Backup Software Macrium Reflect 8 Home -50%

[Frank]

https://www.macrium.com/black-friday

Macrium Reflect 8 Home 50% Off

The holiday season has come early - get our incredible software for half the price! We only offer a discount this big once a year, so if you’ve been thinking about changing your backup and recovery solution to Reflect 8 Home, now is definitely the time. The process couldn’t be easier, so give yourself the gift of true peace-of-mind.

Ready to try Macrium Reflect 8 Home? The process is quick, easy and available for 50% off for a limited time. Our robust and powerful software keeps all your hard work safe and secure.

The complete backup solution for personal use. Protect documents, data and operating systems using advanced disk imaging technology. Includes Macrium viBoot for instant Hyper-V virtualization, as well as Oracle VirtualBox, and ransomware protection with Macrium Image Guardian.

Your license includes 12 months Essentials Support, giving you complete peace of mind. If you have any issues with Macrium Reflect 8 Home, a member of our technical team will be happy to assist. Sit back, relax, and be confident that Macrium quickly and reliably secures your valuable data.

 

[Brian Lawler]

I have been using Macrium Free for several years.  It is outstanding.  From what I can see, the paid "Home" version primarily gives you a year of support.  The free version is not crippled in any way, but lacks some enhancements for scheduled back-ups.  You can use it "guilt free" https://www.macrium.com/reflect-free-faq   Certainly the best way to evaluate before purchase.  They even allow commercial use of the free version.

[mibby]

Does this allow backup up of connected USB drives?

[Grem]

18 minutes ago, Brian Lawler said:

I have been using Macrium Free for several years. 

Certainly the best way to evaluate before purchase.

 

I have been looking at this software for a few years now, but have always stayed with Acronis. But lately Acronis has gotten too... dare I say.. bloated? I mean all I want is a good bkup solution that takes a true image of my HD and an easy way to restore that bkup.

I would also like to be able to restore a single file or folder too. But if I can only restore the whole drive, and it's a TRUE image, then I would take that over charging extra for a bunch of BS I don't ever want or even use!

[Brian Lawler]

4 minutes ago, mibby said:

Does this allow backup up of connected USB drives?

Yes. I run a weekly backup image of my data drives TO a USB drive.  4 TB takes about 9 hours.  This is the mode that is "slow" if run as a scheduled task on the free version.  I just start the job manually Thursday evening and it is usually finished before I want to use the PC next morning.  You CAN use the PC while backing up, but I prefer not to slow things down and potentially miss file changes. You can also backup FROM USB and TO any other device, including network.  The backup images can be mounted as a container in the Windows file system / Explorer in case you only need to restore a few files.  There is also a Windows boot drive system image option that will let you use a bootable Macrium CD/DVD/Thumbdirve to restore your OS in the event of "the big failure".

[Frank]

11 minutes ago, Grem said:

 

I have been looking at this software for a few years now, but have always stayed with Acronis. But lately Acronis has gotten too... dare I say.. bloated? I mean all I want is a good bkup solution that takes a true image of my HD and an easy way to restore that bkup.

I would also like to be able to restore a single file or folder too. But if I can only restore the whole drive, and it's a TRUE image, then I would take that over charging extra for a bunch of BS I don't ever want or even use!

You can simply mount the image of your backup and copy via Windows Explorer the needed file or folder onto your drive.

[Brian Lawler]

I have been bitten by backup software that didn't recover when I REALLY needed it to.  The only way you can know for sure that you can count on it, is to run a system boot drive image backup (I am only talking Windows here- I don't Apple).  Make the recovery boot media (like a thumb drive).  Power down and pull the physical boot drive from your PC.  Plug in a replacement drive. Run the recovery and see if it boots to useable Windows.  As long as you have a reasonably small system "C:" partition, it doesn't take that long (couple hours).  Most back-up solutions WILL work as far as getting all your data back after re-installing Windows manually, but that is a major multi-day task when you have all this copy protection nonsense to deal with.  BTW you STILL might get bit by some security schemes.  I re-routed several USB cables to tidy up my space and Pace iLOK decided I was using a different PC (I changed NOTHING inside the case).  Thankfully the reset request I had to send was honored in about a day.

<EDIT>  I have NOT done this lately, as I am on an M2 drive and don't want to risk damaging the board.  I am just keeping the faith that Macrium will remain up to the task. 

Edited November 17, 2021 by Brian Lawler

[abacab]

I have been running Macrium Reflect for years. Started out with the free edition, which works very well, then upgraded to the Home edition at the sale price last year.

I make daily full images of my boot drive with Reflect, and have restored the full disk several times using the USB flash recovery drive. The recovery drive starts the computer using a bootable copy of Windows PE that is customized for the task. Then you can start the restore by selecting the image you want to restore, and then the target drive you want to put it on.

I can take a full image of my 500GB SSD (~260GB used) in about 35 mins, using an external 2TB WD Elements USB drive. The restore takes about the same amount of time. Rather than backing up files and folders, a disk image copies the disk sector by sector, so you don't miss anything such as a folder being locked.

The main advantage for me with the Home edition is Macrium Image Guardian, which protects the image files from ransomware. The free version does not have that feature. There are more image options in Home as well, but I'm still using the full image type just as I did with the free edition.

Highly recommend!

Edited November 17, 2021 by abacab

[abacab]

3 hours ago, Brian Lawler said:

<EDIT>  I have NOT done this lately, as I am on an M2 drive and don't want to risk damaging the board.  I am just keeping the faith that Macrium will remain up to the task. 

All you basically need to do for assurance is to test boot with the USB recovery drive. Select "Restore" and make sure that you can access a usable image file. And then cancel before starting the actual restore. No need to go swapping in spare drives to test the restore on, unless you really want to.

Macrium is very reliable when it comes to making images, but there is one additional step that you can add to the image definition. Go to "Advanced Settings" and select "Auto verify image" and check the box to verify the file directly after creation. This will double the time that it takes your image job to complete, but you will be extra secure in knowing that you have a usable image file! I leave that enabled on all of my image jobs.

Edited November 17, 2021 by abacab

[Brian Lawler]

Yep.  Better safe than sorry.  I will also add that one should maintain "cold" backups (not connected to a network) and rotate them offsite.  I maintained my wife's medical practice server for decades.  Would you believe that 10 days after we turned it over to a managed service, they got ransomed?  NO cold backups.  They have (had?) a lot of clients.  They paid up and got the data back in two weeks.  "There but for the grace of God" maybe, but I had enough sense to maintain multiple off-line archives.  We could have brought her office back with "my" last backup- but since they had to pay a lump some for all their customers anyway, I let them earn their fees.  

[abacab]

48 minutes ago, Brian Lawler said:

Yep.  Better safe than sorry.  I will also add that one should maintain "cold" backups (not connected to a network) and rotate them offsite.  I maintained my wife's medical practice server for decades.  Would you believe that 10 days after we turned it over to a managed service, they got ransomed?  NO cold backups.  They have (had?) a lot of clients.  They paid up and got the data back in two weeks.  "There but for the grace of God" maybe, but I had enough sense to maintain multiple off-line archives.  We could have brought her office back with "my" last backup- but since they had to pay a lump some for all their customers anyway, I let them earn their fees.  

Yep, I do a "cold" image weekly with a USB drive that I rotate offline. But the Macrium Image Guardian assures me that nothing, including me, can tamper with daily image files that I have connected online to a hot USB drive!