 23 Jul 2010 06:16 HTH wrote: > Dave Doe: > > HTH wrote: >>> In my case I have a C:\ partition of 7GB and only about 1.5GB is used >>> (XP-Pro-SP3) for op/sys and apps. All the MS stuff like "restore >>> points" and "indexing" are disabled because I don't need them. >>> This means that 7GB is ample space and makes imaging very quick. >> >>How would imaging be any slower, on say a 2TB drive. Indeed it may >>well be quicker (if the drive is faster). >> >>(Let us assume that your install on both your system and a 2TB drive >>is identical (OS + apps)). > > > Sure, if you configure imaging s/w correctly and both disks in your > example have identical contents, I guess the time should be the same > or very similar. > > But some imaging s/w takes an image of the complete partition including > all empty sectors, others can be configured to only image used sectors. > > HTH > You are confusing a clone of a partition with an image of a partition. An image is usually a compressed file with free space removed.
From: M.L. on 23 Jul 2010 10:44 >>I have always installed most programs to D: >>When I reinstall the operating system my programs are still sitting >>safely on D:. > >If you installed your programs under 'C:\Program Files' and took a regular >image of that partition, when you restored it the programs would also be >there without any further tinkering. But the imaging process would take longer and the final archive would be larger. One has to weigh that against the possible D drive tinkering afterwards.
From: HTH on 23 Jul 2010 14:03
M.L. wrote: >>>I have always installed most programs to D: >>>When I reinstall the operating system my programs are still sitting >>>safely on D:. >> >>If you installed your programs under 'C:\Program Files' and took a >>regular image of that partition, when you restored it the programs >>would also be there without any further tinkering. > >But the imaging process would take longer and the final archive would >be larger. One has to weigh that against the possible D drive >tinkering afterwards. How much longer? How much larger? Taking an image would certainly take longer if the C:\ partition also contained the user's Program Files. In my case the complete C:\ partition consumes 1.6GB with 0.9GB of that being Program Files. Taking an image of the whole lot takes ~45secs. Based upon my own situation, the image size is currently ~1.2GB, without Program Files it would be ~0.5GB. For this I get all my programs included in the image - one single image backup containing the Op/Sys, Program Files and of course the Registry. Restore time is about 30secs using a Linux boot CD. All that said, there are other partitions I have which I mirror onto other physical drives instead of imaging because they are so big and the imaging time takes up to 25mins for a 640GB partition. YMMV HTH |