Acronis True Image Review

Disk Image backups remain one of the core features of Acronis True Image. This is the same disk image backup technology for which Acronis has become well known for over many years thanks to this very same line of software alongside their range of related business and specialist disk imaging software products.

NB – Disk image backups are extremely useful as they can be used to back up a system in its entirety, this includes all user documents, settings, installed applications and system configurations as well as the operating system itself. Disk Image backups can also allow for the recovery of an entire PC to a new disk or device entirely as well as supporting the migration of an existing system installed on an older mechanical hard disk to a newer and faster SSD alternative.

Starting off at the main application dashboard (see above) and it is here that we see that Acronis have already started off the configuration of a full PC backup set. I could simply continue configuring this initial backup set further, however, since I only want to include a single hard disk in my backup versus the entire system, I will start by selecting “Disks and Partitions” on the initial source configuration screen as can be seen below.

NB – As well as the “Entire PC” imaging option which is shown initially, True Image also supports making image-based backups of individual disks and even individual partitions should this be required. This flexibility could prove useful if you have a Windows system with multiple disks or partitions in-use and only require a core (system) disk to be imaged as a part of the backup.

When utilising a disk or partition-based image backup, given that this option will back up the entire disk or partition in question by default, there is no need to specify which files or folders are to be included (we can, however, optionally exclude specific files and file types if required). The next step in the configuration is then to select the target location for storing this backup upon (as can be seen below, I am using a locally attached hard drive in my own instance).

At this point I have an entire disk drive ready to be backed-up and a storage location ready for storing the backed-up data upon. This is now a good time to go over to the left side menu and right click on this new backup set’s entry to give it a more meaningful name, as can be seen below.

Next, via the “Options” button found towards the bottom of the page, I can next tweak exactly how this new backup set is configured including (amongst other things) a schedule to run it automatically, any files or file types which should be excluded and the optional application of strong AES 256-bit encryption to help keep its contents safe.

As can be seen above, when initially entering this options page, the scheduling options configuration area is the first thig which comes into view. From within this scheduling configuration screen, we can set up virtually any schedule for our backup set to be run on including a “Non stop” option providing near real-time backups as frequently as every 5 minutes.

Moving on to the next tab and we have now the ability to specify the backup scheme which is to be used. This backup scheme selection can get quite complicated given all of the choices made available, however, the default version which comes up in the list of available choices is probably the best for typical use cases (this being the “Incremental scheme” as can be seen below):

With the Incremental scheme chosen, I can then further specify how the incremental backup set will work. As can be seen below, this involves specifying how many full and incremental versions and version chains are to be maintained and kept as a part of the automatic clean-up settings section.

NB – A “version chain” contains both a full backup plus a full set of incremental backups made in-between (the number of incremental backups varying depending upon the settings specified above). Incremental backups usually run much quicker than full backups, meaning a plan with many incremental backups (per each full backup) will most likely be less resource intensive overall.

This backup type configuration tab is also very important as it is the choices which are made here which will help determine the number of historic file versions we keep as a part of our backup. For example, if I backup once per day and want to keep 1 year of historic file versions available, then I could simply store a single chain with 365 incremental backups in-between each full back-up or, alternatively, 12 full chains made up of 30 incremental backups each (before said chains start getting deleted and replaced with new ones).

If for any reason you don’t want to work out you own historic versioning when using True Image then you could simply make use of one of the default backup schemes which are provided. In this case, the “Version chain scheme” (as can be seen below), will automatically manage 6 months of file version history which is enabled by default.

The next two tabs in the configuration page are the “Notifications” tab (where email alerts can be configured and the “Exclusions” tab from where specified files, folders and even file types (e.g. ISO files) can be automatically excluded to help save disk space.

NB – Despite being a cloud-based subscription service, Acronis still expect their customers to enter their own SMTP information for having email reports sent to them!

Finally, in the Advanced tab I can finalise this new backup set by tuning on some other key settings including strong AES 256-bit encryption, file compression, backup splitting and enabling automatic backup validation amongst a few other included features.

As can be seen above, one of the most important methods for protecting a backup set is to make use of a password and strong AES 256-bit encryption. Such a set-up means that if a backup does get into the wrong hands (for whatever reason) it is still safe and the data secure in that such strong encryption is virtually impossible to break.

Another important section within this same configuration tab to be aware of is the Performance section (as can be seen below). From here the compression level for the backup can be set as well as the priority at which the operation will run (and, in-turn, how much of the computer’s resources will be used when in operation).

NB – Higher levels of data compression will help to save disk space, but will also mean backups take longer to run and will consume more of the PC’s resources in the process!

Next, another useful feature for anyone planning to make use of optical discs such as CDs, DVDs or fixed-size media devices such as USB flash drives as backup storage is the file Splitting section. From this section, True Image can be configured to make multiple files per backup within a specified size range so that they can, for example, then be written to multiple 4.7GB DVDs amongst other fixed-size storage media options.

Finally, with all aforementioned options saved, this backup set will then be fully configured and ready to go. If a schedule has been set then this will take over the automatic running of the backup or, alternatively, the green “Back up now” button can be used to start the backup running manually.