I know it is easy to imagine all sort of problems and terrors with what you would like to do, but it is also easy to imagine doing so to be far more difficult than it actually is.
If I only redirect "My Documents", then all the settings in the rest of the "C:\Documents and Settings\username\" folder won't get stored to the separate data partition. So that means that even though I think all of my own data is on the safer D: drive, my settings are not on it, and so I will lose them if the C:\ drive gets corrupted. Am I not trying to avoid this?
You make an image copy of your XP / Vista / W7 or whatever you are going to use. All your settings and everything else is included. If you suffer a corrupted system, you restore the image with all your settings. Your files in C: My Documents will be safe in your D: partition because they will have been constantly redirected. All your setting are safe because they are in your OS image.
{snip}
Easy peasy.
Cheers,
Lee
Thanks, Lee. So you recommend the method of keeping settings in the "Documents and Settings" folder on the same partition as the Operating System, and only redirecting "My Documents". I have tried that with the admin account and it worked. I will soon try it with the limited access account.
Good going to have successfully repartitioned your drive with Partition Master. I use Gparted nowadays but it's not as simple to use. I didn't realize you were using a recovery disk, so no wonder the partition option never came up when setting up XP
Maybe I can make a rescue CD & clean install ISO which would work better for me than starting over with that DVD, since it takes time to load all the Win Updates.
Yes, it would be a good move to create an ISO of your fresh OS and keep it in a folder on D drive. It only takes a few minutes.
When you have your drivers, programs installed and all your final settings established to your liking, make a 2nd. ISO of your C drive into another folder in D, but separate from your 1st. ISO folder. You can then keep both or do what I do, delete the first one as the second one is the important one. Setting up the OS once it is installed is where all the times goes, not the original installation which is a relatively a quick process.
You can also create a rescue disk by following the instructions under "other tasks" in Macrium Reflect. With that disk you can boot to it if you can't access your Desktop and from there you can access your ISO image on D drive and restore your OS.
When you redirect your My Documents on the 2nd account, make another folder in D, but call it My Documents2 or Guest Documents and redirect to there for that account. For obvious reasons, you don't want two "My Documents" folders in D
Cheers,
Lee
PS Edit: As you only have one HDD, it would be a very good idea to regularly back up your D drive on to a USB HDD.
I just make a D drive ISO onto my 2nd. internal HDD and just regularly replace it. Store a copy of your C drive ISO there too, just in case you Laptop HDD ever goes pear shaped.
Their was problems with 2011 version being buggy, me I use the 2010 and stayed with and it run with no problems, like I said if it's not broken, don't fix it.
Their was problems with 2011 version being buggy, me I use the 2010 and stayed with and it run with no problems, like I said if it's not broken, don't fix it.
Jimbo1
I'm looking for a link on the acronis site for 2010, but have only found links for 2011 version
Thank you. The link you gave me above appears to point to physical media rather than a download off the internet. Is that correct? I had hoped to download off the 'net rather than wait for it to be shipped…
I gave Macrium Reflect one more try. I used it to create images of my partitions on an external Hard Drive. I also created a rescue CD using the Linux option. Once again, the rescue CD would not boot up. I gave it 8 minutes but it just sat their with a blank screen. If it's doing something, it should say something so that we know it isn't hung. Since it didn't work, I rebooted into Windows XP and installed the video driver and graphics accelerator and 'chip set' driver. It rebooted on its own. Then, I shut down, powered down, and restarted with the Macrium recovery CD. Still no luck. Sorry, Lee!
I wonder if Reflect is having problems because I installed a Linux OS? Linux OS put the boot options, including Windows XP, into a GRUB boot loader. Would that mess up Macrium Reflect?
(I just read on some page somewhere that if I can find \windows\boot from my Vista DVDs I could use EasyBCD to 'repair' my bootloading. Not sure I want to experiment with that, though)
I'm just wondering what burning program you used and at what speed you burnt the CD at ?
