Acronis Backup for Windows Server User Guide

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Acronis Backup

Version 11.5 Update 5

USER GUIDE

APPLIES TO THE FOLLOWING PRODUCTS

For Windows Server

“Acronis” and “Acronis Secure Zone” are registered trademarks of Acronis International GmbH.

"Acronis Compute with Confidence", “Acronis Startup Recovery Manager”, “Acronis Active Restore”, “Acronis Instant Restore” and the Acronis logo are trademarks of Acronis International GmbH.

Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds.

VMware and VMware Ready are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of VMware, Inc. in the United States and/or other jurisdictions.

Windows and MS-DOS are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation.

All other trademarks and copyrights referred to are the property of their respective owners.

Distribution of substantively modified versions of this document is prohibited without the explicit permission of the copyright holder.

Distribution of this work or derivative work in any standard (paper) book form for commercial purposes is prohibited unless prior permission is obtained from the copyright holder.

DOCUMENTATION IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND ALL EXPRESS OR IMPLIED CONDITIONS, REPRESENTATIONS AND WARRANTIES, INCLUDING ANY IMPLIED WARRANTY OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE OR NON-INFRINGEMENT, ARE DISCLAIMED, EXCEPT TO THE EXTENT THAT SUCH DISCLAIMERS ARE HELD TO BE LEGALLY INVALID.

Third party code may be provided with the Software and/or Service. The license terms for such third-parties are detailed in the license.txt file located in the root installation directory. You can always find the latest up-to-date list of the third party code and the associated license terms used with the Software and/or Service at http://kb.acronis.com/content/7696

Acronis patented technologies

Technologies, used in this product, are covered and protected by one or more U.S. Patent Numbers: 7,047,380; 7,275,139; 7,281,104; 7,318,135; 7,353,355; 7,366,859; 7,475,282; 7,603,533; 7,636,824; 7,650,473; 7,721,138; 7,779,221; 7,831,789; 7,886,120; 7,895,403; 7,934,064; 7,937,612; 7,949,635; 7,953,948; 7,979,690; 8,005,797; 8,051,044; 8,069,320; 8,073,815; 8,074,035; 8,145,607; 8,180,984; 8,225,133; 8,261,035; 8,296,264; 8,312,259; 8,347,137; 8,484,427; 8,645,748; 8,732,121 and patent pending applications.

Table of contents

1 Introducing Acronis Backup ..............................................................................................9

1.1 What's new in Update 5 ............................................................................................................ 9

1.2 What's new in Update 4 ............................................................................................................ 9

1.3 What's new in Update 3 ............................................................................................................ 9

1.4 What's new in Update 2 ............................................................................................................ 9

1.5 What's new in Update 1 ............................................................................................................ 9

1.6 What's new in Acronis Backup & Recovery 11.5 .....................................................................10

1.7 Acronis Backup components ...................................................................................................10

1.7.1 Agent for Windows ....................................................................................................................................... 11

1.7.2 Management Console ................................................................................................................................... 11

1.7.3 Bootable Media Builder ................................................................................................................................ 11

1.8 About using the product in the trial mode ..............................................................................12

1.9 Supported file systems ............................................................................................................12

1.10 Technical Support ....................................................................................................................13

2 Getting started .............................................................................................................. 14

2.1 Using the management console ..............................................................................................15

2.1.1 "Navigation" pane ......................................................................................................................................... 16

2.1.2 Main area, views and action pages .............................................................................................................. 17

2.1.3 Console options ............................................................................................................................................. 19

3 Understanding Acronis Backup ....................................................................................... 22

3.1 Owners .....................................................................................................................................22

3.2 Credentials used in backup plans and tasks ............................................................................22

3.3 User privileges on a managed machine ...................................................................................24

3.4 List of Acronis services .............................................................................................................24

3.5 Full, incremental and differential backups ..............................................................................26

3.6 What does a disk or volume backup store? .............................................................................27

3.7 Backup and recovery of dynamic volumes (Windows) ............................................................28

3.8 Support for Advanced Format (4K-sector) hard disks .............................................................30

3.9 Compatibility with encryption software ..................................................................................30

3.10 Support for SNMP ....................................................................................................................31

3.11 Support for Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012 ................................................................32

3.12 Support for UEFI-based machines ...........................................................................................34

4 Backup .......................................................................................................................... 35

4.1 Back up now .............................................................................................................................35

4.2 Creating a backup plan ............................................................................................................35

4.2.1 Selecting data to back up .............................................................................................................................. 37

4.2.2 Access credentials for source ....................................................................................................................... 38

4.2.3 Source files exclusion .................................................................................................................................... 38

4.2.4 Backup location selection ............................................................................................................................. 40

4.2.5 Access credentials for archive location ........................................................................................................ 42

4.2.6 Backup schemes ............................................................................................................................................ 42

4.2.7 Archive validation .......................................................................................................................................... 52

4.2.8 Backup plan's credentials ............................................................................................................................. 52

4.2.9 Label (Preserving machine properties in a backup) .................................................................................... 53

4.2.10 Sequence of operations in a backup plan ................................................................................................... 54

4.2.11 Why is the program asking for the password? ........................................................................................... 55

4.3 Simplified naming of backup files ............................................................................................55

4.3.1 The [DATE] variable ....................................................................................................................................... 56

4.3.2 Backup splitting and simplified file naming ................................................................................................. 57

4.3.3 Usage examples ............................................................................................................................................. 57

4.4 Scheduling ................................................................................................................................60

4.4.1 Daily schedule ................................................................................................................................................ 61

4.4.2 Weekly schedule ........................................................................................................................................... 63

4.4.3 Monthly schedule .......................................................................................................................................... 65

4.4.4 On Windows Event Log event ...................................................................................................................... 67

4.4.5 Conditions ...................................................................................................................................................... 69

4.5 Replication and retention of backups ......................................................................................72

4.5.1 Supported locations ...................................................................................................................................... 73

4.5.2 Setting up replication of backups ................................................................................................................. 74

4.5.3 Setting up retention of backups ................................................................................................................... 74

4.5.4 Retention rules for the Custom scheme ...................................................................................................... 75

4.5.5 Usage examples ............................................................................................................................................. 77

4.6 How to disable backup cataloging ...........................................................................................78

4.7 Default backup options ............................................................................................................79

4.7.1 Additional settings......................................................................................................................................... 81

4.7.2 Archive protection ......................................................................................................................................... 82

4.7.3 Backup cataloging ......................................................................................................................................... 82

4.7.4 Backup performance ..................................................................................................................................... 83

4.7.5 Backup splitting ............................................................................................................................................. 84

4.7.6 Compression level ......................................................................................................................................... 85

4.7.7 Disaster recovery plan (DRP) ........................................................................................................................ 86

4.7.8 E-mail notifications ........................................................................................................................................ 87

4.7.9 Error handling ................................................................................................................................................ 88

4.7.10 Event tracing .................................................................................................................................................. 89

4.7.11 Fast incremental/differential backup .......................................................................................................... 90

4.7.12 File-level backup snapshot ........................................................................................................................... 90

4.7.13 File-level security ........................................................................................................................................... 91

4.7.14 Media components ....................................................................................................................................... 91

4.7.15 Mount points ................................................................................................................................................. 92

4.7.16 Multi-volume snapshot ................................................................................................................................. 92

4.7.17 Pre/Post commands ...................................................................................................................................... 93

4.7.18 Pre/Post data capture commands ............................................................................................................... 94

4.7.19 Replication/cleanup inactivity time ............................................................................................................. 96

4.7.20 Sector-by-sector backup ............................................................................................................................... 97

4.7.21 Task failure handling ..................................................................................................................................... 97

4.7.22 Task start conditions ..................................................................................................................................... 98

4.7.23 Volume Shadow Copy Service ...................................................................................................................... 99

5 Recovery ..................................................................................................................... 101

5.1 Creating a recovery task ........................................................................................................101

5.1.1 What to recover .......................................................................................................................................... 102

5.1.2 Access credentials for location ................................................................................................................... 105

5.1.3 Access credentials for destination ............................................................................................................. 106

5.1.4 Where to recover ........................................................................................................................................ 106

5.1.5 When to recover ......................................................................................................................................... 114

5.1.6 Task credentials ........................................................................................................................................... 114

5.2 Recovering BIOS-based systems to UEFI-based and vice versa .............................................114

5.2.1 Recovering volumes .................................................................................................................................... 115

5.2.2 Recovering disks .......................................................................................................................................... 116

5.3 Acronis Active Restore ...........................................................................................................118

5.4 Bootability troubleshooting ...................................................................................................120

5.4.1 How to reactivate GRUB and change its configuration ............................................................................ 121

5.4.2 About Windows loaders ............................................................................................................................. 122

5.5 Reverting a Windows system to its factory settings ..............................................................123

5.6 Default recovery options .......................................................................................................123

5.6.1 Additional settings....................................................................................................................................... 124

5.6.2 E-mail notifications ...................................................................................................................................... 125

5.6.3 Error handling .............................................................................................................................................. 126

5.6.4 Event tracing ................................................................................................................................................ 127

5.6.5 File-level security ......................................................................................................................................... 128

5.6.6 Mount points ............................................................................................................................................... 128

5.6.7 Pre/Post commands .................................................................................................................................... 129

5.6.8 Recovery priority ......................................................................................................................................... 130

6 Conversion to a virtual machine ................................................................................... 131

6.1 Conversion methods ..............................................................................................................131

6.2 Conversion to an automatically created virtual machine ......................................................131

6.2.1 Considerations before conversion ............................................................................................................. 132

6.2.2 Setting up regular conversion to a virtual machine .................................................................................. 133

6.2.3 Recovery to the ''New virtual machine'' destination ................................................................................ 136

6.3 Recovery to a manually created virtual machine ..................................................................139

6.3.1 Considerations before conversion ............................................................................................................. 139

6.3.2 Steps to perform ......................................................................................................................................... 140

7 Storing the backed up data........................................................................................... 141

7.1 Vaults .....................................................................................................................................141

7.1.1 Working with vaults .................................................................................................................................... 142

7.1.2 Personal vaults ............................................................................................................................................ 142

7.2 Acronis Secure Zone ..............................................................................................................145

7.2.1 Creating Acronis Secure Zone .................................................................................................................... 145

7.2.2 Managing Acronis Secure Zone .................................................................................................................. 147

7.3 Removable devices ................................................................................................................148

8 Operations with archives and backups.......................................................................... 150

8.1 Validating archives and backups ............................................................................................150

8.1.1 Archive selection ......................................................................................................................................... 151

8.1.2 Backup selection .......................................................................................................................................... 151

8.1.3 Vault selection ............................................................................................................................................. 151

8.1.4 Access credentials for source ..................................................................................................................... 152

8.1.5 When to validate ......................................................................................................................................... 152

8.1.6 Task credentials ........................................................................................................................................... 153

8.2 Exporting archives and backups ............................................................................................153

8.2.1 Archive selection ......................................................................................................................................... 155

8.2.2 Backup selection .......................................................................................................................................... 156

8.2.3 Access credentials for source ..................................................................................................................... 156

8.2.4 Destination selection .................................................................................................................................. 156

8.2.5 Access credentials for destination ............................................................................................................. 157

8.3 Mounting an image ................................................................................................................158

8.3.1 Archive selection ......................................................................................................................................... 159

8.3.2 Backup selection .......................................................................................................................................... 159

8.3.3 Access credentials ....................................................................................................................................... 159

8.3.4 Volume selection ......................................................................................................................................... 160

8.3.5 Managing mounted images........................................................................................................................ 160

8.4 Operations available in vaults ................................................................................................160

8.4.1 Operations with archives ............................................................................................................................ 161

8.4.2 Operations with backups ............................................................................................................................ 161

8.4.3 Converting a backup to full ......................................................................................................................... 163

8.4.4 Deleting archives and backups ................................................................................................................... 163

9 Bootable media ........................................................................................................... 165

9.1 How to create bootable media ..............................................................................................166

9.1.1 Linux-based bootable media ...................................................................................................................... 166

9.1.2 WinPE-based bootable media .................................................................................................................... 170

9.2 Preparing to work under bootable media .............................................................................172

9.3 Working under bootable media.............................................................................................173

9.3.1 Setting up a display mode .......................................................................................................................... 174

9.3.2 Configuring iSCSI and NDAS devices .......................................................................................................... 174

9.4 List of commands and utilities available in Linux-based bootable media .............................175

9.5 Acronis Startup Recovery Manager .......................................................................................176

10 Disk management .................................................................................................. 177

10.1 Supported file systems ..........................................................................................................177

10.2 Basic precautions ...................................................................................................................177

10.3 Running Acronis Disk Director Lite ........................................................................................178

10.4 Choosing the operating system for disk management ..........................................................178

10.5 "Disk management" view ......................................................................................................179

10.6 Disk operations ......................................................................................................................179

10.6.1 Disk initialization .......................................................................................................................................... 180

10.6.2 Basic disk cloning ......................................................................................................................................... 180

10.6.3 Disk conversion: MBR to GPT ..................................................................................................................... 182

10.6.4 Disk conversion: GPT to MBR ..................................................................................................................... 183

10.6.5 Disk conversion: basic to dynamic ............................................................................................................. 183

10.6.6 Disk conversion: dynamic to basic ............................................................................................................. 184

10.6.7 Changing disk status .................................................................................................................................... 185

10.7 Volume operations ................................................................................................................185

10.7.1 Creating a volume ....................................................................................................................................... 185

10.7.2 Delete volume ............................................................................................................................................. 189

10.7.3 Set active volume ........................................................................................................................................ 190

10.7.4 Change volume letter ................................................................................................................................. 190

10.7.5 Change volume label ................................................................................................................................... 190

10.7.6 Format volume ............................................................................................................................................ 191

10.8 Pending operations ................................................................................................................192

11 Protecting applications with disk-level backup ........................................................ 193

11.1 Backing up an application server ...........................................................................................193

11.1.1 Locating database files ................................................................................................................................ 195

11.1.2 Truncating transaction logs ........................................................................................................................ 198

11.1.3 Best practices when backing up application servers ................................................................................ 202

11.2 Recovering SQL Server data ...................................................................................................203

11.2.1 Recovering SQL Server databases from a disk backup ............................................................................. 204

11.2.2 Accessing SQL Server databases from a disk backup ............................................................................... 204

11.2.3 Attaching SQL Server databases ................................................................................................................ 205

11.3 Recovering Exchange Server data ..........................................................................................205

11.3.1 Recovering Exchange Server database files from a disk backup ............................................................. 206

11.3.2 Mounting Exchange Server databases ...................................................................................................... 206

11.3.3 Granular recovery of mailboxes ................................................................................................................. 207

11.4 Recovering Active Directory data ..........................................................................................207

11.4.1 Recovering a domain controller (other DCs are available) ...................................................................... 207

11.4.2 Recovering a domain controller (no other DCs are available) ................................................................. 208

11.4.3 Restoring the Active Directory database ................................................................................................... 209

11.4.4 Restoring accidentally deleted information .............................................................................................. 210

11.4.5 Avoiding a USN rollback .............................................................................................................................. 210

11.5 Recovering SharePoint data ..................................................................................................212

11.5.1 Recovering a content database .................................................................................................................. 212

11.5.2 Recovering configuration and service databases ..................................................................................... 214

11.5.3 Recovering individual items........................................................................................................................ 215

12 Administering a managed machine ......................................................................... 217

12.1 Backup plans and tasks ..........................................................................................................217

12.1.1 Actions on backup plans and tasks ............................................................................................................ 217

12.1.2 States and statuses of backup plans and tasks ......................................................................................... 219

12.1.3 Export and import of backup plans ............................................................................................................ 221

12.1.4 Deploying backup plans as files .................................................................................................................. 224

12.1.5 Backup plan details ..................................................................................................................................... 226

12.1.6 Task/activity details ..................................................................................................................................... 227

12.2 Log ..........................................................................................................................................227

12.2.1 Actions on log entries.................................................................................................................................. 227

12.2.2 Log entry details .......................................................................................................................................... 228

12.3 Alerts ......................................................................................................................................229

12.4 Changing a license .................................................................................................................230

12.5 Collecting system information ...............................................................................................230

12.6 Adjusting machine options ....................................................................................................231

12.6.1 Additional settings....................................................................................................................................... 231

12.6.2 Acronis Customer Experience Program ..................................................................................................... 231

12.6.3 Alerts ............................................................................................................................................................ 231

12.6.4 E-mail settings ............................................................................................................................................. 232

12.6.5 Event tracing ................................................................................................................................................ 233

12.6.6 Log cleanup rules ......................................................................................................................................... 235

12.6.7 Cloud backup proxy ..................................................................................................................................... 236

13 Cloud backup ......................................................................................................... 237

13.1 Introduction to Acronis Cloud Backup ...................................................................................237

13.1.1 What is Acronis Cloud Backup? .................................................................................................................. 237

13.1.2 What data can I back up and recover? ...................................................................................................... 237

13.1.3 How long will my backups be kept in the cloud storage? ........................................................................ 237

13.1.4 How do I secure my data? .......................................................................................................................... 238

13.1.5 Supported operating systems and virtualization products ...................................................................... 238

13.1.6 Backup and recovery FAQ .......................................................................................................................... 239

13.1.7 Initial Seeding FAQ ...................................................................................................................................... 240

13.1.8 Large Scale Recovery FAQ .......................................................................................................................... 246

13.1.9 Subscription lifecycle FAQ .......................................................................................................................... 247

13.2 Where do I start? ...................................................................................................................250

13.3 Choosing a subscription .........................................................................................................250

13.4 Activating cloud backup subscriptions ..................................................................................251

13.4.1 Activating subscriptions in Acronis Backup ............................................................................................... 251

13.4.2 Reassigning an activated subscription ....................................................................................................... 251

13.5 Configuring proxy settings .....................................................................................................252

13.6 Retrieving files from the cloud storage by using a web browser ..........................................253

13.7 Limitations of the cloud storage ............................................................................................254

13.8 Terminology reference ..........................................................................................................254

14 Glossary ................................................................................................................. 257

1 Introducing Acronis Backup

1.1 What's new in Update 5

 The most recent operating systems remain bootable when recovered to dissimilar hardware. To

simplify the recovery procedure, the Acronis Universal Restore setting is removed from the recovery wizard. A separate Acronis Universal Restore tool is introduced for the cases when installing a custom driver is required. The tool can be downloaded from your account on the Acronis website.

