Acronis True Image
Encyclopedia
Acronis True Image is disk imaging software, (see "Disk image
") developed by Acronis
, that creates backups and recovers PC systems. The software allows a user to create an image of a disk while it is running Microsoft Windows
or offline by booting from CD/DVD
, USB flash drive
s, PXE
, or other bootable media. As a disk imaging software, True Image can restore the previously captured image to another disk, replicating the structure and contents to the new disk, also allowing disk cloning and partition resizing, as well if the new disk is of different capacity. The backups are in a proprietary and non-documented file format.
driven interface, and received positive and mixed reviews from both editors and users alike.
The first version of True Image was launched into the market of drive backup software in 2002 and could create a drive image that was running without shutting down to DOS mode.
The other features were an ability to write an image to DVDs, a drive image creation within Windows and support for a wide range of storage options.
Acronis True Image 2010, added a new option of online backup that saves user’s backups to a secure remote location.
, the PC can be booted to the Acronis Startup Recovery Manager, which returns the system to a previous point in time.
True Image creates exact backups of a hard drive sector-by-sector, therefore providing faster restore of user’s operating systems, data, settings, applications, etc.
The program can back up a system hard drive while the OS is running. It recovers a computer after the system crash and boots it by pressing the F11 key.
Acronis True Image offers several different options for system recovery, including the retrieval of lost files or other chunks of data, as well as entire system recovery due to corruption or failure. The following is a quick list of methods:
Storage media:
In addition to the officially supported filesystems, Acronis True Image also provides raw sector backup and restore options for all other filesystems. 'Raw' mode provides support for a file system that is corrupt, or that isn't officially supported, by capturing a complete image of all sectors on the disk. This method results in a larger image file as it isn't able to compress, resize, or selectively restore files on the unrecognized filesystem.
Disk image
A disk image is a single file or storage device containing the complete contents and structure representing a data storage medium or device, such as a hard drive, tape drive, floppy disk, CD/DVD/BD, or USB flash drive, although an image of an optical disc may be referred to as an optical disc image...
") developed by Acronis
Acronis
Acronis, Inc. is an international computer software company, dealing in the area of computer backup, disaster recovery, bare-metal restore, system deployment, and storage management in both Windows and Linux systems.-History:...
, that creates backups and recovers PC systems. The software allows a user to create an image of a disk while it is running Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...
or offline by booting from CD/DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
, USB flash drive
USB flash drive
A flash drive is a data storage device that consists of flash memory with an integrated Universal Serial Bus interface. flash drives are typically removable and rewritable, and physically much smaller than a floppy disk. Most weigh less than 30 g...
s, PXE
Preboot Execution Environment
The Preboot eXecution Environment is an environment to boot computers using a network interface independently of data storage devices or installed operating systems.PXE was introduced as part of the Wired for Management framework by Intel and is described in the specification The Preboot...
, or other bootable media. As a disk imaging software, True Image can restore the previously captured image to another disk, replicating the structure and contents to the new disk, also allowing disk cloning and partition resizing, as well if the new disk is of different capacity. The backups are in a proprietary and non-documented file format.
History
True Image has a wizardWizard (software)
A software wizard or setup assistant is a user interface type that presents a user with a sequence of dialog boxes that lead the user through a series of well-defined steps. Tasks that are complex, infrequently performed, or unfamiliar may be easier to perform using a wizard...
driven interface, and received positive and mixed reviews from both editors and users alike.
The first version of True Image was launched into the market of drive backup software in 2002 and could create a drive image that was running without shutting down to DOS mode.
The other features were an ability to write an image to DVDs, a drive image creation within Windows and support for a wide range of storage options.
Acronis True Image 2010, added a new option of online backup that saves user’s backups to a secure remote location.
Operation
As a disk imaging software, True Image offers functionality such as restoring data or creating a drive image without rebooting the system. In case of operating system error or hard disk failureHard disk failure
In computing, a hard-disk failure occurs when a hard disk drive malfunctions and the stored information cannot be accessed with a properly configured computer...