I never use more than 4x speed to make a bootable CD, as often a faster speed doesn't create a bootable disk.
Cheers,
Lee
I used the option in Macrium Reflect to create a Rescue disk. Screenshots below. It doesn't have a burn speed - no place to select 4x. 📎Macrium_Reflect_Rescue_Disk_Creation.JPG
Looking at the page for Bart's PE, I probably can't use it because I don't have an 'install' dvd, I only have this recovery disk!
I actually bought the 2011 version of ATI in January. It was very buggy and there is a thread about 2011 ATI somewhere here at WTT.
I had opened an ATI account after finding out it was possible to get the 2010 version. I haven't gotten round to it yet, so I wasn't dead sure about the changeover to 2010.
Cheers,
Lee
I don't have a Recovery Console start up option & no rescue disk. When I tried to follow instructures for installing Recovery Console (using my 'install' CD), I got nowhere. I thought it would be a really good idea to have that as a startup option… If that needs to be on a primary partition, I might be in trouble. I've already used 3 primary partitions.
Anyway, getting back to backup & restore process: before trying Acronis, I thought - why not try the MS WINDOWS backup utility? After all, it's there. It's what Microbrain includes in the operating system, right?
So I plugged in my USB external floppy drive and opened My Computer. Something I haven't seen in a long time - the A: drive!
I started the Windows Backup tool. Automated System Recovery Wizard. It wrote more than 50% of my C: partition out to the external USB drive (over 10G). It didn't even ask me if I wanted all that to be in the initial backup. And then it wrote a floppy diskette. It was supposed to be bootable.
Anyway. Went to BIOS. Included Floppy drive in the boot options, prior to the internal hard drive. Saved settings. Shutdown. Restarted. The floppy made a bunch of noise and then the screen said 'non-system disk or disk error'. Maybe I was supposed to format the disk as bootable first?
Seems kinda weak to me that manufacturers like Sony, and Microsoft, would include a backup utility which relied on hardware which, even in summer of 2008, was rarely come by. Why wouldn't they just assume you could at least attach a writeable CD drive, since they were far more common?
If I were a more regular Mandriva user and had a lot of expertise in that area, I would back up the entire hard drive using Linux utilities, including a recovery/rescue CDs. Assuming that Mandriva has a whole hard-drive backup utility.
So, more experimenting for me.
thanks
Linda
Anyway, getting back to backup & restore process: before trying Acronis, I thought - why not try the MS WINDOWS backup utility? After all, it's there. It's what Microbrain includes in the operating system, right?
Unlike MR and ATI, the XP backup utility is does not create a drive image. It is a file a settings backup utility and in that role it is just another piece of Microsoft add-on junk
So you recommend the method of keeping settings in the "Documents and Settings" folder on the same partition as the Operating System, and only redirecting "My Documents". I have tried that with the admin account and it worked. I will soon try it with the limited access account.
recovery disk! 
and opened My Computer. Something I haven't seen in a long time - the A: drive!
I started the Windows Backup tool. Automated System Recovery Wizard. It wrote more than 50% of my C: partition out to the external USB drive (over 10G). It didn't even ask me if I wanted all that to be in the initial backup. And then it wrote a floppy diskette. It was supposed to be bootable.
Anyway. Went to BIOS. Included Floppy drive in the boot options, prior to the internal hard drive. Saved settings. Shutdown. Restarted. The floppy made a bunch of noise and then the screen said 'non-system disk or disk error'. Maybe I was supposed to format the disk as bootable first?
Seems kinda weak to me that manufacturers like Sony, and Microsoft, would include a backup utility which relied on hardware which, even in summer of 2008, was rarely come by. Why wouldn't they just assume you could at least attach a writeable CD drive, since they were far more common?
If I were a more regular Mandriva user and had a lot of expertise in that area, I would back up the entire hard drive using Linux utilities, including a recovery/rescue CDs. Assuming that Mandriva has a whole hard-drive backup utility.
So, more experimenting for me.
thanks
Linda