 The cataloging performance is improved.  Acronis Active Restore now works faster, by using a Read-Only Memory cache, and supports

Windows 8/8.1 and Windows Server 2012/2012R2.

 It is now possible to contact Acronis technical support directly from the error dialog box.

1.2 What's new in Update 4

 Improved backup to Acronis Cloud Storage.

1.3 What's new in Update 3

Rebranding

 Acronis Backup & Recovery 11.5 is renamed to Acronis Backup.

Licensing

 The Universal Restore feature is included in all Acronis Backup licenses. The Universal Restore

add-on license is deprecated.

Cloud backup

 The Acronis Backup & Recovery Online service is renamed to Acronis Cloud Backup.  Cloud backup subscriptions for Servers and for Virtual Machines are deprecated. Users can

renew these subscriptions to volume subscriptions (p. 250).

OS support

 Support for Windows MultiPoint Server 2012 and Windows Storage Server 2012 R2.

1.4 What's new in Update 2

 Support for volume subscriptions to Acronis Backup & Recovery Online (p. 250).  Support for WinPE 5.0.

1.5 What's new in Update 1

Improvements added in build 37975

 Basic support for Windows 8.1 and Windows Server 2012 R2.  Installation of Acronis Backup & Recovery 11.5 in the trial mode without a license key.  Upgrade from a stand-alone product to the advanced platform without reinstalling the software.

Basic support for Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012 (p. 32)

 Install Acronis Backup & Recovery 11.5 in Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012.  Boot a machine from bootable media that is based on WinPE 4.  Use bootable media on a machine where UEFI Secure Boot is enabled.  Back up and recover (without resize) volumes that have the ReFS file system or any data on these

volumes.

 Back up storage spaces and recover them to the original location, to different storage spaces or

as ordinary disks.

 Back up and recover (at a disk level) volumes where the Data Deduplication feature is enabled.

Other

 Completely disable backup cataloging (p. 78).  Save a Disaster Recovery Plan (p. 86) to a local or network folder, in addition to sending it via

e-mail.

 Enable VSS Full backup (p. 99) to truncate logs of VSS-aware applications after a disk-level

backup.

 Boot a UEFI machine from bootable media that is based on 64-bit WinPE (p. 170).  Add the %description% variable (the description shown in system properties of a Windows

machine) to the e-mail notification subject (p. 87).

1.6 What's new in Acronis Backup & Recovery 11.5

The following is a summary of the product's new features and enhancements.

Support for various types of storage

Acronis Online Backup Storage

 Replicating or moving backups to Acronis Online Backup Storage (p. 77).  The Grandfather-Father-Son and Tower of Hanoi backup schemes are now available when

backing up to Acronis Online Backup Storage.

Bootable media

 New Linux kernel version (3.4.5) in Linux-based bootable media. The new kernel makes for better

hardware support.

Usability

 Support for 800x600 screen resolution.

1.7 Acronis Backup components

This section contains a list of Acronis Backup components with a brief description of their functionality.

Components for a managed machine (agents)

These are applications that perform data backup, recovery and other operations on the machines managed with Acronis Backup. Agents require a license to perform operations on each managed machine.

Console

The console provides Graphical User Interface to the agents. Usage of the console is not licensed. The console is installed together with the agent and cannot be disconnected from it.

Bootable Media Builder

With Bootable Media Builder, you can create bootable media in order to use the agents and other rescue utilities in a rescue environment. Bootable Media Builder is installed together with the agent.

1.7.1 Agent for Windows

This agent enables disk-level and file-level data protection under Windows.

Disk backup

Disk-level data protection is based on backing up either a disk or a volume file system as a whole, along with all the information necessary for the operating system to boot; or all the disk sectors using the sector-by-sector approach (raw mode). A backup that contains a copy of a disk or a volume in a packaged form is called a disk (volume) backup or a disk (volume) image. It is possible to recover disks or volumes as a whole from such backup, as well as individual folders or files.

File backup

File-level data protection is based on backing up files and folders residing on the machine where the agent is installed or on a network share. Files can be recovered to their original location or to another place. It is possible to recover all files and folders that were backed up or select which of them to recover.

Conversion to a virtual machine

Agent for Windows performs the conversion by recovering a disk backup to a new virtual machine of any of the following types: VMware Workstation, Microsoft Virtual PC, Citrix XenServer Open Virtual Appliance (OVA) or Red Hat Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM). Files of the fully configured and operational machine will be placed in the folder you select. You can start the machine using the respective virtualization software or prepare the machine files for further usage.

Disk management

Agent for Windows includes Acronis Disk Director Lite - a handy disk management utility. Disk management operations, such as cloning disks; converting disks; creating, formatting and deleting volumes; changing a disk partitioning style between MBR and GPT or changing a disk label, can be performed either in the operating system or using bootable media.

1.7.2 Management Console

Acronis Backup Management Console is an administrative tool for local access to Acronis Backup agent. Remote connection to the agent is not possible.

1.7.3 Bootable Media Builder

Acronis Bootable Media Builder is a dedicated tool for creating bootable media (p. 259). The media builder that installs on Windows can create bootable media based on either Windows Preinstallation Environment, or Linux kernel.

1.8 About using the product in the trial mode

Before buying an Acronis Backup license, you may want to try the software. This can be done without a license key.

To install the product in the trial mode, run the setup program locally or use the remote installation functionality. Unattended installation and other ways of installation are not supported.

Limitations of the trial mode

When working under bootable media:

 The disk management functionality is not available. You can try the user interface, but there is no

option to commit the changes.

 The recovery functionality is available, but the backup functionality is not. To try the backup

functionality, install the software in the operating system.

Upgrading to the full mode

After the trial period expires, the product GUI displays a notification requesting you to specify or obtain a license key.

To specify a license key, click Help > Change License (p. 230). Specifying the key by running the setup program is not possible.

If you have activated a trial or purchased a subscription for the cloud backup service (p. 237), cloud backup will be available until the subscription period expires, regardless of whether you specify a license key.

1.9 Supported file systems

Acronis Backup can back up and recover the following file systems with the following limitations:

 FAT16/32  NTFS  ReFS - volume recovery without the volume resize capability. Supported in Windows Server

2012/2012 R2 (p. 32) only.

 Ext2/Ext3/Ext4  ReiserFS3 - particular files cannot be recovered from disk backups located on Acronis Backup

Storage Node

 ReiserFS4 - volume recovery without the volume resize capability; particular files cannot be

recovered from disk backups located on Acronis Backup Storage Node

 XFS - volume recovery without the volume resize capability; particular files cannot be recovered

from disk backups located on Acronis Backup Storage Node

 JFS - particular files cannot be recovered from disk backups located on Acronis Backup Storage

Node

 Linux SWAP

Acronis Backup can back up and recover corrupted or non-supported file systems using the sector-by-sector approach.

1.10 Technical Support

Maintenance and Support Program

If you need assistance with your Acronis product, please go to http://www.acronis.com/support/

Product Updates

You can download the latest updates for all your registered Acronis software products from our website at any time after logging into your Account (http://www.acronis.com/my) and registering the product. See Registering Acronis Products at the Website (http://kb.acronis.com/content/4834) and Acronis Website User Guide (http://kb.acronis.com/content/8128).

2 Getting started

1. Select Tools > Create bootable media in the menu.

2. Click Next in the welcome screen. Keep clicking Next until the list of components appears.

3. Proceed as described in "Linux-based bootable media" (p. 166).

Step 1. Installation

These brief installation instructions enable you to start using the product quickly. For the complete description of installation methods and procedures, please refer to the Installation documentation.

Before installation, make sure that:

 Your hardware meets the system requirements.  You have a license key for the product of your choice.  You have the setup program. You can download it from the Acronis website.

To install Acronis Backup

Run the Acronis Backup setup program and follow the on-screen instructions.

Step 2. Running

Run Acronis Backup by selecting Acronis Backup from the Start menu.

For understanding of the GUI elements see "Using the management console" (p. 15).

Step 3. Bootable media

To be able to recover an operating system that fails to start, or deploy it on bare metal, create bootable media.

Step 4. Backup

Back up now (p. 35)

Click Back up now to do a one-time backup in a few simple steps. The backup process will start immediately after you perform the required steps.

To save your machine to a file:

Under Where to back up, click Location, and select the location where the backup will be saved. Click OK to confirm your selection. Click OK at the bottom of the window to start the backup.

Tip. Using the bootable media, you can do off-line ("cold") backups in the same way as in the operating system.

Create backup plan (p. 35)

Create a backup plan if you need a long-term backup strategy including backup schemes, schedules and conditions, timely deleting of backups, or moving them to different locations.

Step 5. Recovery

Recover (p. 101)

To recover data, you need to select the backed-up data and the destination the data will be recovered to. As a result, a recovery task will be created.

Recovery of a disk or volume over a volume locked by the operating system requires a reboot. After the recovery is completed, the recovered operating system goes online automatically.

If the machine fails to boot or if you need to recover a system to bare metal, boot the machine using the bootable media and configure the recovery operation in the same way as the recovery task.

Step 6. Management

The Navigation pane (at the left part of the console) enables you to navigate across the product views that are used for different administering purposes.

 Use the Backup plans and tasks view to manage backup plans and tasks: run, edit, stop and

delete plans and tasks, view their states and progress.

 Use the Alerts view to rapidly identify and solve the problems.  Use the Log view to browse the operations log.  The location where you store backup archives is called a vault (p. 269). Navigate to the

Vaults (p. 141) view to obtain information about your vaults. Navigate further to the specific vault to view backups and their contents. You can also select the data to recover and perform manual operations with backups (mounting, validating, deleting).

2.1 Using the management console

As soon as the console starts, the respective items appear across the console's workspace (in the menu, in the main area with the Welcome screen, or in the Navigation pane) enabling you to perform machine-specific operations.

Acronis Backup Management Console - Welcome screen

Name

Description

Navigation pane

Contains the Navigation tree. Lets you navigate to the different views. For details, see Navigation pane (p. 16).

Main area

Here you configure and monitor backup, recovery and other operations. The main area displays views and action pages (p. 17) depending on the items selected in the menu or Navigation tree.

Menu bar

Appears across the top of the program window. Lets you perform most of operations available in Acronis Backup. The menu items change dynamically depending on the item selected in the Navigation tree and the main area.

Key elements of the console workspace

2.1.1 "Navigation" pane

The navigation pane includes the Navigation tree.

Navigation tree

The Navigation tree enables you to navigate across the program views. You can choose between the Full list or the Short list of views. The Short list contains the most frequently used views from the Full list.

The Short list displays

 [Machine name]. This is the root of the tree also called a Welcome screen. It displays the

name of the machine the console is currently connected to. Use this view for quick access to the main operations, available on the managed machine.

 Backup plans and tasks. Use this view to manage backup plans and tasks on the

managed machine: run, edit, stop and delete plans and tasks, view their progress.

 Vaults. Use this view to manage personal vaults and archives stored in there, add new

vaults, rename and delete the existing ones, validate vaults, explore backup content, perform operations on archives and backups, etc.

 Alerts. Use this view to examine warning messages for the managed machine.

The Full list additionally displays

 Disk management. Use this view to perform operations on the machine's hard disk

drives.

 Log. Use this view to examine information on operations performed by the program on

the managed machine.

 Mounted images. This node is displayed if at least one volume is mounted. Use this view

to manage mounted images.

Operations with pane

How to expand/minimize panes

By default, the Navigation pane appears expanded. You might need to minimize the pane in order to free some additional workspace. To do this, click the chevron ( ). The pane will be minimized and the chevron changes its direction ( ). Click the chevron once again to expand the pane.

How to change the panes' borders

1. Point to the pane's border.

2. When the pointer becomes a double-headed arrow, drag the pointer to move the border.

2.1.2 Main area, views and action pages

The main area is a basic place where you work with the console. Here you create, edit and manage backup plans, recovery tasks and perform other operations. The main area displays different views and action pages according the items you select in the menu, or Navigation tree.

2.1.2.1 Views

A view appears on the main area when clicking any item in the Navigation tree in the Navigation pane (p. 16).

"Log" view

Common way of working with views

Generally, every view contains a table of items, a table toolbar with buttons, and the Information panel.

 Use filtering and sorting (p. 18) capabilities to search the table for the item in question.  In the table, select the desired item.  In the information panel (collapsed by default), view the item's details. To expand the panel, click

the arrow mark ( ).

 Perform actions on the selected item. There are several ways of performing the same action on

selected items:

 By clicking the buttons on the table toolbar.  By selecting the items in the Actions menu.  By right-clicking the item and selecting the operation in the context menu.

Sorting, filtering and configuring table items

Do the following

Sort items by any column

Click a column's header to sort items in ascending order.

Click it once again to sort items in descending order.

Filter items by predefined column value

In a field below the corresponding column's header, select the required value from the drop-down list.

Filter items by entered value

In a field below the corresponding column's header, type a value.

As a result you will see the list of values, fully or just partly coincide with the entered value.

Filter items by predefined parameters

Click the appropriate buttons above the table.

For example, in the Log view, you can filter the log entries by event type (Error, Warning, Information) or by the period when the event occurred (For last 24 hours, For last week, For last three months, or For custom period).

Show or hide table columns

By default, any table has a fixed number of columns that are shown, others are hidden. If required, you can hide the shown columns and show the hidden ones.

To show or hide columns

1. Right-click any column header to open the context menu.

2. Click the items you want to be displayed/hidden.

The following is a guideline to sort, filter and configure table items in any view.

2.1.2.2 Action pages

An action page appears in the main area when clicking any action item in the Actions menu. It contains steps you need to perform in order to create and launch any task or a backup plan.

Action page - Create backup plan

Using controls and specifying settings

Use active controls to specify a backup plan or recovery task settings and parameters. By default, such fields as credentials, options, comments, and some others are hidden. Most settings are configured by clicking the respective Show… links. Others are selected from the drop-down list, or typed manually in the page's fields.

Action page - Controls

Acronis Backup remembers the changes you made on the action pages. For example, if you started to create a backup plan, and then for any reason switched to another view without accomplishing the plan creation, you can click the Back navigation button on the menu. Or, if you have passed several steps forward, click the Down arrow and select the page where you started the plan creation from the list. Thus, you can perform the remaining steps and accomplish the backup plan creation.

Navigation buttons

2.1.3 Console options

The console options define the way information is represented in the Graphical User Interface of Acronis Backup.

To access the console options, select Options > Console options from the top menu.

2.1.3.1 Alert display options

The option specifies which alerts to show and which to hide in the Alerts view.

The preset is: All alerts.

To show (hide) alerts, select (clear) the check boxes next to the respective alert types.

2.1.3.2 Credentials cache

The option specifies whether to store the credentials entered while using the management console.

The preset is: Enabled.

If the option is enabled, the credentials for various locations that you enter during a console session are saved for use during later sessions. In Windows, the credentials are stored in the Windows Credential Manager. In Linux, the credentials are stored in a special encrypted file.

If the option is disabled, the credentials are stored only until the console is closed.

