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

1. What is an RD? I have already reformatted it to FAT32 — I need that soI can use it on Windows or Mac, as my other computer is a Mac. You gave a command to erase it, your notes said there might be an problem with that, but since it ran smoothly and I see nothing, I have to think not.

But no, we want it invisible on part 6, as it always was. Yes, if invisible and trying to delete, you can’t see if you accomplished it.

2. Oh, just simply the general command ReagentC /Info, and it will check all partitions, I don’t have to specify any in particular?  Or is there more to the command,

We did not do anything with part 5 today, so I don’t think it would have been affected. What we did was specified for part 6.

Yes, I know it won’t give a final, definitive answer, but we can at least see if it even recognizes a recovery image on part 6. If not, that’s an answer.

4. OK, so PCR is your initials. :) That’s why I couched the question in :”f I may ask.” :)

If you confirm, just open Command Prompt, put in ReagentC /Info, nothing else, I will run that tomorrow, and I’ll let you know the outcome.

Oh, BTW, re Command Prompt, up front I think you were suggesting you prefer Command Prompt because you are experienced with it, you are not so sure about Power Shell. My understanding is that Power Shell is pretty much just a renamed Command Prompt, but continues getting updates and advances. Command Prompt is not getting those updates anymore, its being phased out. I’m pretty sure these commands could have been run with same effect in Power Shell. BUT, I agree, when doing something like we have, use what you know, not a good time to be experimenting.

I just ran the ReagentC /Info command. It does see the Recovery image on part 6, and still sees the Recovery WindowsRE on part 5. I note, it says the Windows RE status is enabled. It does not say anything about whether the Recovery image is enabled. Not sure that means anything. But that's it, at least it sees the image, whether it could work, who knows, but not really important. 

So, all that is left is to do those backups now. I'll let you know how much time they take now, with no sector-by-sector backup.

Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.19041.388]

(c) 2020 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

C:\WINDOWS\system32>ReagentC  /Info

Windows Recovery Environment (Windows RE) and system reset configuration

Information:

    Windows RE status:         Enabled

    Windows RE location:       \?\GLOBALROOT\device\harddisk0\partition5\Recovery\WindowsRE

    Boot Configuration Data (BCD) identifier: 06a7379d-d1bb-11ea-8997-b888e3b1b2f5

    Recovery image location:   \?\GLOBALROOT\device\harddisk0\partition6\RecoveryImage

    Recovery image index:      2

    Custom image location:

    Custom image index:        0

REAGENTC.EXE: Operation Successful.

C:\WINDOWS\system32>

OK, I have made the backups. And just for your curiosity:

First backed up the 15 GB Push Button partition only. That took 8-8.5 minutes, only maybe a minute to maybe a 1.5 minutes faster. It was not a sector-by-sector backup.

Just finished backing up all five partitions in a full backup, not sector-by-sector. It took about 2.5 hours, maybe 15 minutes to 30 minutes faster. The image file size came in agt 5 GB bigger than the one I made just a couple days ago to make sure I had a version with the good part 5 on it. I expected it might come in smaller, don't know where it found an extra 5 GB.

So Partition 6 survived in /Info -- hmm. Well, it did come back as 6 after delete/recreate. Also, there was no reboot between the delete & recreate. So, I'm not overly surprised. Good to know it wasn't affected.

My own system images seem to creep upwardly in size too. It can be lessened somewhat at "START, Settings, System, Storage, Temporary Files". I generally delete the big ones there before making a new system image. If the item named "Windows update cleanup" (or some such) exists, it can be several GB huge & is expendable. But careful you don't delete your Downloads folder.

OK, I think we are done & have been successful. Good going making a new set of backups. Good luck. Keep us informed of any further developments.

Yes, part 6 appears to be just like it was to start out — although we can’t know that about everything, Now next time you get into 22 pages of a forum thread writing code for someone to play around with partitions, you will know that much more. :)

I was surprised it did not much affect the time frame for the backups. I thought it might knock it back to maybe two hours.

BTW, I kept much of the code we ran, I was putting them in text files. Will probably never need to use it, but I have it if I need it. I was able to follow much of it once you wrote it, and thanks for the explanations of what it was doing.

So, as they say in Hollywood, that’s a wrap. :) And I really do appreciate all the work and effort you went to to help out, I know that was a lot. You’re one of the good guys.

Oh, I did one more try holdng down Shift while doing a restart, and while doing a cold startup. No difference, still does not boot to Advanced Startup. And yes, I tried both shift keys.