, the PC can be booted to the Acronis Startup Recovery Manager, which returns the system to a previous point in time.
True Image creates exact backups of a hard drive sector-by-sector, therefore providing faster restore of user’s operating systems, data, settings, applications, etc.
The program can back up a system hard drive while the OS is running. It recovers a computer after the system crash and boots it by pressing the F11 key.
Acronis True Image offers several different options for system recovery, including the retrieval of lost files or other chunks of data, as well as entire system recovery due to corruption or failure. The following is a quick list of methods:
- True Image can access files within an existing image file by mounting the image file as if it were a disk, in either read-only or read-write mode. This enables the user to quickly copy data files from the image file back to the local system. A virtual device driver must be installed in the operating system in order to use the mounting feature, but this driver is installed during the original installation of True Image. Separately, files can be read from and, in read-write mode, written to the image, which effectively creates an incremental file, and has the advantage of leaving the original image files untouched by saving the changes in a new file.
- True Image offers a bootable media wizard, which creates a recovery environment to CD or other media, and is used to boot the machine to a proprietary environment for quick recovery. While this method also provides the ability to recover lost data, the primary focus is restoring the complete system back to a given point in timePoint-in-time recoveryPoint-in-time recovery in the context of computers is a system whereby a set of data or a particular setting can be restored or recovered from a time in the past...
in case of complete failure.
- The Acronis Secure ZoneAcronis Secure ZoneAcronis Secure Zone is a hard disk partition type created and used by Acronis True Image as a backup storage target.-Overview:Backup applications typically use network storage for storing backup archives, but this can be problematic when such resources are not available...
is a bootable, hidden partition option created and managed by True Image. This space, which is not accessible to the user or other applications such as malwareMalwareMalware, short for malicious software, consists of programming that is designed to disrupt or deny operation, gather information that leads to loss of privacy or exploitation, or gain unauthorized access to system resources, or that otherwise exhibits abusive behavior...
, is used to store the backup image files. The Secure Zone can be created as bootable, enabling the user to boot directly into the recovery environment by pressing the F11 key, very useful when the machine doesn't contain an optical disk drive or other access to external media.
- The recent version of True Image 2010 offers an online backup feature, providing optional off-site data protection and recovery.
Versions
Acronis has published their Version Comparison and an OEM comparison.- Acronis True Image Home 6.0 (2002). The version supports creation of disk image on recordable DVD media and external USB drives.
- Acronis True Image Home 7.0 (2003) offers an innovative wizard-driven interface, which guides a user through the whole process of backing up. Moreover, this version supports a disk cloning feature, allowing cloning hard drive to another one directly, saving PC resources and time.
- Acronis True Image Home 8.0 (2004) includes options of saving disk image on a remote computer or laptop, and an ability to restore files by exploring an image file.
- Acronis True Image Home 9.0 (2005) includes the SecureZone, which allows backing up an image to a hidden drive partition, making it inaccessible to viruses and most hackers. Another feature, Startup Recovery Manager, helps to configure user’s system, letting boot it up and restore itself without a separate boot disk. This is the latest version supporting Windows 98 and Windows ME operating systems.
- Acronis True Image Home 10.0 (2006) releases new abilities to back up and restore directly to the network share and FTP. It also can save archives of Outlook and Outlook Express, including a user’s Windows Address Book.
- Acronis True Image Home 11 (2007) This version provides users with more options, such as File Shredder that destroys individual files so they can't be resurrected and Try&Decide feature, allowing user to create a temporary, safe place on a hard drive where any changes of the system can be performed.
- Acronis True Image Home 2009 provides a one-click protection that allows a user to back up a computer or laptop a click away. The other features, such as Windows Vista style and an option of full text search, let the inexperienced users perform drive imaging and disk cloning operations easily.
- Acronis True Image Home 2010 provides the following new options, consisting of Acronis Nonstop Backup, which provides continuous data protectionContinuous data protectionContinuous data protection , also called continuous backup or real-time backup, refers to backup of computer data by automatically saving a copy of every change made to that data, essentially capturing every version of the data that the user saves...