To clear the credentials cache for the current user account, click the Clear credentials cache button.

2.1.3.3 Fonts

The option defines the fonts to be used in the Graphical User Interface of Acronis Backup. The Menu font setting affects the drop-down and context menus. The Application font setting affects all other

GUI elements.

The preset is: System Default font for both the menus and the application interface items.

To make a selection, choose the font from the respective combo-box and set the font's properties. You can preview the font's appearance by clicking Browse to the right.

2.1.3.4 Pop-up messages

The “Activities Need Interaction” dialog

This option defines whether to display a pop-up window when one or more activities require user interaction. This window enables you to specify your decision, such as to confirm reboot or to retry after freeing-up the disk space, on all the activities in the same place. Until at least one activity requires interaction, you can open this window at any time from the managed machine's welcome screen. Alternatively, you can review the task execution states in the Backup plans and tasks view and specify your decision on each task in the information panel.

The preset is: Enabled.

To make a selection, select or clear the The “Activities Need Interaction” dialog check box.

The “Feedback Confirmation” dialog

This option defines whether to display a pop-up window with the information about your system after an error occurs. You can send this information to Acronis technical support.

The preset is: Enabled.

To make a selection, select or clear the The “Feedback Confirmation” dialog check box.

Notify if bootable media is not created

This option defines whether to display a pop-up window when the management console is launched on a machine and no bootable media has been created on that machine.

The preset is: Enabled.

To make a selection, select or clear the Notify if bootable media is not created check box.

Notify when the management console is connected to a component of a different version

This option defines whether to display a pop-up window when a console is connected to an agent and their versions differ.

The preset is: Enabled.

To make a selection, select or clear the Notify when the management console is connected to a

component of a different version check box.

Request description when ejecting a tape

This option defines whether to display a prompt for you to describe a tape when you eject it from a tape device by using Acronis Backup. For example, you may describe the physical location where the tape will be kept (recommended). If a tape is ejected automatically according to the Eject tapes after successful backups option, no such prompt is displayed.

The preset is: Enabled.

To make a selection, select or clear the Request description when ejecting a tape check box.

Note Tape devices are available only if you have upgraded from Acronis Backup & Recovery 10.

About the task execution results

The option defines whether to display the pop-up messages about task run results: successful completion, failure or success with warnings. When the displaying of pop-up messages is disabled, you can review the task execution states and results in the Backup plans and tasks view.

The preset is: Enabled for all results.

To make a setting for each result (successful completion, failure or success with warnings) individually, select or clear the respective check box.

3 Understanding Acronis Backup

This section attempts to give its readers a clear understanding of the product so that they can use the product in various circumstances without step-by-step instructions.

3.1 Owners

This section explains the concept of a backup plan (task) owner and an archive owner.

Plan (task) owner

A local backup plan owner is the user who created or last modified the plan.

Tasks, belonging to a backup plan, are owned by the backup plan owner.

Tasks that do not belong to a backup plan, such as the recovery task, are owned by the user who has created or last modified the task.

Managing a plan (task) owned by another user

Having Administrator privileges on the machine, a user can modify tasks and local backup plans owned by any user registered in the operating system.

When a user opens a plan or task for editing, which is owned by another user, all passwords set in the task are cleared. This prevents the "modify settings, leave passwords" trick. The program displays a warning each time you are trying to edit a plan (task) last modified by another user. On seeing the warning, you have two options:

 Click Cancel and create your own plan or task. The original task will remain intact.  Continue editing. You will have to enter all credentials required for the plan or task execution.

Archive owner

An archive owner is the user who saved the archive to the destination. To be more precise, this is the user whose account was specified when creating the backup plan in the Where to back up step. By default, the plan's credentials are used.

3.2 Credentials used in backup plans and tasks

This section explains the concept of access credentials, backup plan's credentials and task credentials.

Access credentials

When browsing backup locations, setting up backups, or creating recovery tasks, you may need to provide credentials for accessing various resources, such as the data you are going to back up or the location where the backups are (or will be) stored.

If the Credentials cache (p. 19) option is enabled (it is enabled by default), the credentials which you provide during a console session are saved for use during the later sessions. Thus, there is no need to enter the credentials next time. The credentials are cached independently for each user who uses the console on the machine.

Backup plan's credentials

Any backup plan running on a machine runs on behalf of a user.

In Windows

By default, the plan runs under the agent service account, if created by a user having administrative privileges on the machine. If created by a regular user, such as a member of the Users group, the plan runs under this user's account.

When creating a backup plan, you are only asked for credentials in specific cases. For example:

 You are scheduling backups as a regular user and did not enter credentials when connecting the

console to the machine. This may be the case when the console is installed on the same machine that you are backing up.

 You are backing up a Microsoft Exchange cluster to a storage node.

Specifying the credentials explicitly

You have the option to explicitly specify a user account under which the backup plan will run. To do this, on the backup plan creation page:

1. In the Plan parameters section, click Show plan's credentials, comments, label.

2. Click Plan's credentials.

3. Enter the credentials under which the plan will run. When entering the name of an Active

Directory user account, be sure to also specify the domain name (DOMAIN\Username or Username@domain).

In Linux

You do not need to specify backup plan's credentials. In Linux, backup plans always run under the root user account.

Task credentials

Like a backup plan, any task runs on behalf of a user.

In Windows

When creating a task, you have the option to explicitly specify an account under which the task will run. Your choice depends on whether the task is intended for manual start or for executing on schedule.

 Manual start

Every time you manually start the task, the task will run under the credentials with which you are currently logged on. Any person that has administrative privileges on the machine can also start the task. The task will run under this person's credentials.

The task will always run under the same credentials, regardless of the user who actually starts the task, if you specify the task credentials explicitly.

 Scheduled or postponed start

The task credentials are mandatory. You cannot complete the task creation until you specify the task credentials. Task credentials are specified on the task creation page in a similar manner as the plan’s credentials are specified.

In Linux

You do not need to specify task credentials. In Linux, tasks always run under the root user account.

3.3 User privileges on a managed machine

Service name

Purpose

Account used by the service

Privileges added to the account

User rights

Group

membership

Permissions on registry

keys

When managing a machine running Windows, the scope of a user's management rights depends on the user's privileges on the machine.

Regular users

A regular user, such as a member of the Users group, has the following management rights:

 Perform file-level backup and recovery of the files that the user has permissions to access—but

without using a file-level backup snapshot (p. 90).

 Create backup plans and tasks and manage them.  View—but not manage—backup plans and tasks created by other users.  View the local event log.

Backup operators

A user who is a member of the Backup Operators group, also has the following management right:

 Back up and recover the entire machine or any data on the machine, with or without using a disk

snapshot. Using a hardware snapshot provider may still require administrative privileges.

Administrators

A user who is a member of the Administrators group, also has the following management right:

 View and manage backup plans and tasks owned by any user on the machine.

3.4 List of Acronis services

During installation, Acronis Backup creates several services. Some of these services can be used by other Acronis products installed on the machine.

Services of Acronis Backup

The services include the main service and a number of auxiliary services.

The main service can run under a dedicated account or under an account you specify during installation. Either of the accounts is given privileges that are needed for the service to work. The privileges include a set of user rights, membership in security groups, and the Full Control permissions on registry keys in the following key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Acronis. There are no permissions granted on other registry keys.

The following table lists the services of Acronis Backup and the privileges for their accounts.

Service name

Purpose

Account used by the service

Privileges added to the account

User rights

Group

membership

Permissions on registry

keys

Acronis Managed Machine Service

(Main service)

Backing up and recovering data on the machine

Acronis Agent User (new

account) or user-specified account

Log on as a service

Adjust memory quotas for a process

Replace a process level token

Modify firmware environment values

Backup Operators

(for any account)

Administrators

(for new account only)

BackupAndRecovery

Encryption

Global

MMS

Acronis VSS Provider

(Auxiliary service; created only in a Windows Server operating system)

Using a Volume Shadow Copy (VSS) provider (p. 99) that comes with Acronis Backup

Local System

No additional privileges

Common services for Acronis Backup and other Acronis products

Service name

Purpose

Account used by the service

Acronis Remote Agent Service

Providing connectivity among Acronis components

Local System (Windows Vista and later)

NetworkService (earlier than Windows Vista)

Acronis Scheduler2 Service

Providing scheduling for tasks performed by Acronis components

Local System

The following services are shared with other Acronis products installed on the machine. These services run under a system account. No additional privileges are given to the account.

Dependencies on other services

Acronis Managed Machine Service depends on the following standard Windows services: Remote Procedure Call (RPC), Protected Storage, and Windows Management Instrumentation. This service

also depends on Acronis Scheduler2 Service.

To view the list of dependencies for a service, do the following:

1. In the Services snap-in, double-click the name of the service.

2. On the Dependencies tab, examine the This service depends… field.

3.5 Full, incremental and differential backups

Acronis Backup provides the capability to use popular backup schemes, such as Grandfather-Father-Son and Tower of Hanoi, as well as to create custom backup schemes. All backup schemes are based on full, incremental and differential backup methods. The term "scheme" in fact denotes the algorithm of applying these methods plus the algorithm of the archive cleanup.

Comparing backup methods with each other does not make much sense because the methods work as a team in a backup scheme. Each method should play its specific role according to its advantages. A competent backup scheme will benefit from the advantages of all backup methods and lessen the influence of all the methods’ shortcomings. For example, weekly differential backup facilitates archive cleanup because it can be easily deleted along with the weekly set of daily incremental backups depending on it.

Backing up with the full, incremental or differential backup method results in a backup (p. 258) of the corresponding type.

Full backup

A full backup stores all data selected for backup. A full backup underlies any archive and forms the base for incremental and differential backups. An archive can contain multiple full backups or consist of only full backups. A full backup is self-sufficient - you do not need access to any other backup to recover data from a full backup.

It is widely accepted that a full backup is the slowest to do but the fastest to restore. With Acronis technologies, recovery from an incremental backup may be not slower than recovery from a full one.

A full backup is most useful when:

 you need to roll back the system to its initial state  this initial state does not change often, so there is no need for regular backup.

Example: An Internet cafe, school or university lab where the administrator often undoes changes made by the students or guests but rarely updates the reference backup (in fact, after installing software updates only). The backup time is not crucial in this case and the recovery time will be minimal when recovering the systems from the full backup. The administrator can have several copies of the full backup for additional reliability.

Incremental backup

An incremental backup stores changes to the data against the latest backup. You need access to other backups from the same archive to recover data from an incremental backup.

An incremental backup is most useful when:

 you need the possibility to roll back to any one of multiple saved states  the data changes tend to be small as compared to the total data size.

It is widely accepted that incremental backups are less reliable than full ones because if one backup in the "chain" is corrupted, the next ones can no longer be used. However, storing multiple full backups is not an option when you need multiple prior versions of your data, because reliability of an oversized archive is even more questionable.

Example: Backing up a database transaction log.

Differential backup

Parameter

Full backup

Differential backup

Incremental backup

Storage space

Maximal

Medium

Minimal

Creation time

Maximal

Medium

Minimal

Recovery time

Minimal

Medium

Maximal

A differential backup stores changes to the data against the latest full backup. You need access to the corresponding full backup to recover the data from a differential backup. A differential backup is most useful when:

 you are interested in saving only the most recent data state  the data changes tend to be small as compared to the total data size.

The typical conclusion is: "differential backups take longer to do and are faster to restore, while incremental ones are quicker to do and take longer to restore." In fact, there is no physical difference between an incremental backup appended to a full backup and a differential backup appended to the same full backup at the same point of time. The above mentioned difference implies creating a differential backup after (or instead of) creating multiple incremental backups.

An incremental or differential backup created after disk defragmentation might be considerably larger than usual because defragmentation changes file locations on the disk and the backup reflects these changes. It is recommended that you re-create a full backup after disk defragmentation.

The following table summarizes the advantages and shortcomings of each backup type as they appear based on common knowledge. In real life, these parameters depend on numerous factors such as the amount, speed and pattern of data changes; the nature of the data, the physical specifications of the devices, the backup/recovery options you set, to name a few. Practice is the best guide to selecting the optimal backup scheme.

3.6 What does a disk or volume backup store?

A disk or volume backup stores a disk or a volume file system as a whole and includes all of the information necessary for the operating system to boot. It is possible to recover disks or volumes as a whole from such backups as well as individual folders or files.

Windows

A volume backup stores all files and folders of the selected volume independent of their attributes (including hidden and system files), the boot record, the file allocation table (FAT) if it exists, the root and the zero track of the hard disk with the master boot record (MBR).

A disk backup stores all volumes of the selected disk (including hidden volumes such as the vendor's maintenance partitions) and the zero track with the master boot record.

The following items are not included in a disk or volume backup (as well as in a file-level backup):

 The swap file (pagefile.sys) and the file that keeps the RAM content when the machine goes

into hibernation (hiberfil.sys). After recovery, the files will be re-created in the appropriate place with the zero size.

 Windows shadow storage. The path to it is determined in the registry value VSS Default

Provider which can be found in the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\BackupRestore\FilesNotToBa ckup. This means that in operating systems starting with Windows Vista, Windows Restore

Points are not backed up.

Linux

A volume backup stores all files and directories of the selected volume independent of their attributes, a boot record, and the file system super block.

A disk backup stores all disk volumes as well as the zero track with the master boot record.

With the sector-by-sector (raw mode) option enabled, a disk backup stores all the disk sectors. The sector-by-sector backup can be used for backing up disks with unrecognized or unsupported file systems and other proprietary data formats.

3.7 Backup and recovery of dynamic volumes

(Windows)

This section explains in brief how to back up and recover dynamic volumes (p. 264) using Acronis Backup.

A dynamic volume is a volume located on dynamic disks (p. 263), or more exactly, on a disk group (p.

263). Acronis Backup supports the following dynamic volume types/RAID levels:

 simple/spanned  striped (RAID 0)  mirrored (RAID 1)  a mirror of stripes (RAID 0+1)  RAID-5.

Backing up dynamic volumes

Dynamic volumes are backed up in the same way as basic volumes. When creating a backup plan through the GUI, all types of volumes are available for selection as Items to back up. When using the command line, specify the dynamic volumes with the DYN prefix.

Command line examples

acrocmd backup disk --volume=DYN1,DYN2 --loc=\\srv1\backups

--credentials=netuser1,pass1 --arc=dyn1_2_arc

This will back up volumes DYN1 and DYN2 to a network shared folder.

acrocmd backup disk --volume=DYN --loc=\\srv1\backups --credentials=netuser1,pass1

--arc=alldyn_arc

This will back up all dynamic volumes of the local machine to a network shared folder.

Recovering dynamic volumes

A dynamic volume can be recovered:

 Over any type of existing volume.  To unallocated space of a disk group.  To unallocated space of a basic disk.  To a disk which has not been initialized.

Recovery over an existing volume

When a dynamic volume is recovered over an existing volume, either basic or dynamic, the target volume’s data is overwritten with the backup content. The type of target volume (basic,

simple/spanned, striped, mirrored, RAID 0+1, RAID-5) will not change. The target volume size has

Backup (source):

Recovered to:

Dynamic volume

Basic volume

Dynamic volume

Type as of the target

Dynamic volume

Type as of the target

Unallocated space (disk group)

Dynamic volume

Type as of the source

Dynamic volume

Simple

Basic volume or unallocated space on a basic disk

Basic volume

to be enough to accommodate the backup content.

Recovery to disk group unallocated space

When recovering a dynamic volume to disk group unallocated space, the software preserves the volume's original type and size. If the disk group configuration does not allow for the original volume type, the volume will be recovered as a simple or spanned volume. If this volume does not fit the unallocated space, the volume will be resized by decreasing its free space.

Examples of when the disk group configuration does not allow the original type of the volume

Example 1. The group contains fewer disks than is required for the dynamic volume. Assume you

are going to recover an 80 GB RAID-5 volume that had resided on three disks, to a disk group consisting of two disks. The total size of unallocated space is 100 GB: 40 GB on the first disk and 60 GB on the second. The RAID-5 volume will be recovered as a spanned volume across two disks.

Example 2. Unallocated space distribution does not allow recovery of certain types of dynamic volumes. Assume you are going to recover a 30 GB striped volume to a disk group consisting of two disks. The total size of unallocated space is 50 GB: 10 GB on the first disk and 40 GB on the second. The striped volume will be recovered to the second disk as simple.

Recovery to a disk that has not been initialized

In this case, the target disk will be automatically initialized to the MBR partitioning style. The dynamic volumes will be recovered as basic ones. If the volumes cannot fit into unallocated space, they will be proportionally resized (by decreasing their free space).

The table below demonstrates the resulting volume types depending on the backed-up source and the recovery target.

