My OperaParagon Drive Backup to the rescue
Friday, July 17, 2009 8:59:46 AM
Last October I did a short review here on my blog of Paragon Drive Backup 9.0 Free Edition. I concluded that it was a useful tool for experienced users, but probably won't work for others.
One of the things that prompted me to try Windows 7 on my P1510D (as mentioned in my previous post) was that my wife got a 1TB external drive recently, which meant that I could easily back up the subnotebook's disk (30GB). The program I chose to do the backup was Drive Backup 9.0 Free. I wanted to see how well it'd work in practice, given a scenario I commented in my review that it should be good for.
It was indeed very convenient for this. I did my first backup to an external drive running from the XP, and also created the rescue media on CD (the software recommends a USB disk, but I haven't managed to boot the subnotebook from one in the past). This is Linux based, though has a UI that'd be familiar to Windows users. After the CD loads you can remove it, which I found useful as it's an external drive, and I wanted to disconnect it and plug in the USB backup disk instead.
When I went back to XP I first backed up the Windows 7 installation using the Linux CD, then restored XP. It all worked without a hitch. Backup took 20 to 30 minutes and restore about 40 minutes. Note that the internal disk on the P1510D is slow, as well as its CPU (a 1.2GHz Pentium M).
All in all, I think that Drive Backup 9.0 Free is a good "ghosting" solution, and as such an essential tool for any enthusiast who does a lot of reinstalling. I still think it's not useful for its intended use (regular backup), but it worked well for my use.
I'd also like to add that unlike my previous experience, this time I had no problem getting a key and activating the product.
One of the things that prompted me to try Windows 7 on my P1510D (as mentioned in my previous post) was that my wife got a 1TB external drive recently, which meant that I could easily back up the subnotebook's disk (30GB). The program I chose to do the backup was Drive Backup 9.0 Free. I wanted to see how well it'd work in practice, given a scenario I commented in my review that it should be good for.
It was indeed very convenient for this. I did my first backup to an external drive running from the XP, and also created the rescue media on CD (the software recommends a USB disk, but I haven't managed to boot the subnotebook from one in the past). This is Linux based, though has a UI that'd be familiar to Windows users. After the CD loads you can remove it, which I found useful as it's an external drive, and I wanted to disconnect it and plug in the USB backup disk instead.
When I went back to XP I first backed up the Windows 7 installation using the Linux CD, then restored XP. It all worked without a hitch. Backup took 20 to 30 minutes and restore about 40 minutes. Note that the internal disk on the P1510D is slow, as well as its CPU (a 1.2GHz Pentium M).
All in all, I think that Drive Backup 9.0 Free is a good "ghosting" solution, and as such an essential tool for any enthusiast who does a lot of reinstalling. I still think it's not useful for its intended use (regular backup), but it worked well for my use.
I'd also like to add that unlike my previous experience, this time I had no problem getting a key and activating the product.
