Windows 10: Macrium Reflect vs Acronis

I have been using Acronis for many years but lately have not been sure of its reliability. I recently tried Macrium but I noticed a difference. With Acronis when I have restored the Windows OS I have "sanitized" the SSD that had the corrupted OS on it. Then Acronis would automatically format and partition the drive prior to doing the restore.

When I tried to do a restore with Macrium it hung up with no error message. I suspected that it could not restore to an unallocated drive so I used diskpart to do just that which is more time consuming.

Am I correct? Does Macrium require the use of diskpart or some third party method of creating an active, simple, system partition?

I would like to hear other's thoughts.


I have experimented with a number of backup software brands and have yet to find one that is simple and reliable.

:)

 

Restoring Windows 10 Image using Macrium Reflect


In addition to the above. Here's my suggestion in step by step.
I assume you have Macrium Installed in your current HD and already made a backup copy.

1. Connect your new HD via USB port and boot up.
2. Run Macrium, click on Restore tab then select the Backup Image that you made to restore
3. click on "select a different target disk" then select your new HD as destination
   
   
   
4. Proceed to restore then Shutdown and disconnect the old HD and replace with the new HD
5. Boot up with your new HD.

 

Backup/Recovery tools - Acronis vs Macrium


Please forgive me for not reading the whole "Window 10 Recovery Tools" thread before posting this, but that's a very long thread.

I am a long time user of Acronis True Image. Lately I've run into a few peculiarities that have me looking at alternatives. A number of people have recommended the free version Macrium Reflect, but I need the paid version to meat my requirements. I would like more information to help me decide. (Other products can be suggested, of course.)

My requirements are:

1. I have to run the backups on 3 devices - 2 desktops and 1 laptop.
2. The laptop backup goes to a NAS drive.
3. I need to run full disk image backups on all 3 devices.
4. I need to run file/folder backups of some files on the NAS drive from one of the PCs.

I've done 1 recovery using Macrium and 2 using Acronis. I had a couple false starts with Acronis because understand the process. I don't remember how easy the Macrium process was. I found configuring the backup process less straightforward with Macrium than with Acronis, but I recently discovered that Acronis has an exclusion list and was excluding files from its "Entire PC" backups. (Grrr!) All recoveries were successful.

I've had to recover old data a number of times. I've done it successfully from the Acronis backup and have walked through the process with the Macrium. Both work with no problem. Macrium mounts the backup image faster than Acronis, but I don't think it gives an option of the drive letter to use in mounting.

Tthe free version of Macrium Reflect does not take file/folder backups, and the cost of a 3 (actually 4) device license for Macrium Home costs quit a bit more than a 3 platform license for Acronis.

The Acronis doc says only file/folder backups can be taken to a NAS, but I'm taking "Entire PC" drive backups of the laptop to my NAS drive. I know for a fact that the Acronis stand-alone recovery systems cannot access a NAS drive. I would have to copy the backup to another drive before doing a drive recovery. I have not idea what the Macriun capabilities are regarding NAS.

I suspect I will continue using Acronis, but I would like to hear what other people think I should do.

 

Acronis True Image vs Macrium Reflect

I would not use Acronis even if it's free. Was a long time Acronis user and quit using it since version 2009 once I found out it modified the MBR and put services that were hard/impossible to get rid of even if I uninstalled Acronis.
Acronis Leftover Drivers? | Knowledge Base

Macrium free is all you need to do backup/restore and you don't even need to create CD/USB to boot from, you can set up to either:

1. Run as dual boot from HD/SSD with Windows
2. Solved FYI: Setup Macrium Rescue to boot from an Internal/External USB HD/SSD - Windows 10 Forums