Moving and resizing volumes during recovery

You can manually resize the resulting basic volume during recovery, or change the volume's location on the disk. A resulting dynamic volume cannot be moved or resized manually.

Preparing disk groups and volumes

Before recovering dynamic volumes to bare metal you should create a disk group on the target hardware.

You also might need to create or increase unallocated space on an existing disk group. This can be done by deleting volumes or converting basic disks to dynamic.

You might want to change the target volume type (basic, simple/spanned, striped, mirrored, RAID 0+1, RAID 5). This can be done by deleting the target volume and creating a new volume on the resulting unallocated space.

Acronis Backup includes a handy disk management utility which enables you to perform the above operations both under the operating system and on bare metal. To find out more about Acronis Disk Director Lite, see the Disk management (p. 177) section.

3.8 Support for Advanced Format (4K-sector) hard disks

Acronis Backup can back up hard disks with a sector size of 4 KB (known as Advanced Format disks), as well as traditional hard disks that have 512-byte sectors.

Acronis Backup can recover data from one disk to another as long as both disks have the same logical sector size. (This is the sector size presented to the operating system.) Acronis Backup automatically aligns the disk’s volumes (p. 112) if necessary. This way, the start of a cluster in the file system always matches the start of a physical sector on the disk.

The disk management (p. 177) functionality of Acronis Backup is not available for disks with a 4-KB logical sector size.

Determining the logical sector size

By disk specification

Development of the Advanced Format technology is coordinated by the International Disk Drive Equipment and Materials Association (IDEMA). For more details, see http://www.idema.org/?page_id=2.

In terms of the logical sector size, IDEMA specifies two types of Advanced Format disks:

 512 Byte emulation (512e) disks have a 512-byte logical sector size. These disks are supported in

Windows starting with Windows Vista, and in modern Linux distributions. Microsoft and Western Digital use the term “Advanced Format” exclusively for this type of disk.

 4K native (4Kn) disks have a 4-KB logical sector size. Modern operating systems can store data on

these disks, but generally cannot boot from these disks. These disks are commonly external drives with USB connection.

By running the appropriate command

To find out the logical sector size of a disk, do the following.

1. Make sure that the disk contains an NTFS volume.

2. Run the following command as an administrator, specifying the drive letter of the NTFS volume:

fsutil fsinfo ntfsinfo D:

3. Examine the value in the Bytes Per Sector line. For example, the output may be the following:

Bytes Per Sector : 512

3.9 Compatibility with encryption software

Acronis Backup fully retains its functionality when interacting with file-level encryption software.

Disk-level encryption software encrypts data on the fly. This is why data contained in the backup is not encrypted. Disk-level encryption software often modifies system areas: boot records, or partition tables, or file system tables. These factors affect disk-level backup and recovery, the ability of the recovered system to boot and access to Acronis Secure Zone.

Under some conditions, Acronis Backup is compatible with the following disk-level encryption software:

 Microsoft BitLocker Drive Encryption  McAfee Endpoint Encryption  PGP Whole Disk Encryption.

To ensure reliable disk-level recovery, follow the common rules and software-specific recommendations.

Common installation rule

The strong recommendation is to install the encryption software before installing Acronis Backup.

The way of using Acronis Secure Zone

Acronis Secure Zone must not be encrypted with disk-level encryption. This is the only way to use Acronis Secure Zone:

1. Install encryption software; then, install Acronis Backup.

2. Create Acronis Secure Zone.

3. Exclude Acronis Secure Zone when encrypting the disk or its volumes.

Common backup rule

You can do a disk-level backup in the operating system. Do not try to back up using bootable media or Acronis Startup Recovery Manager.

Software-specific recovery procedures

Microsoft BitLocker Drive Encryption

To recover a system that was encrypted by BitLocker:

1. Boot from the bootable media.

2. Recover the system. The recovered data will be unencrypted.

3. Reboot the recovered system.

4. Turn on BitLocker.

If you only need to recover one partition of a multi-partitioned disk, do so under the operating system. Recovery under bootable media may make the recovered partition undetectable for Windows.

McAfee Endpoint Encryption and PGP Whole Disk Encryption

You can recover an encrypted system partition by using bootable media only.

If the recovered system fails to boot, rebuild Master Boot Record as described in the following Acronis knowledge base article: http://kb.acronis.com/content/1507 and reboot.

3.10 Support for SNMP

SNMP objects

Acronis Backup provides the following Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) objects to SNMP management applications:

 Type of event

Object identifier (OID): 1.3.6.1.4.1.24769.100.200.1.0

Syntax: OctetString

The value may be "Information", "Warning", 'Error" and "Unknown". "Unknown" is sent only in the test message.

 Text description of the event

Object identifier (OID): 1.3.6.1.4.1.24769.100.200.2.0

Syntax: OctetString

The value contains the text description of the event (it looks identical to messages published by Acronis Backup in its log).

Example of varbind values:

1.3.6.1.4.1.24769.100.200.1.0:Information

1.3.6.1.4.1.24769.100.200.2.0:I0064000B

Supported operations

Acronis Backup supports only TRAP operations. It is not possible to manage Acronis Backup using GET- and SET- requests. This means that you need to use an SNMP Trap receiver to receive TRAP-messages.

About the management information base (MIB)

The MIB file acronis-abr.mib is located in the Acronis Backup installation directory. By default: %ProgramFiles%\Acronis\BackupAndRecovery in Windows and /usr/lib/Acronis/BackupAndRecovery in Linux.

This file can be read by a MIB browser or a simple text editor such as Notepad or vi.

About the test message

When configuring SNMP notifications, you can send a test message to check if your settings are correct.

The parameters of the test message are as follows:

 Type of event

OID: 1.3.6.1.4.1.24769.100.200.1.0

Value: "Unknown"

 Text description of the event

OID: 1.3.6.1.4.1.24769.100.200.2.0

Value: "?00000000"

3.11 Support for Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012

This section describes how Acronis Backup supports features that are introduced in the Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012 operating systems.

The information in this section also applies to Windows 8.1 and Windows Server 2012 R2.

Limitations

 Acronis Disk Director Lite (p. 177) is not available under Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012.  Disk management operations under bootable media may work incorrectly if storage spaces are

configured on the machine.

 The Windows To Go feature of Windows 8 is not supported.

WinPE 4.0 and WinPE 5.0

Acronis Media Builder can create bootable media based on these versions of Windows Preinstallation Environment (WinPE).

These bootable media support new features of Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012 (see later in this section). They can boot on machines that use Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI).

To create bootable media based on these versions of WinPE, you need Windows Assessment and Deployment Kit (ADK). For more details, see the “WinPE-based bootable media” (p. 170) section.

UEFI Secure Boot

On a machine that runs Windows 8 or Windows Server 2012 and uses UEFI, the Secure Boot feature of UEFI may be turned on. Secure Boot ensures that only trusted boot loaders can boot the machine.

By using Acronis Media Builder, you can create a bootable media that has a trusted boot loader. To do this, choose to create a 64-bit Linux-based media or a 64-bit media based on WinPE 4 or later.

Resilient file system (ReFS)

In Windows Server 2012, you can format a volume by using the ReFS file system. This file system provides a more reliable way of storing data on the volume as compared with the NTFS file system.

In Windows Server 2012 and under a bootable media based on WinPE 4 or later, you can back up and recover a ReFS volume. Resizing a ReFS volume during recovery is not supported.

Linux-based bootable media and bootable media based on WinPE version earlier than 4.0 cannot write files to a ReFS volume. Therefore, you cannot recover files to a ReFS volume by using these media; and you cannot select a ReFS volume as a backup destination.

Storage spaces

In Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012, you can combine several physical disks into a storage pool. In this storage pool, you can create one or more logical disks, called storage spaces. As with ordinary disks, storage spaces can have volumes.

In Windows 8, in Windows Server 2012, and under a bootable media based on WinPE 4 or later, you can back up and recover storage spaces. In Windows Server 2012 and under a bootable media based on WinPE 4 or later, you also can recover a storage space to an ordinary disk or vice versa.

Linux-based bootable media does not recognize storage spaces. It backs up the underlying disks sector-by-sector. If you recover all of the underlying disks to the original disks, the storage spaces will be recreated.

Data Deduplication

In Windows Server 2012, you can enable the Data Deduplication feature for an NTFS volume. Data Deduplication reduces the used space on the volume by storing duplicate fragments of the volume's files only once.

You can back up and recover a data deduplication–enabled volume at a disk level, without limitations. File-level backup is supported, except when using Acronis VSS Provider. To recover files from a disk backup, mount the backup (p. 158) on a machine running Windows Server 2012, and then copy the files from the mounted volume.

3.12 Support for UEFI-based machines

Acronis Backup can back up and recover machines that use 64-bit Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) in the same way as it does for machines that use BIOS for booting.

This applies to both physical and virtual machines, no matter if the virtual machines are backed up at a hypervisor level or from inside a guest OS.

Backup and recovery of devices that use 32-bit UEFI are not supported.

For details about transferring Windows machines between UEFI and BIOS, see "Recovering BIOS-based systems to UEFI-based or vice versa" (p. 114).

Limitations

 WinPE-based bootable media of a version earlier than 4.0 do not support UEFI booting.  Acronis Active Restore (p. 257) is not available on UEFI machines.  Acronis Startup Recovery Manager (ASRM) (p. 257) on UEFI machines can be activated only in

Windows.

4 Backup

4.1 Back up now

Use the Back up now feature to configure and run a one-time backup in a few simple steps. The backup process will start immediately after you perform the required steps and click OK.

For a long-time backup strategy that includes schedules and conditions, timely deleting of backups or moving them to different locations, consider creating a backup plan.

Configuring immediate backup is similar to creating a backup plan (p. 35) except for the following:

 There are no options to schedule backups and to set up retention rules.  Simplified naming of backup files (p. 55) is used, if the backup destination supports it. Otherwise,

the standard backup naming is used.

The following locations do not support simplified file naming: Acronis Secure Zone and Acronis Cloud Storage.

Due to simplified file naming, an RDX drive or USB flash drive can only be used in the removable media (p. 148) mode.

 Conversion of a disk-level backup to a virtual machine is not available as a part of the backup

operation. You can convert the resulting backup afterwards.

4.2 Creating a backup plan

Before creating your first backup plan (p. 258), please familiarize yourself with the basic concepts used in Acronis Backup.

To create a backup plan, perform the following steps.

What to back up

Items to back up (p. 37)

Select the type of data to back up and specify the data items. The type of data depends on the agents installed on the machine.

Access credentials, exclusions

To access these settings, click Show access credentials, exclusions.

Access credentials (p. 38)

Provide credentials for the source data if the plan's account does not have access permissions to the data.

Exclusions (p. 38)

Set up exclusions for the specific types of files you do not wish to back up.

Where to back up

Location (p. 40)

Specify a path to the location where the backup archive will be stored and the archive name. The archive name has to be unique within the location. Otherwise, backups of the newly created backup plan will be placed to the existing archive that belongs to another backup plan. The default archive name is Archive(N) where N is the sequence number of the archive in the location you have selected.

Select the mode the removable device will be used in (p. 148)

If the specified location is an RDX drive or USB flash drive, select the device mode:

Removable media or Fixed drive.

Backup file naming, access credentials, archive comments

To access these settings, click Show backup file naming, access credentials, archive comments.

File naming (p. 55)

[Optional] Select the Name backup files using the archive name, as in Acronis True Image Echo, rather than auto-generated names check box if you want to use simplified file naming

for the archive’s backups.

Not available when backing up to Acronis Secure Zone or Acronis Cloud Storage. When backing up to an RDX drive or USB flash drive, the file naming scheme is determined by the removable device mode (p. 148).

Access credentials (p. 42)

[Optional] Provide credentials for the location if the plan account does not have access permissions to the location.

Archive comments

[Optional] Enter comments on the archive.

How to back up

Backup scheme (p. 42)

Specify when and how often to back up your data; define for how long to keep the created backup archives in the selected location; set up schedule for the archive cleanup procedure (see “Replication and retention settings” below).

Replication and retention settings (p. 72)

Not available for removable media or when simplified naming of backup files (p. 55) is chosen.

Define whether to copy (replicate) the backups to another location, and whether to move or delete them according to retention rules. The available settings depend on the backup scheme.

2nd location

[Optional] To set up replication of backups, select the Replicate newly created backup to another location check box. For more information about backup replication, see Setting up replication of backups (p. 74).

Validation, convert to virtual machine

To access these settings, click Show validation, convert to virtual machine.

When to validate (p. 52)

[Optional] Depending on the selected backup scheme, define when and how often to perform validation and whether to validate the entire archive or the latest backup in the archive.

Convert to virtual machine (p. 133)

[Optional] Applies to: disk or volume backup.

Set up a regular conversion of a disk or volume backup to a virtual machine.

Plan parameters

Plan name

[Optional] Enter a unique name for the backup plan. A conscious name lets you identify the plan among others.

Backup options

[Optional] Configure parameters of the backup operation, such as pre/post backup commands, maximum network bandwidth allocated for the backup stream or the backup archive compression level. If you do nothing in this section, the default values (p. 79) will be used.

After any of the settings is changed against the default value, a new line that displays the newly set value appears. The setting status changes from Default to Reset to default. Should you modify the setting again, the line will display the new value unless the new value is the default one. When the default value is set, the line disappears. Therefore, in this section you always see only the settings that differ from the default values.

To reset all the settings to the default values, click Reset to default.

Plan's credentials, comments, label

To access these settings, click Show plan's credentials, comments, label.

Plan's credentials (p. 52)

[Optional] Specify the credentials under which the plan will run.

Comments

[Optional] Type a description of the backup plan.

Label (p. 53)

[Optional] Type a text label for the machine you are going to back up. The label can be used to identify the machine in various scenarios.

After you have performed all the required steps, click OK to create the backup plan.

After that, you might be prompted for the password (p. 55).

The plan you have created will be accessible for examination and managing in the Backup plans and tasks (p. 217) view.

4.2.1 Selecting data to back up

To select the data to back up

1. In the Data to back up section, select the type of data you want to be backed up. The list of

available data types depends on the agents running on the machine and the types of licenses:

Disks/volumes

Available if Acronis Backup Agent for Windows or Acronis Backup Agent for Linux is installed.

Select this option to back up entire physical machines or their individual disks or volumes. To be able to back up this data, you must have Administrator or Backup operator privileges.

A disk-level backup enables you to recover the entire system in case of severe data damage or hardware failure. Also, you can individually recover files and folders. The backup procedure is faster than copying files, and may significantly speed up the backup process when backing up large volumes of data.

Folders/files

Available if Acronis Backup Agent for Windows or Acronis Backup Agent for Linux is installed.

Select this option to back up specific files and folders.

A file-level backup is not sufficient for recovery of the operating system. Choose file backup if you plan to keep safe only certain data (the current project, for example). This will reduce the archive size, thus saving storage space.

In order to recover your operating system along with all the settings and applications, you have to perform a disk backup.

2. In the tree below the Data to back up section, select the items to back up by selecting check

boxes next to the items.

To back up all items of the selected data type present on a machine, select the check box next to the machine. To back up individual data items, expand the machine and select check boxes next to the required items.

Note for Disks/volumes

 If your operating system and its loader reside on different volumes, always include both

volumes in the backup. The volumes must also be recovered together; otherwise there is a high risk that the operating system will not start.

3. Having specified the data to backup, click OK.

4.2.2 Access credentials for source

Specify the credentials required for access to the data you are going to back up.

To specify credentials

1. Select one of the following:

 Use the plan's credentials

The program will access the source data using the credentials of the backup plan account specified in the Plan parameters section.

 Use the following credentials

The program will access the source data using the credentials you specify.

Use this option if the plan's account does not have access permissions to the data.

Specify:

 User name. When entering the name of an Active Directory user account, be sure to also

specify the domain name (DOMAIN\Username or Username@domain).

 Password. The password for the account.  Confirm password. Re-enter the password.

2. Click OK.

4.2.3 Source files exclusion

This option is effective for Windows and Linux operating systems and bootable media.

This option is effective for disk-level backup of NTFS, FAT, Ext3, and Ext4 file systems only. This option is effective for file-level backup of all supported file systems.

The option defines which files and folders to skip during the backup process and thus exclude from the list of backed-up items.

Note: Exclusions override selection of data items to back up. For example, if you select to back up file MyFile.tmp and to exclude all .tmp files, file MyFile.tmp will not be backed up.

To specify which files and folders to exclude, set up any of the following parameters.

Exclude all hidden files and folders

Criterion

Example

Description

Windows and Linux

Select this check box to skip files and folders that have the Hidden attribute (for file systems that are supported by Windows) or that start with a period (.) (for file systems in Linux such as Ext2 and Ext3). If a folder is hidden, all of its contents (including files that are not hidden) will be excluded.