, Virtual Hard Disk (VHD) and Microsoft Windows 7 support. This version offers Acronis Online Backup, an optional feature, allowing to back up important data to an online vault. - Acronis True Image Home 2011 (2010) This version of True image includes the following new features: Redesigned GUI, full Windows 7 Integration; USB 3.0 support; Predefined Backup Schemes and Check Points for Acronis Backup Explorer.
- Acronis True Image Home 2012 (2011) The latest version of True image includes the following new features: File synchronization, NAS support, Nonstop Backup over network, Extended Capacity Disk support, Integrated Online Backup, Improved logs and Improved UI
Problems
For some users, the "Nonstop Backup" feature in version 2010 and 2011 intermittently pauses, turns off or crashes. Acronis states that the feature is working now. Users disagree.Supported storage media and systems
Operating systems:- Windows XP SP3
- Windows XP Professional x64 Edition
- Windows Vista SP2 (all editions)
- Windows 7 (all editions)
Storage media:
- Hard disk drives
- Networked storage devices
- FTP servers
- CD-R/RW, DVD-R/RW, DVD+R (including double-layer DVD+R), DVD+RW, DVD-RAM, BD-R, BD-RE
- USB 1.0 / 2.0 / 3.0, FireWire (IEEE-1394) and PC card storage devices
- ZIP, Jaz and other removable media
Supported filesystems
File systems supported by software:- NTFSNTFSNTFS is the standard file system of Windows NT, including its later versions Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2008, Windows Vista, and Windows 7....
- FAT16File Allocation TableFile Allocation Table is a computer file system architecture now widely used on many computer systems and most memory cards, such as those used with digital cameras. FAT file systems are commonly found on floppy disks, flash memory cards, digital cameras, and many other portable devices because of...
- FAT32File Allocation TableFile Allocation Table is a computer file system architecture now widely used on many computer systems and most memory cards, such as those used with digital cameras. FAT file systems are commonly found on floppy disks, flash memory cards, digital cameras, and many other portable devices because of...
- ext2Ext2The ext2 or second extended filesystem is a file system for the Linux kernel. It was initially designed by Rémy Card as a replacement for the extended file system ....
- ext3Ext3The ext3 or third extended filesystem is a journaled file system that is commonly used by the Linux kernel. It is the default file system for many popular Linux distributions, including Debian...
- ext4Ext4The ext4 or fourth extended filesystem is a journaling file system for Linux, developed as the successor to ext3.It was born as a series of backward compatible extensions to ext3, many of them originally developed by Cluster File Systems for the Lustre file system between 2003 and 2006, meant to...
(since version 2011) - ReiserFSReiserFSReiserFS is a general-purpose, journaled computer file system designed and implemented by a team at Namesys led by Hans Reiser. ReiserFS is currently supported on Linux . Introduced in version 2.4.1 of the Linux kernel, it was the first journaling file system to be included in the standard kernel...
- Reiser4Reiser4Reiser4 is a computer file system, successor to the ReiserFS file system, developed from scratch by Namesys and sponsored by DARPA as well as Linspire...
- Linux SwapVirtual memoryIn computing, virtual memory is a memory management technique developed for multitasking kernels. This technique virtualizes a computer architecture's various forms of computer data storage , allowing a program to be designed as though there is only one kind of memory, "virtual" memory, which...
In addition to the officially supported filesystems, Acronis True Image also provides raw sector backup and restore options for all other filesystems. 'Raw' mode provides support for a file system that is corrupt, or that isn't officially supported, by capturing a complete image of all sectors on the disk. This method results in a larger image file as it isn't able to compress, resize, or selectively restore files on the unrecognized filesystem.
See also
- Disk cloningDisk cloningDisk cloning is the process of copying the contents of one computer hard disk to another disk or to an "image" file. Often, the contents of the first disk are written to an image file as an intermediate step, and the second disk is loaded with the contents of the image...
- Comparison of disk cloning software
- List of disk cloning software