Windows Backup Software Review - 'Bare Metal Showdown 2' - Part 3

Quick links for backup software review:-

Overview of the contenders
Test 1 - Hard disk copy
Test 2 - Drive to image
Test 3 - Image to drive
Test 4 - Rescue CD
Test 5 - Real world hard disk copy
Features at a glance
Conclusions
Comment on this article

Test number 2 - Drive to Image

For the next test in our 2010 disk backup software review, we created an image file of the Windows 7 disk that we were currently using and stored it on another hard drive in the system.

Program	Time (mm:ss)	Notes

Acronis True Image 2010	02:50
Easus Todo Backup 1.1	05:01
Nero Backitup 4	07:33
Norton Ghost 15	03:09
Paragon Drive backup 10	13:47	"VSS Technology has failed with error 0x11112" message displayed multiple times

All of the programs managed to create an image file, True Image 10 was the fastest followed by Norton Ghost. The slowest product was Paragon Drive Backup, which repeatedly displayed an error message telling us "VSS Technology has failed with error 0x11112" before finally managing to image the disk.

Test number 3 - Image to Drive

Now things start to get interesting. In this test, we used the drive images we just created and restored them to the destination drive. We then removed the source drive and replaced it with the destination drive and tried to boot it.

Program	Time (mm:ss)	Boot?	Notes

Acronis True Image 2010	02:55	Yes
Easus Todo Backup 1.1	03:21	Yes	"Windows did not shut down properly" message
Nero Backitup 4	03:38	No (see below)	Does not show enough information when choosing a disk to restore to
Norton Ghost 15	09:29	No	Extremely confusing GUI, BOOTMGR is missing message when trying to boot destination drive
Paragon Drive backup 10	03:03	Yes

Each package restored the drive with files in tact, but two of the drives would not boot. When using Nero BackItUp in Windows, there is no option to restore the master boot record to the drive. Without this vital piece of information, the drive will not boot. This is a curious omission, if you create a Nero rescue CD (more on rescue CD performance later) then Nero BackItUp will create a bootable disk from a drive image.

On the subject of Nero BackItUp, we would have appreciated a little more information about the drives attached to our computer, to aid in selecting the right destination drive for recovery. The other packages all show information about what is on the drives, their labels and the amount of used and free space. Nero just shows a drive serial number, disk number and total capacity. The last thing you want to do is overwrite a working drive with an image intended for an empty one so this is a black mark against BackItUp in our opinion.

As for the Norton product, this is somewhat more perplexing. We did specifically ask the software to restore the master boot record, but we still ended up with a drive that did not boot. Actually restoring the drive was just about as confusing and complicated as it could possibly be made. To give the software the benefit of the doubt we tried again, double checking the settings but still ended up with a "BOOTMGR is missing" message when trying to boot the disk, very poor.

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