Exclude all system files and folders

This option is effective only for file systems that are supported by Windows. Select this check box to skip files and folders with the System attribute. If a folder has the System attribute, all of its contents (including files that do not have the System attribute) will be excluded.

Tip: You can view file or folder attributes in the file/folder properties or by using the attrib command. For more information, refer to the Help and Support Center in Windows.

Exclude files matching the following criteria

Select this check box to skip files and folders matching any of the criteria. Use the Add, Edit, Remove and Remove All buttons to create the list of criteria.

The criteria are not case-sensitive in Windows and Linux. For example, if you choose to exclude all .tmp files and the C:\Temp folder, also excluded will be all .Tmp files, all .TMP files, and the C:\TEMP folder.

Criteria: full path

Specify the full path to the file or folder, starting with the drive letter (when backing up Windows) or the root directory (when backing up Linux).

Both in Windows and Linux, you can use a forward slash in the file or folder path (as in C:/Temp and

C:/Temp/File.tmp). In Windows, you can also use the traditional backslash (as in C:\Temp and C:\Temp\File.tmp).

Under a Windows-style bootable media, a volume might have a different drive letter than in Windows. For more information, see "Working under bootable media" (p. 173).

Criteria: name

Specify the name of the file or folder, such as Document.txt. All files and folders with that name will be excluded.

Wildcard characters

You can use one or more wildcard characters * and ? in the criterion. These characters can be used both within the full path and in the file or folder name.

The asterisk (*) substitutes for zero or more characters in a file name. For example, the criterion Doc*.txt covers files such as Doc.txt and Document.txt

The question mark (?) substitutes for exactly one character in a file name. For example, the criterion Doc?.txt covers files such as Doc1.txt and Docs.txt, but not the files Doc.txt or Doc11.txt

Exclusion examples

By name

F.log

Excludes all files named "F.log"

Excludes all folders named "F"

By mask (*)

*.log

Excludes all files with the .log extension

Excludes all files and folders with names starting with "F" (such as folders F, F1 and files F.log, F1.log)

By mask (?)

F???.log

Excludes all .log files with names consisting of four symbols and starting with "F"

Windows

By file path

C:\Finance\F.log

Excludes the file named "F.log" located in the folder C:\Finance

By folder path

C:\Finance\F or C:\Finance\F\

Excludes the folder C:\Finance\F (be sure to specify the full path starting from the drive letter)

Linux

By file path

/home/user/Finance/F.log

Excludes the file named "F.log" located in the folder (directory) /home/user/Finance

By folder path

/home/user/Finance or /home/user/Finance/

Excludes the folder (directory) /home/user/Finance

4.2.4 Backup location selection

Specify where the archive will be stored.

1. Selecting the destination

In the Path field, enter the full path to the destination, or select the desired destination in the location tree as described in "Selecting backup destinations" (p. 41).

2. Using the archives table

To assist you with choosing the right destination, the table displays the names of the archives contained in each location you select. While you are reviewing the location content, archives can be added, deleted or modified by another user or by the program itself according to scheduled operations. Use the Refresh button to refresh the list of archives.

3. Naming the new archive

Once you select the archive destination, the program generates a name for the new archive and displays it in the Name field. The name commonly looks like Archive(N), where N is a sequence number. The generated name is unique within the selected location. If you are satisfied with the automatically generated name, click OK. Otherwise enter another unique name.

Backing up to an existing archive

You can configure the backup plan to back up to an existing archive. To do so, select the archive in the archives table or type the archive name in the Name field. If the archive is protected with a password, the program will ask for it in the pop-up window.

By selecting the existing archive, you are meddling in the area of another backup plan that uses the

Destination

Details

Cloud storage

To back up data to Acronis Cloud Storage, click Log in and specify the credentials to log in to the cloud storage. Then, expand the Cloud storage group and select the account.

Prior to backing up to the cloud storage, you need to buy a subscription (p. 250) to the cloud backup service and activate (p. 251) the subscription on the machine(s) you want to back up.

Cloud backup is not available under bootable media.

Note Acronis Cloud Backup might be unavailable in your region. To find more information, click here: http://www.acronis.com/my/cloud-backup/corporate

Personal

To back up data to a personal vault, expand the Vaults group and click the vault. Acronis Secure Zone is considered as a personal vault available to all users that can log on to the system.

Machine

Local machine

Local folders

To back up data to a local folder of the machine, expand the <Machine name> group and select the required folder.

CD, DVD, BD

To back up data to optical media such as CD, DVD, or Blu-ray Discs (BD), expand the <Machine name> group, then select the required drive.

RDX, USB

To back up data to an RDX drive or USB flash drive, expand the <Machine name> group, then select the required drive. For information about using these drives, see the "Removable devices" (p. 148) section.

Network folders

To back up data to a network folder, expand the Network folders group, select the required networked machine, and then click the shared folder.

If the network share requires access credentials, the program will ask for them.

archive. This is not an issue if the other plan is discontinued. However, you should generally follow the rule: "one backup plan - one archive". Doing the opposite will not prevent the program from functioning but is not practical or efficient, except for some specific cases.

Why two or more plans should not back up to the same archive

1. Backing up different sources to the same archive makes it difficult to use archive. When it comes

to recovery, every second counts, and you might be "lost" in the archive content.

Backup plans that operate with the same archive should back up the same data items (say, both plans back up volume C.)

2. Applying multiple retention rules to an archive makes the archive content unpredictable. Since

each of the rules will be applied to the entire archive, the backups belonging to one backup plan can be easily deleted along with the backups belonging to the other. You should not expect the classic behavior of the GFS and Tower of Hanoi backup schemes.

Normally, each complex backup plan should back up to its own archive.

4.2.4.1 Selecting backup destinations

Acronis Backup lets you back up data to various physical storages.

Destination

Details

FTP, SFTP

To back up data to FTP or SFTP, type the server name or address in the Path field as follows:

ftp://ftp_server:port _number or sftp://sftp_server:port number

To establish an active mode FTP connection, use the following notation:

aftp://ftp_server:port _number

If the port number is not specified, port 21 is used for FTP and port 22 is used for SFTP.

After entering access credentials, the folders on the server become available. Click the appropriate folder on the server.

You can access the server as an anonymous user if the server enables such access. To do so, click Use anonymous access instead of entering credentials.

Note: According to the original FTP specification, credentials required for access to FTP servers are transferred through a network as plaintext. This means that the user name and password can be intercepted by an eavesdropper using a packet sniffer.

4.2.5 Access credentials for archive location

Specify credentials required for access to the location where the backup archive will be stored. The user whose name is specified will be considered as the archive owner.

To specify credentials

1. Select one of the following:

 Use the plan's credentials

The program will access the source data using the credentials of the backup plan account specified in the Plan parameters section.

 Use the following credentials

The program will access the source data using the credentials you specify.

Use this option if the plan account does not have access permissions to the location. You might need to provide special credentials for a network share or a storage node vault.

Specify:

 User name. When entering the name of an Active Directory user account, be sure to also

specify the domain name (DOMAIN\Username or Username@domain).

 Password. The password for the account.  Confirm password. Re-enter the password.

2. Click OK.

Warning: According to the original FTP specification, credentials required for access to FTP servers are transferred through a network as plaintext. This means that the user name and password can be intercepted by an eavesdropper using a packet sniffer.

4.2.6 Backup schemes

Choose one of the available backup schemes:

 Simple – to schedule when and how often to backup data and specify retention rules.  Grandfather-Father-Son – to use the Grandfather-Father-Son backup scheme. The scheme does

not allow data to be backed up more than once a day. You set the days of week when the daily

backup will be performed and select from these days the day of weekly/monthly backup. Then you set the retention periods for the daily (referred to as "sons"), weekly (referred to as "fathers") and monthly (referred to as "grandfathers") backups. The expired backups will be deleted automatically.

 Tower of Hanoi – to use the Tower of Hanoi backup scheme. This scheme allows you to schedule

when and how often to back up (sessions) and select the number of backup levels (up to 16). The data can be backed up more than once a day. By setting up the backup schedule and selecting backup levels, you automatically obtain the rollback period – the guaranteed number of sessions that you can go back at any time. The automatic cleanup mechanism maintains the required rollback period by deleting the expired backups and keeping the most recent backups of each level.

 Custom – to create a custom scheme, where you are free to set up a backup strategy in the way

your enterprise needs it most: specify multiple schedules for different backup types, add conditions and specify the retention rules.

 Manual start – to create a backup task for manual start.  Initial seeding – to save locally a full backup whose final destination is Acronis Cloud Storage.

4.2.6.1 Simple scheme

With the simple backup scheme, you just schedule when and how often to back up data. Other steps are optional.

To set up the simple backup scheme, specify the appropriate settings as follows.

Schedule

Set up when and how often to back up the data. To learn more about setting up the schedule, see the Scheduling (p. 60) section.

Retention rules

Specify how long to store backups in the location and whether to move or delete them afterward. The retention rules are applied after creating a backup. The Keep backups indefinitely is set by default, which means that no backups will be deleted automatically. For more information about retention rules, see Setting up retention of backups (p. 74).

Backup type

To access this setting, click Show backup type, validation, convert to virtual machine.

Select the backup type.

 Full - selected by default for all backup locations (except for Acronis Cloud Storage).  Incremental. At the first time a full backup will be created. The next backups will be

incremental. Selected as the one and only backup type for Acronis Cloud Storage.

Note: When the Incremental backup type is selected along with retention rules, the archive will be cleaned up using consolidation (p. 261), which is a more time-consuming and resource-intensive operation.

4.2.6.2 Grandfather-Father-Son scheme

At a glance

 Daily ("Son"), weekly ("Father"), and monthly ("Grandfather") backups  Custom day for weekly and monthly backups

 Custom retention periods for backups of each type

Jan 1—Jan 7

D D D D W - -

Jan 8—Jan 14

D D D D W - -

Jan 15—Jan 21

D D D D W - -

Jan 22—Jan 28

D D D D M - -

Jan 29—Feb 4

D D D D W - -

Feb 5—Feb 11

D D D D W - -

Feb 12—Feb 18

D D D D W - -

Feb 19—Feb 25

D D D D M - -

Feb 26—Mar 4

D D D D W - -

Start backup at

Specifies when to start a backup. The default value is 12:00 PM.

Back up on

Specifies the days of the week when a backup will be performed. The default value is

Workdays.

Weekly/Monthly

Specifies which day of the week (out of the days selected in the Back up on field) you want to reserve for weekly and monthly backups.

The default value is Friday. With this value, a monthly backup will run on the last Friday of each month. Weekly backups will run on all other Fridays. If you choose a different day of week, these rules will apply to the day chosen.

Keep backups

Specifies how long you want the backups to be stored in the archive. A term can be set in hours, days, weeks, months, or years. For monthly backups, you can also select Keep indefinitely if you want them to be saved forever.

The default values for each backup type are as follows.

Daily: 5 days (recommended minimum)

Weekly: 7 weeks

Monthly: indefinitely

The retention period for weekly backups must exceed that for daily backups; the monthly backups' retention period must be greater than the weekly backups' retention period.

We recommend setting a retention period of at least one week for daily backups.

Description

Let us suppose that we want to set up a backup plan that will regularly produce a series of daily (D), weekly (W), and monthly (M) backups. Here is a natural way to do this: the following table shows a sample two-month period for such a plan.

Daily backups run every workday except Friday, which is left for weekly and monthly backups. Monthly backups run on the last Friday of each month, and weekly backups run on all other Fridays. As a result, you will normally obtain 12 monthly backups over a full year.

Parameters

You can set up the following parameters of a Grandfather-Father-Son (GFS) scheme.

Backup type

Specifies the types of daily, weekly and monthly backups.

 Always full - all the daily, weekly and monthly backups will always be full.  Full/Differential/Incremental - daily backups are incremental, weekly backups

are differential, and monthly backups are full.

The first backup is always full. However, this does not mean that it is a monthly backup. It will be kept as a daily, weekly or monthly backup, depending on the day of week it is created.

A backup is not deleted until all backups that directly depend on it become subject to deletion as well. This is

why you might see a backup, marked with the icon, for a few days past its expected expiration date.

Examples

Each day of the past week, each week of the past month

Let us consider a GFS backup scheme that many may find useful.

 Back up files every day, including weekends  Be able to recover files as of any date over the past seven days  Have access to weekly backups of the past month  Keep monthly backups indefinitely.

Backup scheme parameters can then be set up as follows.

 Start backup at: 11:00 PM  Back up on: All days  Weekly/monthly: Saturday (for example)  Keep backups:

 Daily: 1 week  Weekly: 1 month  Monthly: indefinitely

As a result, an archive of daily, weekly, and monthly backups will be created. Daily backups will be available for seven days since creation. For instance, a daily backup of Sunday, January 1, will be available through next Sunday, January 8; the first weekly backup, the one of Saturday, January 7, will be stored on the system until February 7. Monthly backups will never be deleted.

Limited storage

If you do not want to arrange a vast amount of space to store a huge archive, you may set up a GFS scheme so as to make your backups more short-lived, at the same time ensuring that your information can be recovered in case of an accidental data loss.

Suppose that you need to:

 Perform backups at the end of each working day  Be able to recover an accidentally deleted or inadvertently modified file if this has been

discovered relatively quickly

 Have access to a weekly backup for 10 days after it was created  Keep monthly backups for half a year.

Backup scheme parameters can then be set up as follows.

 Start backup at: 6:00 PM

 Back up on: Workdays  Weekly/monthly: Friday  Keep backups:

 Daily: 1 week  Weekly: 10 days  Monthly: 6 months

With this scheme, you will have a week to recover a previous version of a damaged file from a daily backup; as well as 10-day access to weekly backups. Each monthly full backup will be available for six months since the creation date.

Work schedule

Suppose you are a part-time financial consultant and work in a company on Tuesdays and Thursdays. On these days, you often make changes to your financial documents, statements, and update the spreadsheets etc. on your laptop. To back up this data, you may want to:

 Track changes to the financial statements, spreadsheets, etc. performed on Tuesdays and

Thursdays (daily incremental backup).

 Have a weekly summary of file changes since last month (Friday weekly differential backup).  Have a monthly full backup of your files.

Moreover, assume that you want to retain access to all backups, including the daily ones, for at least six months.

The following GFS scheme suits such purposes:

 Start backup at: 11:30 PM  Back up on: Tuesday, Thursday, Friday  Weekly/monthly: Friday  Keep backups:

 Daily: 6 months  Weekly: 6 months  Monthly: 5 years

Here, daily incremental backups will be created on Tuesdays and Thursdays, with weekly and monthly backups performed on Fridays. Note that, in order to choose Friday in the Weekly/monthly field, you need to first select it in the Back up on field.

Such an archive would allow you to compare your financial documents as of the first and the last day of work, and have a five-year history of all documents, etc.

No daily backups

Consider a more exotic GFS scheme:

 Start backup at: 12:00 PM  Back up on: Friday  Weekly/monthly: Friday  Keep backups:

 Daily: 1 week  Weekly: 1 month

 Monthly: indefinitely

Parameter

Meaning

Full backup schedule

Specifies on what schedule and under which conditions to perform a full backup.

For example, the full backup can be set up to run every Sunday at 1:00 AM as soon as all users are logged off.

Incremental backup schedule

Specifies on what schedule and under which conditions to perform an incremental backup.

If the archive contains no backups at the time of the task run, a full backup is created instead of the incremental backup.

Differential backup schedule

Specifies on what schedule and under which conditions to perform a differential backup.

If the archive contains no full backups at the time of the task run, a full backup is created instead of the differential backup.

Clean up archive

Specifies how to get rid of old backups: either to apply retention rules (p. 75) regularly or clean up the archive during a backup when the destination location runs out of space.

By default, the retention rules are not specified, which means older backups will not be deleted automatically.

Using retention rules

Specify the retention rules and when to apply them.

This setting is recommended for backup destinations such as shared folders.

When there is insufficient space while backing up

The archive will be cleaned up only during backup and only if there is not enough space to create a new backup. In this case, the software will act as follows:

 Delete the oldest full backup with all dependent incremental/differential

backups

 If there is only one full backup left and a full backup is in progress, then

delete the last full backup with all dependent incremental/differential backups

 If there is only one full backup left, and an incremental or differential backup

is in progress, an error occurs saying there is a lack of available space

This setting is recommended when backing up to a USB drive or Acronis Secure

Backup is thus performed only on Fridays. This makes Friday the only choice for weekly and monthly backups, leaving no other date for daily backups. The resulting “Grandfather-Father” archive will hence consist only of weekly differential and monthly full backups.

