Trouble Making Image Backup with Acronia True Image 2016 -- apparent misread of space

Anonymous
2020-06-18T23:54:58+00:00

I have been trying for days now to make a backup image of my internal Windows 10 hard drive, fully updated to current Windows 10 level May 2020. I have been using Acronis True Image 2016, as I always do. I have been backing up to an external, USB2 connected hard drive with 160 GB of free space on it (a 320 GB hard drive), the same drive I normally backup to. This is a Gateway laptop, NE56R from 2012, which shipped with Windows 8.

I have been trying to backup all partitions, including the C, and recovery partitions (including the Push Button one, which is about 15 GB) and whatever others are there. In total, they are about 109 GB. So I ought to have plenty enough free space.

I have checked all partitions to back up with True Image. It runs the whole backup, takes a good five hours. At the end, it throws up amessage saying ther eis not enough space for the image.

I have never had this problem before. The machine is booted from the True Image disk, so that should rule out some issue wiht my Widows 10 OS. I am doing a full disk backup, and I am even using Maximum Compression, which is what I always use, so I should need something lessthatn 109 GB of free space. and Ihave 160 GB of free space on the external drive.

I have a backup of Win 10 I made in April, shortly before the new OS level cam out on the drive -- I always keep two, just because. I deleted the older of the two on there, so now have only the one. I certainly don't want to delete the one on there, and still have this problem but no backup at all. But Ihave more free space than shudbe needed.

The external drive has been used only for backups since I started using it brand new, and I make a backup once or twice a year -- and I have been using it no more than four years. So, the external drive has very little, hardly any actual use on it, it is not far from brand new.

I read something this morning about a real problem found in the new Win 10 update, something to do with Storage Space, that is some sort of function in the OS now. I don't know what that is, or what it does. But the story said if your drive is not showing as RAW, then it should be OK, not affected. I checked Disk Management, and none of my volumes nor the external drive are marked as RAW. So, that should mean that issue is not the case here.

I have done enough backups in the past four years using the Acronis True Image 2016 software. It has always worked fine, and actually with less free space (I had another item on the drive too, but have deleted it. I also have deleterd about 32 GB of stuff from my C drive in an attempt to make this backup fit, but to no avail -- that is, my last two backups were actually larger than this one, and they fit fine.)

So, why do I keep getting the message about not enough space? I should have way more than enough.

Windows for home | Windows 10 | Windows update

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  1. Anonymous
    2020-06-19T17:14:43+00:00

    On that storage issue, I don’t understand it. But I thought it might be doing something to the files or even format to make them look bigger than they are. Not that anything is running, that the files been changed, basically corrupted. But I, too, doubted that was the issue.

    Actually, even Windows, under its imaging process, says in order to have the necessary volumes, it must be three of them, the C drive (the Windows partition), the EFI partition, and the “push button” recovery partition. The other two partitions are so small, a few hundred MB each, that it doesn’t even matter. My Win 10 was an upgrade from Win 8.1.

    I have to run Legacy in bios in order to boot from a DVD. That is so even when I boot my Win 10 installer disk, which I have to presume Win 10 made with Win 10 OS on it.  Of course, UEFI is required to boot it from the Win 10 OS on the hard drive. Its a pain in the neck, I have to keep switching back and forth for this kind of thing. But, it means Acronis True Image is booting as Legacy.

    And you just confirmed that Acronis True Image 2016 is fully compatible with the newest level of the Win 10 OS. Thanks, at least I have that answer now. So, can rule out that consideration.

    Could the bad sectors on my internal hard drive be the issue? They have been like that for quite some time, were like that when I last imaged in April, and I’m pretty sure also when I imaged last year. (I had already decided to get another disk, but I need this image now so I can put it on any disk I get.)  Until I get this image, I do not want to do anything that might impact or damage the April image. Gee, even copying it off the disk could result in something corrupted in that image, so I don’t even want to do that.

    Will get a shot of Disk Management and post. I’m on a different computer right now.

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  2. VARADHARAJAN K 9,721 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
    2020-06-19T17:21:21+00:00

    Windows 10  works best with Windows 10 Pre-installation environment which is created by windows 10 adk. I never used third party tool to backup and reinstallation of windows

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  3. Anonymous
    2020-06-19T17:59:06+00:00

    Slance301 (I think you and I dealt with this machine a few years back! You were wonderful, the hell carried on for well over a month and pretty much daily and you stayed with me. I learned a LOT from you. In fact, we were dealing with this very Acronis then, and it was then that I learned Acronis estimates the size with a wrong number -- that fouled us up for weeks.)

    Here is the screen shot of Disk Management -- 2 is the EFI partition, C is main partition, and the 15 GB partition is the Push Button one). They are identified differently in Acronis, but I can tell which is which by size:

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  4. Anonymous
    2020-06-19T18:02:31+00:00

    RAJU.MSC.MATHEMATICS, Thanks for the input. I do have it in my mind to try it from Windows OS imaging if necessary. Acronis has a top reputation and it offers more to do with the imaging, including the compression. And, I've been using it to do this since about 2016 with no problems once I learned about the issue it is misrepresenting size final image will be. No problem until now, that is.

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  5. VARADHARAJAN K 9,721 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
    2020-06-19T18:10:00+00:00

    Compression is also included in windows 10 pe.  Also complete c drive files and folders will be compressed into single file im format of .wim

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