Even though it is possible to use GFS to create such an archive, the Custom scheme is more flexible in this situation.

4.2.6.3 Custom backup scheme

At a glance

 Custom schedule and conditions for backups of each type  Custom schedule and retention rules

Parameters

Zone. This setting is not applicable to FTP and SFTP servers.

This setting enables deletion of the last backup in the archive, in case your storage device cannot accommodate more than one backup. However, you might end up with no backups if the program is not able to create the new backup for some reason.

Apply retention rules

(only if the retention rules are set)

Specifies when to apply the retention rules (p. 75).

For example, the cleanup procedure can be set up to run after each backup, and also on schedule.

This option is available only if you have set at least one retention rule in Retention rules.

Cleanup schedule

(only if On schedule is selected)

Specifies a schedule for archive cleanup.

For example, the cleanup can be scheduled to start on the last day of each month.

This option is available only if you selected On schedule in Apply retention rules.

2nd location, 3rd location, and so on

Specifies where to copy or move (p. 72) the backups from the current location.

This option is available only if you selected either the Replicate newly created

backup to another location check box under How to back up, or Move the oldest backups to another location in the Retention rules window.

Examples

Weekly full backup

The following scheme yields a full backup performed every Friday night.

Full backup: Schedule: Weekly, every Friday, at 10:00 PM

Here, all parameters except Schedule in Full backup are left empty. All backups in the archive are kept indefinitely (no archive cleanup is performed).

Full and incremental backup plus cleanup

With the following scheme, the archive will consist of weekly full backups and daily incremental backups. We further require that a full backup begin only after all users have logged off.

Full backup: Schedule: Weekly, every Friday, at 10:00 PM

Full backup: Conditions: User is logged off

Incremental: Schedule: Weekly, every workday, at 9:00 PM

Also, let all backups older than one year be deleted from the archive, and let the cleanup be performed upon creating a new backup.

Retention rules: Delete backups older than 12 months

Apply the rules: After backing up

By default, a one-year-old full backup will not be deleted until all incremental backups that depend on it become subject to deletion too. For more information, see Retention rules (p. 75).

Monthly full, weekly differential, and daily incremental backups plus cleanup

Schedule

Set up a daily (p. 61), weekly (p. 63), or monthly (p. 65) schedule. Setting up schedule parameters allows for the creation of simple schedules (example of a simple daily

This example demonstrates the use of all options available in the Custom scheme.

Suppose that we need a scheme that will produce monthly full backups, weekly differential backups, and daily incremental backups. Then the backup schedule can look as follows.

Full backup: Schedule: Monthly, every Last Sunday of the month, at 9:00 PM

Incremental: Schedule: Weekly, every workday, at 7:00 PM

Differential: Schedule: Weekly, every Saturday, at 8:00 PM

Further, we want to add conditions that have to be satisfied for a backup task to start. This is set up in the Conditions fields for each backup type.

Full backup: Conditions: Location available

Incremental: Conditions: User is logged off

Differential: Conditions: User is idle

As a result, a full backup—originally scheduled at 9:00 PM—may actually start later: as soon as the backup location becomes available. Likewise, backup tasks for incremental and differential backups will wait until all users are logged off and users are idle, respectively.

Finally, we create retention rules for the archive: let us retain only backups that are no older than six months, and let the cleanup be performed after each backup task and also on the last day of every month.

Retention rules: Delete backups older than 6 months

Apply the rules: After backing up, On schedule

Cleanup schedule: Monthly, on the Last day of All months, at 10:00 PM

By default, a backup is not deleted as long as it has dependent backups that must be kept. For example, if a full backup has become subject to deletion, but there are incremental or differential backups that depend on it, the deletion is postponed until all the dependent backups can be deleted as well.

For more information, see Retention rules (p. 75).

4.2.6.4 Tower of Hanoi scheme

At a glance

 Up to 16 levels of full, differential, and incremental backups  Next-level backups are twice as rare as previous-level backups  One backup of each level is stored at a time  Higher density of more recent backups

Parameters

You can set up the following parameters of a Tower of Hanoi scheme.

schedule: a backup task will be run every 1 day at 10 AM) as well as more complex schedules (example of a complex daily schedule: a task will be run every 3 days, starting from January 15. During the specified days the task will be repeated every 2 hours from 10 AM to 10 PM). Thus, complex schedules specify the sessions on which the scheme should run. In the discussion below, "days" can be replaced with "scheduled sessions".

Number of levels

Select from 2 to 16 backup levels. See the example stated below for details.

Roll-back period

The guaranteed number of sessions that one can go back in the archive at any time. Calculated automatically, depending on the schedule parameters and the numbers of levels you select. See the example below for details.

Backup type

Specifies what backup types the backup levels will have

 Always full - all levels of backups will be full.  Full/Differential/Incremental - backups of different levels will have different types:

- Last-level backups are full

- Backups of intermediate levels are differential

- First-level backups are incremental

Example

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

14 4 1 2 1 3 1 2 1 4 1 2 1 3 1

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 4 1 2 1 3 1 2

Schedule parameters are set as follows

 Recur: Every 1 day  Frequency: Once at 6 PM

Number of levels: 4

Backup type: Full/Differential/Incremental

This is how the first 14 days (or 14 sessions) of this scheme's schedule look. Shaded numbers denote backup levels.

Backups of different levels have different types:

 Last-level (in this case, level 4) backups are full;  Backups of intermediate levels (2, 3) are differential;  First-level (1) backups are incremental.

A cleanup mechanism ensures that only the most recent backups of each level are kept. Here is how the archive looks on day 8, a day before creating a new full backup.

The scheme allows for efficient data storage: more backups accumulate toward the current time. Having four backups, we could recover data as of today, yesterday, half a week, or a week ago.

Roll-back period

The number of days we can go back in the archive is different on different days. The minimum number of days we are guaranteed to have is called the roll-back period.

The following table shows full backup and roll-back periods for schemes of various levels.

Number of levels

Full backup every

On different days, can go back

Roll-back period

2 days

1 to 2 days

1 day

4 days

2 to 5 days

2 days

8 days

4 to 11 days

4 days

16 days

8 to 23 days

8 days

32 days

16 to 47 days

16 days

Adding a level doubles the full backup and roll-back periods.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

12 4 1 2 1 3 1 2 1 4 1 2 1

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

13 4 1 2 1 3 1 2 1 4 1 2 1

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

14 4 1 2 1 3 1 2 1 4 1 2 1 3 1

To see why the number of recovery days varies, let us return to the previous example.

Here are the backups we have on day 12 (numbers in gray denote deleted backups).

A new level 3 differential backup has not yet been created, so the backup of day five is still stored. Since it depends on the full backup of day one, that backup is available as well. This enables us to go as far back as 11 days, which is the best-case scenario.

The following day, however, a new third-level differential backup is created, and the old full backup is deleted.

This gives us only a four day recovery interval, which turns out to be the worst-case scenario.

On day 14, the interval is five days. It increases on subsequent days before decreasing again, and so on.

The roll-back period shows how many days we are guaranteed to have even in the worst case. For a four-level scheme, it is four days.

4.2.6.5 Manual start

With the Manual start scheme, you do not have to specify the backup schedule. You can run the backup plan from the Plans and Tasks view manually at any time afterwards.

Specify the appropriate settings as follows.

Backup type

Select the type of backup

 Full - selected by default for all backup locations (except for Acronis Cloud Storage).  Incremental. At the first time a full backup will be created. The next backups will be

incremental. Selected as the one and only backup type for Acronis Cloud Storage.

 Differential. At the first time a full backup will be created. The next backups will be

differential.

4.2.6.6 Initial seeding

This backup scheme is available when Acronis Cloud Storage is selected as the backup destination. A backup is only successful if you have an Initial Seeding license.

The Initial Seeding service might be unavailable in your region. To find more information, click here: http://kb.acronis.com/content/15118.

Initial seeding enables you to transfer the first backup, which is full and usually the largest, to the cloud storage on a hard drive instead of over the Internet. Subsequent backups, which are all incremental and thus usually much smaller, can be transferred over the Internet after the full backup has arrived in the cloud storage.

If you back up 500 GB of data or more, initial seeding ensures faster delivery of the backed-up data and lower traffic costs.

Please refer to the "Initial Seeding FAQ (p. 240)" section for more details.

4.2.7 Archive validation

Set up the validation task to check if the backed-up data is recoverable. If the backup could not pass the validation successfully, the validation task fails and the backup plan gets the Error status.

Validation of a file backup imitates recovery of all files from the backup to a dummy destination. Validation of a volume backup calculates a checksum for every data block saved in the backup.

To set up validation, specify the following parameters

1. When to validate – select when to perform the validation. As the validation is a

resource-intensive operation, it makes sense to schedule the validation to the managed machine's off-peak period. On the other hand, if the validation is a major part of your data protection strategy and you prefer to be immediately informed whether the backed-up data is not corrupted and can be successfully recovered, think of starting the validation right after backup creation.

2. What to validate – select either to validate the entire archive or the latest backup in the archive.

Validation of the archive will validate all the archive’s backups and may take a long time and a lot

of system resources.

Validation of the latest backup may also take time, even if this backup is incremental or differential, and small in size. This is because the operation validates not only the data physically contained in the backup, but all of the data recoverable by selecting the backup. This requires access to previously created backups.

3. Validation schedule (appears only if you have selected On schedule in step 1) - set the schedule

of validation. For more information see the Scheduling (p. 60) section.

4.2.8 Backup plan's credentials

Provide the credentials for the account under which the plan will run. By default, the plan runs under the agent service account, if created by a user having administrative privileges on the machine. If created by a regular user, such as a member of the Users group, the plan runs under this user's account.

To specify credentials explicitly

1. If you have administrative privileges on the machine, select Use the following credentials.

Otherwise skip this step.

2. Specify:

Parameter

Value

Description

acronisTag.label

A user-defined label.

The label can be set by a user when creating a backup plan.

acronisTag.hostname

Host name (FQDN)

acronisTag.os.type

Operating system

acronisTag.os.servicepack

0, 1, 2...

The version of the Service Pack installed in the system.

For Windows OS only.

acronisTag.os.sid

Machine's SID.

For example: S-1-5-21-874133492-782267321-3928949834.

For Windows OS only.

Windows NT 4

winNTGuest

 User name. When entering the name of an Active Directory user account, be sure to also

specify the domain name (DOMAIN\Username or Username@domain).

 Password. The password for the account.  Confirm password. Re-enter the password.

3. Click OK.

To learn more about operations available depending on the user privileges, see the Users' privileges on a managed machine (p. 24) section.

4.2.9 Label (Preserving machine properties in a backup)

Any time data on a machine is backed up, information about the machine name, operating system, Windows service pack and security identifier (SID) is added to the backup, along with the user-defined text label. The label may include the department or machine owner's name or similar information that can be used as a tag or a key.

If you recover (p. 101) the machine to a VMware ESX(i) using Agent for VMware, or convert (p. 133) the backup to a ESX(i) virtual machine, these properties will be transferred to the virtual machine's configuration. You can view them in the virtual machine settings: Edit settings > Options > Advanced > General > Configuration parameters. You can select, sort and group the virtual machines with the help of these custom parameters. This can be useful in various scenarios.

Example:

Let's assume you migrate your office or datacenter to a virtual environment. By using third-party software that can access configuration parameters through VMware API, you can automatically apply security policies to each machine even before powering it on.

To add a text label to a backup:

1. On the Create backup plan (p. 35) page, click Show plan's credentials, comments, label.

2. In Label, enter the text label or select it from the drop-down menu.

Parameters specification

Values of the "acronisTag.os.type" parameter

Windows 2000 Professional

win2000ProGuest

Windows 2000 Server

win2000ServGuest

Windows 2000 Advanced Server

win2000ServGuest

Windows XP All Editions

winXPProGuest

Windows XP All Editions (64 bit)

winXPPro64Guest

Windows Server 2003, All Editions

winNetStandardGuest

Windows Server 2003, All Editions (64 bit)

winNetStandard64Guest

Windows 2008

winLonghornGuest

Windows 2008 (64 bit)

winLonghorn64Guest

Windows Vista

winVistaGuest

Windows Vista (64 bit)

winVista64Guest

Windows 7

windows7Guest

Windows 7 (64 bit)

windows7_64Guest

Windows Server 2008 R2 (64 bit)

windows7Server64Guest

Linux

otherLinuxGuest

Linux (64 bit)

otherLinux64Guest

Other Operating System

otherGuest

Other Operating System (64 bit)

otherGuest64

Example

acronisTag.label = “DEPT:BUCH; COMP:SUPERSERVER; OWNER:EJONSON”

acronisTag.hostname = “superserver.corp.local”

acronisTag.os.type = “windows7Server64Guest”

acronisTag.os.servicepack = “1”

acronisTag.os.sid = “S-1-5-21-874133492-782267321-3928949834”

4.2.10 Sequence of operations in a backup plan

If a backup plan contains multiple operations, Acronis Backup performs them in the following order:

1. Cleanup (if configured Before backup) and validation (if cleanup has been performed and

validation is configured to run After the retention rules are applied).

If a backup was moved to a different location during the cleanup, all the operations configured for the subsequent locations are performed before continuing to the following steps in the primary location.

2. Pre-backup command execution.

3. Backup:

a. Pre-data capture command execution b. Snapshot creation c. Post-data capture command execution d. Backup process

4. Start of backup cataloging.

Backup cataloging can be a time-consuming process. It is performed in parallel with the following steps.

5. Post-backup command execution.

6. Disaster Recovery Plan (DRP) creation.

7. Conversion to a virtual machine.

8. Backup replication.

9. Cleanup.

If the replication took place, or a backup was moved to a different location during the cleanup, all the operations configured for the subsequent locations are performed before continuing to the following steps in the primary location.

10. Validation.

11. Sending e-mail notification.

4.2.11 Why is the program asking for the password?

A scheduled or postponed task has to run regardless of users being logged on. In case you have not explicitly specified the credentials, under which the task(s) will run, the program proposes using your account. Enter your password, specify another account or change the scheduled start to manual.

4.3 Simplified naming of backup files

To use simplified naming of backup files, do either of the following:

 In the welcome screen, click Create backup plan (p. 35), expand Show backup file naming,

archive comments, and then select the Name backup files using the archive name… check box.

When you back up to a locally attached RDX drive or USB flash drive, the Name backup files using the archive name... check box does not appear. Instead, the removable device mode (p.

148) determines whether the standard or simplified naming scheme will be used. In Linux, the check box appears after you manually mount the device.

 In the welcome screen, click Back up now (p. 35). Simplified naming will be used whenever the

backup destination supports it (see “Restrictions” below).

When you use simplified file naming

 The file name of the first (full) backup in the archive will consist of the archive name; for

example: MyData.tib. The file names of subsequent (incremental or differential) backups will have an index. For example: MyData2.tib, MyData3.tib, and so on.

This simple naming scheme enables you to create a portable image of a machine on a detachable media or move the backups to a different location by using a script.

 Before creating a new full backup, the software will delete the entire archive and start a new

one.

This behavior is useful when you rotate USB hard drives and want each drive to keep a single full backup (p. 58) or all backups created during a week (p. 58). But you might end up with no backups if a full backup to your only drive fails.

This behavior can be suppressed by adding the [Date] variable (p. 56) to the archive name.

When you use standard file naming

 Each backup will have a unique file name with the exact time stamp and the backup type. For

example: MyData_2010_03_26_17_01_38_960D.tib. This standard file naming allows for a wider range of backup destinations and backup schemes.

Restrictions

When using simplified file naming, the following functionality is not available:

 Setting up full, incremental and differential backups within a single backup plan. You need to

create separate backup plans for each type of backup

 Backup to Acronis Secure Zone or Acronis Cloud Storage  Setting up replication of backups  Setting up retention rules  Setting up regular conversion of backups to a virtual machine  Converting an incremental or differential backup into a full one

Restrictions on archive names

 The archive name cannot end with a number.  The FAT16, FAT32, and NTFS file systems do not allow the following characters in the file name:

backslash (\), slash (/), colon (:), asterisk (*), question mark (?), quotation mark ("), less than sign (<), greater than sign (>), and pipe (|).

4.3.1 The [DATE] variable

If you specify the [DATE] variable in the archive name, the file name of each backup will include that backup’s creation date.

When using this variable, the first backup of a new day will be a full backup. Before creating the next full backup, the software deletes all backups taken earlier that day. Backups taken before that day are kept. This means you can store multiple full backups with or without incremental ones, but no more than one full backup per day. You can sort the backups by date. You can also use a script to copy, move, or delete the older backups.

The value of this variable is the current date surrounded by brackets ([]). The date format depends on the regional options on the machine. For example, if the date format is year-month-day, the value for January 31, 2012, is [2012-01-31]. Characters that are not supported in a file name, such as slashes (/), are replaced with underscores (_).

You can place this variable anywhere in the archive name. You can use both lowercase and uppercase letters in this variable.

Examples

Example 1. Suppose that you perform incremental backups twice a day (at midnight and noon) for two days, starting on January 31, 2012. The archive name is MyArchive-[DATE], the date format is year-month-day. Here is the list of backup files after day two:

MyArchive-[2012-01-31].tib (full, created on January 31 at midnight) MyArchive-[2012-01-31]2.tib (incremental, created on January 31 at noon) MyArchive-[2012-02-01].tib (full, created on February 1 at midnight) MyArchive-[2012-02-01]2.tib (incremental, created on February 1 at noon)

Example 2. Suppose that you perform full backups, with the same schedule, archive name, and date

format as in the previous example. Then, the list of backup files after day two is the following:

MyArchive-[2012-01-31].tib (full, created on January 31 at noon) MyArchive-[2012-02-01].tib (full, created on February 1 at noon)

This is because the full backups created at midnight were replaced by new full backups of the same day.

4.3.2 Backup splitting and simplified file naming

When a backup is split according to backup splitting (p. 84) settings, the same indexing is used to also name parts of the backup. The file name for the next backup will have the next available index.

For example, suppose that the first backup of the archive MyData has been split in two parts. Then, the file names for this backup are MyData1.tib and MyData2.tib. The second backup (supposing that it is not split) will be named MyData3.tib.

4.3.3 Usage examples

This section provides examples of how you can use simplified file naming.

4.3.3.1 Example 1. Daily backup replacing the old one

Consider the following scenario:

 You want to perform a daily full backup of your machine.  You want to store the backup on a locally attached USB hard drive in the file MyMachine.tib.  You want each new backup to replace the old one.

In this scenario, create a backup plan with a daily schedule. When creating the backup plan, specify the USB hard drive as the archive location, specify MyMachine as the archive name, select the Name

backup files using the archive name... check box, and select Full as the backup type.

Result. The archive consists of a single file: MyMachine.tib. This file is deleted before creating a new

backup.

If you choose to back up to a locally attached RDX drive or USB flash drive, you will not see the Name backup files using the archive name... check box. Instead, make sure that the removable device mode (p. 148) is set to Removable media.

4.3.3.2 Example 2. Daily full backups with a date stamp

Consider the following scenario:

 You want to perform a daily full backup of your machine.  You want to move older backups to a remote location by using a script.

In this scenario, create a backup plan with a daily schedule. When creating the backup plan, specify MyMachine-[DATE] as the archive name, select the Name backup files using the archive name... check box, and select Full as the backup type.

Result:

 The backups of January 1, 2012, January 2, 2012, and so on, are stored respectively as

MyMachine-[2012-01-01].tib, MyMachine-[2012-01-02].tib, and so on.

 Your script can move older backups based on the date stamp.

See also “The [Date] variable” (p. 56).

4.3.3.3 Example 3. Hourly backups within a day

Consider the following scenario:

 You want to perform hourly backups of your server's critical files every day.  You want the first backup of each day to be full and to run at midnight; and the subsequent

backups of the day to be differential and to run at 01:00, 02:00, and so on.

 You want to keep older backups in the archive.

In this scenario, create a backup plan with a daily schedule. When creating the backup plan, specify ServerFiles[Date] as the archive name, select the Name backup files using the archive name… check box, specify Differential as the backup type, and schedule the backups to run every hour from midnight.

Result:

 The 24 backups of January 1, 2012, will be stored as ServerFiles[2012-01-01].tib,

ServerFiles[2012-01-01]2.tib, and so on up to ServerFiles[2012-01-01]24.tib.

 The following day, the backups will start with the full backup ServerFiles[2012-01-02].tib.

See also "The [Date] variable" (p. 56).

4.3.3.4 Example 4. Daily full backups with daily drive swaps

Consider the following scenario:

 You want to perform a daily full backup of your machine.  You want to store the backup on a locally attached USB hard drive in the file MyMachine.tib.  You have two such drives. Each of them has the drive letter D when attached to the machine.  You want to swap the drives before each backup so that one drive contains today’s backup and

the other drive yesterday’s backup.

 You want each new backup to replace the backup on the currently attached drive.

In this scenario, create a backup plan with a daily schedule. When creating the backup plan:

 Specify MyMachine as the archive name.  Specify D:\ as the archive location.  Select the Name backup files using the archive name... check box.  Select Full as the backup type.

Result. Each hard disk drive will contain one full backup. While one drive is attached to the machine, you can keep the other drive off-site for extra data protection.

If you choose to back up to locally attached RDX drives or USB flash drives, the Name backup files using the archive name... check box does not appear. Instead, make sure that the removable device mode (p. 148) is set to Removable media.

4.3.3.5 Example 5. Daily backups with weekly drive swaps

Consider the following scenario:

 You want to perform daily backups of your machine: a full backup each Monday and incremental

backups on Tuesday through Sunday.

 You want to store the backups on a locally attached USB hard drive in the archive MyMachine.

 You have two such drives. Either of them has drive letter D in the operating system when

attached to the machine.

 You want to swap the drives each Monday so that one drive contains backups of the current

week (Monday through Sunday), and the other drive those of the previous week.

In this scenario, you need to create two backup plans as follows:

a) When creating the first backup plan:

 Specify MyMachine as the archive name.  Specify D:\ as the archive location, where D is the letter either of the drives has in the

operating system when attached to the machine.

 Select the Name backup files using the archive name... check box.  Select Full as the backup type.  Schedule the backups to run every week on Monday.

b) When creating the second backup plan, specify the same settings as in the first backup plan, but

select Incremental as the backup type and schedule the backups to run every week on Tuesday through Sunday.

Result:

 Before creating a Monday backup (by the first backup plan), all backups will be deleted from the

currently attached drive.

 While one drive is attached to the machine, you can keep the other drive off-site for extra data

protection.

4.3.3.6 Example 6. Backups within working hours

Consider the following scenario:

 You want to back up your server’s critical files every day.  You want the first backup of each day to be full and to run at 01:00 AM.  You want the backups during working hours to be differential and to run every hour from

8:00 AM through 5:00 PM.

 You want to include a creation date in the name of each backup file.

In this scenario, you need to create two backup plans as follows:

a) When creating the first backup plan, specify ServerFiles[DATE] as the archive name, select the

Name backup files using the archive name… check box, select Full as the backup type, and schedule the backups to run every day at 01:00:00 AM.

b) When creating the second backup plan, specify the same settings as in the first backup plan, but

select Differential as the backup type and schedule the backups as follows:

 Run the task: Daily  Every: 1 Hour(s)  From: 08:00:00 AM  Until: 05:01:00 PM

Result:

 The full backup of January 31, 2012, will be stored as ServerFiles[2012-01-31].tib.

Event

Time: Daily, Weekly, Monthly

Time since completion of the last successful backup within the same backup plan

(specify the length of time)

User logon

(any user, current user, specify the user’s account)

User logoff*

(any user, current user, specify the user’s account)

*Shutting down is not the same as logging off. The task will not run at a system shutdown.

System startup

System shutdown

An event in Windows Event Log

(specify the parameters of the event)

 The 10 differential backups of January 31, 2012, will be stored as ServerFiles[2012-01-31]2.tib,

ServerFiles[2012-01-31]3.tib, and so on up to ServerFiles[2012-01-31]11.tib.

 The following day, February 1, the backups will start with the full backup

ServerFiles[2012-02-01].tib. The differential backups will start with ServerFiles[2012-02-01]2.tib.

See also “The [Date] variable” (p. 56).

4.4 Scheduling

Acronis scheduler helps the administrator adapt backup plans to the company’s daily routine and each employee’s work style. The plans’ tasks will be launched systematically keeping the critical data

safely protected.

The scheduling is available when creating a backup plan (p. 35) with any of the following backup schemes: Simple, Custom or Tower of Hanoi. The schedule also can be set for validation tasks (p.

150).

The scheduler uses local time of the machine the backup plan exists on. Before creating a schedule, be sure the machine’s date and time settings are correct.

Schedule

To define when a task has to be executed, you need to specify an event or multiple events. The task will be launched as soon as any of the events occurs. The table below lists the events available under Windows operating systems.

Condition

For backup operations only, you can specify a condition or multiple conditions in addition to the events. Once any of the events occurs, the scheduler checks the condition and runs the task if the condition is met. With multiple conditions, all of them must be met simultaneously to enable task execution. The table below lists the conditions available under Windows operating systems.

Condition: run the task only if

User is idle (a screen saver is running or the machine is locked)

Location's host is available

The task run time is within the specified time interval

All users are logged off

The specified period of time has passed since the completion of the last successful backup within the same backup plan

The scheduler behavior, in case the event occurs but the condition (or any of multiple conditions) is

Every: <...> day(s)

Set up the certain number of days you want the task to be run. For example, if you set Every 2 day(s), the task will be started on every other day.

Once at: <...>

Set up the time at which the task will be run once.

Every: <...>

From: <...> Until: <...>

Set up how many times the task will be restarted during the specified time interval. For example, setting the task frequency to Every 1 hour From 10:00:00 AM until 10:00:00 PM allows the task to run 12 times: from 10 AM to 10 PM during one day.

From: <...>

Set up a date when this schedule will be enabled (an effective date). If this check box is cleared, the task will be started on the nearest day and time you have specified above.

To: <...>

Set up a date when this schedule will be disabled. If this check box is cleared, the task will be run for an indefinite number of days.

not met is defined by the Task start conditions (p. 98) backup option.

What-ifs

 What if an event occurs (and a condition, if any, is met) while the previous task run has not

completed?

The event will be ignored.

 What if an event occurs while the scheduler is waiting for the condition required by the

previous event?

The event will be ignored.

 What if the condition is not met for a very long time?

If delaying a backup is getting risky, you can force the condition (tell the users to log off) or run the task manually. To automatically handle this situation, you can set the time interval after which the task will run regardless of the condition.

4.4.1 Daily schedule

Daily schedule is effective in Windows and Linux operating systems.

To specify a daily schedule

In the Schedule area, select the appropriate parameter as follows:

In the During the day execute the task... area, select one of the following:

In the Effective... area, set the following settings:

All the settings you made are displayed in the Result field at the bottom of the window.

Examples

"Simple" daily schedule

Run the task every day at 6PM.

The schedule's parameters are thus set up as follows.

1. Every: 1 day(s).

2. Once at: 06:00:00 PM.

3. Effective:

From: not set. The task will be started on the current day, if it has been created before 6PM. If you have created the task after 6 PM, the task will be started for the first time on the next day at 6 PM.

To: not set. The task will be performed for an indefinite number of days.

"Three-hour time interval lasting for three months" schedule

Run the task every three hours. The task starts on a certain date (say, September 15, 2009), and ends after three months.

The schedule's parameters are thus set up as follows.

1. Every: 1 day(s).

2. Every: 3 hours

From: 12:00:00 AM (midnight) Until: 09:00:00 PM - thus, the task will be performed 8 times a day with a 3 hour time interval. After the last daily recurrence at 9 PM, the next day comes and the task starts over again from midnight.

3. Effective:

From: 09/15/2009. If September 15, 2009 is the current date of the task's creation and, say, 01:15 PM is the task's creation time, the task will be started when the nearest time interval comes: at 03:00 PM in our example.

To: 12/15/2009. On this date the task will be performed for the last time, but the task itself is still available in the Tasks view.

Several daily schedules for one task

There are some cases when you might need the task to be run several times a day, or even several times a day with different time intervals. For such cases, consider adding several schedules to a single task.

For example, suppose that the task has to be run every 3rd day, starting from 09/20/2009, five times a day:

 first at 8 AM  second at 12 PM (noon)  third at 3 PM  fourth at 5 PM  fifth at 7 PM

The obvious way is to add five simple schedules. If you spend one minute for examination, you can think out a more optimal way. As you can see, the time interval between the first and the second task's recurrences is 4 hours, and between the third, fourth and fifth is 2 hours. In this case, the optimal way is to add two schedules to the task.

First daily schedule

Every: <...> week(s) on: <...>

Specify a certain number of weeks and the days of the week you want the task to be run. For example, with the Every 2 week(s) on Mon setting, the task will be performed on Monday of every other week.

Once at: <...>

Set up the time at which the task will be run once.

Every: <...>

From: <...> Until: <...>

Set up how many times the task will be run during the specified time interval. For example, setting the task frequency to Every 1 hour From 10:00:00 AM until 10:00:00 PM allows the task to be run 12 times from 10 AM to 10 PM during one day.

From: <...>

Set up a date when this schedule will be enabled (an effective date). If this check box is cleared, the task will be started on the nearest day and time you have specified above.

To: <...>

Set up a date when this schedule will be disabled. If this check box is cleared, the task will be run for an indefinite number of weeks.

1. Every: 3 day(s).

2. Every: 4 hours.

From: 08:00:00 AM Until: 12:00:00 PM.

3. Effective:

From: 09/20/2009.

To: not set.

Second daily schedule

1. Every: 3 day(s).

2. Every: 2 hour(s).

From: 03:00:00 PM Until: 07:00:00 PM.

3. Effective:

From: 09/20/2009.

To: not set.

4.4.2 Weekly schedule

Weekly schedule is effective in Windows and Linux operating systems.

To specify a weekly schedule

In the Schedule area, select the appropriate parameter as follows:

In the During the day execute the task... area, select one of the following:

In the Effective... area, set the following settings:

All the settings you made are displayed in the Result field at the bottom of the window.

Examples

"One day in the week" schedule

Run the task every Friday at 10PM, starting from a certain date (say 05/14/2009) and ending after six months.

The schedule's parameters are thus set up as follows.

1. Every: 1 week(s) on: Fri.

2. Once at: 10:00:00 PM.

3. Effective:

From: 05/13/2009. The task will be started on the nearest Friday at 10 PM.

To: 11/13/2009. The task will be performed for the last time on this date, but the task itself will still be available in the Tasks view after this date. (If this date were not a Friday, the task would be last performed on the last Friday preceding this date.)

This schedule is widely used when creating a custom backup scheme. The "One day in the week"-like schedule is added to the full backups, while the incremental backups are scheduled to be performed on workdays. For more details, see the Full and incremental backups plus cleanup example in the Custom backup scheme (p. 47) section.

"Workdays" schedule

Run the task every week on workdays: from Monday through Friday. During a workday, the task starts only once at 9 PM.

The schedule's parameters are thus set up as follows.

1. Every: 1 week(s) on: <Workdays> - selecting the <Workdays> check box automatically selects the

corresponding check boxes (Mon, Tue, Wed, Thu, and Fri), and leaves the remaining ones unchanged.

2. Once at: 09:00:00 PM.

3. Effective:

From: empty. If you have created the task, say on Monday at 11:30 AM, the task will be started on the same day at 9 PM. If the task was created, say on Friday after 9 PM, then it will be started for the first time on the nearest workday (Monday in our example) at 9 PM.

End date: empty. The task will be restarted for an indefinite number of weeks.

This schedule is widely used when creating a custom backup scheme. The "Workdays"-like schedule is added to the incremental backups, while the full backup is scheduled to be performed one day in the week. For more details, see the Full and incremental backups plus cleanup example in the Custom backup scheme (p. 47) section.

Several weekly schedules for one task

In the case when the task needs to be run on different days of the weeks with different time intervals, consider adding a dedicated schedule to every desired day of the week, or to several days.

For example, you need the task to be run with the following schedule:

 Monday: twice at 12 PM (noon) and 9 PM  Tuesday: every 3 hours from 9 AM until 9 PM  Wednesday: every 3 hours from 9 AM until 9 PM  Thursday: every 3 hours from 9 AM until 9 PM  Friday: twice at 12 PM and 9 PM (i.e. same as on Monday)  Saturday: once at 9 PM  Sunday: once at 9 PM

Combining the identical times, the following three schedules can be added to the task:

First schedule

1. Every: 1 week(s) on: Mon, Fri.

Months: <...>

Select a certain month(s) you want to run the task in.

Days: <...>

Select specific days of the month to run the task on. You can also select the last day of the month, irrespective of its actual date.

On: <...> <...>

Select specific days of the weeks to run the task on.

Once at: <...>

Set up the time at which the task will be run once.

Every: <...>

From: <...> Until: <...>

From: <...>

Set up a date when this schedule will be enabled (an effective date). If this check box is cleared, the task will be started on the nearest day and time you have specified above.

To: <...>

Set up a date when this schedule will be disabled. If this check box is cleared, the task will be run for an indefinite number of months.

2. Every: 9 hours

From: 12:00:00 PM Until: 09:00:00 PM.

3. Effective:

From: not set.

To: not set.

Second schedule

1. Every 1 week(s) on: Tue, Wed, Thu.

2. Every 3 hours

From 09:00:00 AM until 09:00:00 PM.

3. Effective:

From: not set.

To: not set.

Third schedule

1. Every: 1 week(s) on: Sat, Sun.

2. Once at: 09:00:00 PM.

3. Effective:

From: not set.

To: not set.

4.4.3 Monthly schedule

Monthly schedule is effective in Windows and Linux operating systems.

To specify a monthly schedule

In the Schedule area, select the appropriate parameter as follows:

In the During the day execute the task... area, select one of the following:

In the Effective... area, set the following settings:

All the settings you made are displayed in the Result field at the bottom of the window.

Examples

"Last day of every month" schedule

Run the task once at 10 PM on the last day of every month.

The schedule's parameters are set up as follows.

1. Months: <All months>.

2. Days: Last. The task will run on the last day of every month despite its actual date.

3. Once at: 10:00:00 PM.

4. Effective:

From: empty.

To: empty.

This schedule is widely used when creating a custom backup scheme. The "Last day of every month" schedule is added to the full backups, while the differential backups are scheduled to be performed once a week and incremental on workdays. For more details, see the Monthly full, weekly differential, and daily incremental backups plus cleanup example in the Custom backup scheme (p. 47) section.

"Season" schedule

Run the task on all workdays during the northern autumn seasons of 2009 and 2010. During a workday, the task is performed every 6 hours from 12 AM (midnight) until 6 PM.

The schedule's parameters are set up as follows.

1. Months: September, October, November.

2. On: <all> <workdays>.

3. Every: 6 hours.

From: 12:00:00 AM Until: 06:00:00 PM.

4. Effective:

From: 08/30/2009. Actually the task will be started on the first workday of September. By setting up this date we just define that the task must be started in 2009.

To: 12/01/2010. Actually the task will end on the last workday of November. By setting up this date we just define that the task must be discontinued in 2010, after autumn ends in the northern hemisphere.

Several monthly schedules for one task

In the case when the task needs to be run on different days or weeks with different time intervals depending on the month, consider adding a dedicated schedule to every desired month or several months.

Suppose that the task goes into effect on 11/01/2009.

 During northern winter, the task runs once at 10PM on every workday.  During northern spring and autumn, the task runs every 12 hours on all workdays.  During northern summer, the task runs every first and fifteenth of every month at 10 PM.

Thus, the following three schedules are added to the task.

First schedule

1. Months: December, January, February.

2. On: <All> <All workdays>

3. Once at: 10:00:00 PM.

4. Effective:

From: 11/01/2009.

To: not set.

Second schedule

1. Months: March, April, May, September, October, November.

2. On: <All> <All workdays>.

3. Every: 12 hours

From: 12:00:00 AM Until: 12:00:00 PM.

4. Effective:

From: 11/01/2009.

To: not set.

Third schedule

1. Months: June, July, August.

2. Days: 1, 15.

3. Once at: 10:00:00 PM.

4. Effective:

From: 11/01/2009.

To: not set.

4.4.4 On Windows Event Log event

This type of schedule is effective only in Windows operating systems.

You can schedule a backup task to start when a certain Windows event has been recorded in one of the event logs such as the Application, Security, or System log.

For example, you may want to set up a backup plan that will automatically perform an emergency full backup of your data as soon as Windows discovers that your hard disk drive is about to fail.

Parameters

Log name

Specifies the name of the log. Select the name of a standard log (Application, Security, or System) from the list, or type a log name—for example: Microsoft Office Sessions

Event source

Specifies the event source, which typically indicates the program or the system component that caused the event—for example: disk

Event type

Specifies the event type: Error, Warning, Information, Audit success, or Audit failure.

Event ID

Specifies the event number, which typically identifies the particular kind of events among events from the same source.

For example, an Error event with Event source disk and Event ID 7 occurs when Windows discovers a bad block on a disk, whereas an Error event with Event source disk and Event ID 15 occurs when a disk is not ready for access yet.

Examples

"Bad block" emergency backup

One or more bad blocks that have suddenly appeared on a hard disk usually indicate that the hard disk drive will soon fail. Suppose that you want to create a backup plan that will back up hard disk data as soon as such a situation occurs.

When Windows detects a bad block on a hard disk, it records an event with the event source disk and the event number 7 into the System log; the type of this event is Error.

When creating the plan, type or select the following in the Schedule area:

 Log name: System  Event source: disk  Event type: Error  Event ID: 7

Important: To ensure that such a task will complete despite the presence of bad blocks, you must make the task ignore bad blocks. To do this, in Backup options, go to Error handling, and then select the Ignore bad sectors check box.

Pre-update backup in Vista

Suppose that you want to create a backup plan that will automatically perform a backup of the system—for example, by backing up the volume where Windows is installed—every time that Windows is about to install updates.

Having downloaded one or more updates and scheduled their installation, the Microsoft Windows Vista operating system records an event with the event source Microsoft-Windows-WindowsUpdateClient and event number 18 into the System log; the type of this event is Information.

When creating the plan, type or select the following in the Schedule area:

 Log name: System  Event source: Microsoft-Windows-WindowsUpdateClient  Event type: Information  Event ID: 18

Tip: To set up a similar backup plan for machines running Microsoft Windows XP, replace the text in Event source with Windows Update Agent and leave the remaining fields the same.

How to view events in Event Viewer

To open a log in Event Viewer

1. On the Desktop or in the Start menu, right-click My Computer, and then click Manage.

2. In the Computer Management console, expand System Tools, and then expand Event Viewer.

3. In Event Viewer, click the name of a log that you want to view—for example, Application.

Note: To be able to open the security log (Security), you must be a member of the Administrators group.

To view properties of an event, including the event source and event number

1. In Event Viewer, click the name of a log that you want to view—for example, Application.

Note: To be able to open the security log (Security), you must be a member of the Administrators group.

2. In the list of events in the right pane, double-click the name of an event whose properties you

want to view.

3. In the Event Properties dialog box, view the event's properties such as the event source, shown

in the Source field; and the event number, shown in the Event ID field.

When you are finished, click OK to close the Event Properties dialog box.

4.4.5 Conditions

Conditions add more flexibility to the scheduler, enabling to execute backup tasks with respect to certain conditions. Once a specified event occurs (see the "Scheduling (p. 60)" section for the list of available events), the scheduler checks the specified condition and executes the task if the condition is met.

Conditions are available only when the custom backup scheme (p. 47) is used. You can set conditions for full, incremental and differential backup separately.

The scheduler behavior in case the event occurs but the condition (or any of multiple conditions) is not met, is defined by the Task start conditions (p. 98) backup option. There, you can specify how important the conditions are for the backup strategy:

 conditions are obligatory - put the backup task run on hold until all the conditions are met.  conditions are preferable, but a backup task run has higher priority - put the task on hold for the

specified time interval. If the time interval lapses and the conditions are still not met, run the task anyway. With this setting, the program will automatically handle the situation when the conditions are not met for too long and further delaying the backup is undesirable.

 backup task start time matters - skip the backup task if the conditions are not met at the time

when the task should be started. Skipping the task run makes sense when you need to back up data strictly at the specified time, especially if the events are relatively often.

Adding multiple conditions

If two or more conditions are specified, the backup will start only when all of them are met.

4.4.5.1 User is idle

Applies to: Windows

"User is idle" means that a screen saver is running on the managed machine or the machine is locked.

Example:

Run the backup task on the managed machine every day at 9PM, preferably when the user is idle. If the user is still active by 11PM, run the task anyway.

 Event: Daily, every 1 day(s); Once at: 09:00:00 PM.  Condition: User is idle.  Task start conditions: Wait until the conditions are met, Run the task anyway after 2 hour(s).

As a result,

(1) If the user becomes idle before 9PM, the backup task will start at 9PM.

(2) If the user becomes idle between 9PM and 11PM, the backup task will start immediately after the user becomes idle.

(3) If the user is still active at 11PM, the backup task starts anyway.

4.4.5.2 Location's host is available

Applies to: Windows, Linux

"Location's host is available" means that the machine hosting the destination for storing archives on a networked drive is available.

Example:

Backing up data to the networked location is performed on workdays at 9:00 PM. If the location's host is not available at that moment (for instance, due to maintenance work), skip the backup and wait for the next workday to start the task. It is assumed that the backup task should not be started at all rather than failed.

 Event: Weekly, Every 1 week(s) on <workdays>; Once at 09:00:00 PM.  Condition: Location's host is available  Task start conditions: Skip the task execution.

As a result,

(1) If 9:00 PM comes and the location's host is available, the backup task starts right on time.

(2) If 9:00 PM comes but the host is unavailable at the moment, the backup task will start on the next workday if the location's host is available.

(3) If the location's host will never be available on workdays at 9:00 PM, the task never starts.

4.4.5.3 Fits the time interval

Applies to: Windows, Linux

Restricts a backup task's start time to a specified interval.

Example

A company uses different locations on the same network-attached storage for backing up users data and servers. The workday starts at 8AM and ends at 5 PM. Users' data should be backed up as soon as the users log off, but not earlier than 4:30 PM and not later than 10 PM. Every day at 11 PM the company's servers are backed up. So, all the users' data should be preferably backed up before this time, in order to free network bandwidth. By specifying the upper limit as 10 PM, it is supposed that the backing up of users' data does not take more than one hour. If a user is still logged on within the specified time interval, or logs off at any other time – do not back up the users' data, i.e. skip task execution.

 Event: When logging off, The following user: Any user.  Condition: Fits the time interval, from 04:30:00 PM until 10:00:00 PM.  Task start conditions: Skip the task execution.

As a result,

(1) if the user logs off between 04:30:00 PM and 10:00:00 PM, the backup task will start immediately following the logging off.

(2) if the user logs off at any other time, the task will be skipped.

What if...

What if a task is scheduled to be executed at a certain time and this time is outside the specified time interval?

For example:

 Event: Daily, Every 1 day(s); Once at 03:00:00 PM.  Condition: Fits the time interval, from 06:00:00 PM until 11:59:59 PM.

In this case, whether and when the task will run depends on the task start conditions:

 If the task start conditions are Skip the task execution, the task will never run.  If the task start conditions are Wait until the conditions are met and the Run the task anyway

after check box is cleared, the task (scheduled to run at 3:00 PM) will start at 6:00 PM—the time when the condition is met.

 If the task start conditions are Wait until the conditions are met and the Run the task anyway

after check box is selected with, say, the 1 Hour waiting time, the task (scheduled to run at

3:00 PM) will start at 4:00 PM—the time when the waiting period ends.

4.4.5.4 Users logged off

Applies to: Windows

Enables to put a backup task run on hold until all users log off from Windows on the managed machine.

Example

Run the backup task at 8 PM on the first and third Friday of every month, preferably when all users are logged off. If one of the users is still logged on at 11 PM, run the task anyway.

 Event: Monthly, Months: <All>; On: <First>, <Third> <Friday>; Once at 08:00:00 PM.  Condition: Users logged off.  Task start conditions: Wait until the conditions are met, Run the task anyway after 3 hour(s).

As a result,

(1) If all users are logged off at 8PM, the backup task will start at 8PM.

(2) If the last user logs off between 8PM and 11PM, the backup task will start immediately after the user has logged off.

(3) If any of the users is still logged on at 11PM, the backup task starts anyway.

4.4.5.5 Time since last backup

Applies to: Windows, Linux

Postpones a backup until the specified time passes since the completion of the last successful backup within the same backup plan.

Example:

Run the backup task at system startup, but only if more than 12 hours have passed since the last successful backup.

 Event: At startup, Start the task on machine startup.  Condition: Time since last backup, Time since the last backup: 12 hour(s).  Task start conditions: Wait until the conditions are met.

As a result,

(1) if the machine is restarted before 12 hours pass since the completion of the latest successful backup, the scheduler will wait until 12 hours pass, and then will start the task.

(2) if the machine is restarted after 12 hours have passed since the completion of the latest successful backup, the backup task will start immediately.

(3) if the machine is never restarted, the task will never start. You can start the backup manually, if need be, in the Backup plans and tasks view.

4.5 Replication and retention of backups

When creating a backup plan (p. 35), you specify the primary location for the backups. In addition, you can do the following:

 Replicate (copy) each backup to a second location immediately after creation.  Retain the backups according to the retention rules you specify, and then either move them to a

second location or delete them.

Similarly, you can copy or move backups from a second location to a third location and so on. Up to five consecutive locations are supported (including the primary one).

Note: The replication feature replaces and enhances the Dual destination option, which was available in Acronis Backup & Recovery 10.

Example. You back up your machine to a local folder. The backup is immediately copied to a network folder. In the original local folder, the backup is stored for just one month.

The following picture illustrates this example.

Usage scenarios

 Reliable disaster recovery (p. 77)

Store your backups both on-site (for immediate recovery) and off-site (to secure the backups from local storage failure or a natural disaster).

 Keeping only the latest recovery points (p. 77)

Delete older backups from a fast storage according to retention rules, in order to not overuse expensive storage space.

 Using Acronis Cloud Backup to protect data from a natural disaster (p. 77)

Backup scheme

Can copy backups

Can move backups

Can delete backups

Manual start (p. 51)

Yes

Simple (p. 43)

Yes

Grandfather-Father-Son (GFS) (p. 43)

Yes

Tower of Hanoi (p. 49)

Yes

Custom (p. 47)

Yes

Initial seeding (p. 52)

Replicate the archive to the cloud storage by transferring only the data changes outside working hours.

 Reduced costs of storing the backed-up data

Store your backups on a fast storage for as long as a need to access them is likely. Then, move them to a lower-cost storage to keep them there for a longer term. This enables you to meet legal requirements on data retention.

Replication and retention in backup schemes

The following table shows availability of replication and retention rules in various backup schemes.

Notes:

 Setting up both copying and moving backups from the same location is not possible.  With simplified naming of backup files (p. 55), neither replication nor use of retention rules is

available.

4.5.1 Supported locations

You can copy or move a backup from any of these locations:

 A local folder on a fixed drive  A network folder  An FTP or SFTP server  Acronis Secure Zone

You can copy or move a backup to any of these locations:

 A local folder on a fixed drive  A network folder  An FTP or SFTP server  Acronis Cloud Storage  A removable device (p. 148) used in the Fixed drive mode. (You select the removable device

mode when creating a backup plan.)

Backups that were copied or moved to the next location do not depend on the backups remaining in the original location and vice versa. You can recover data from any backup without access to other locations.

Restrictions

 Copying or moving backups to and from optical discs (CD, DVD, Blu-ray discs) is not supported.  Copying or moving backups to and from removable devices used in the Removable media mode

is not supported.

 Acronis Cloud Storage can only be the final location. Further copying or moving backups from it is

not possible.

 You cannot specify the same location more than once. For example, you cannot move a backup

from one folder to another and then back to the original folder.

4.5.2 Setting up replication of backups

Setting up replication of backups is available when creating a backup plan (p. 35).

 To set up replication from the primary location, select the Replicate newly created backup to

another location check box.

 To set up replication from the second or a further location, select the Replicate backups to

another location as soon as they appear in this location check box.

Next, select the location where to replicate the backups.

If allowed by the backup scheme, you can also specify when to automatically delete the backups from each of the locations.

A backup is replicated to the next location as soon as it appears in the previous location. If earlier backups were not replicated (for example, the network connection was lost), the software also replicates all of the backups that appeared after the last successful replication.

4.5.3 Setting up retention of backups

You can set retention rules for backups when creating a backup plan (p. 35). The available retention rules depend on the chosen backup scheme.

Applying retention rules can be restricted by the Replication/cleanup inactivity time (p. 96) option.

Simple scheme

Each backup is retained until its age exceeds a limit you specify. Then, it is either deleted or moved.

To set up deleting the backups:

 In Retention rules, select Delete backups older than…, and then specify the retention period.

To set up moving the backups:

 In Retention rules, select Move backups older than…, specify the retention period. Under Where

to replicate/move backups, specify the location.

The retention rules are applied after creating a backup. For the second and next locations, creating a backup means copying or moving a backup there from the previous location.

Grandfather-Father-Son (GFS) scheme

Backups of each type (daily, weekly, and monthly) are retained for the periods you specify in Keep backups, and then deleted.

The retention rules are applied after creating a backup. They are applied sequentially in the primary, the second and all next locations.

Tower of Hanoi scheme

Each backup is retained based on its level (p. 49), and then deleted. You specify the number of levels in Number of levels.

The retention rules are applied after creating a backup. They are applied sequentially in the primary, the second and all next locations.

Custom scheme

Each backup is retained until the rules you specify are met. Then, it is either deleted or moved.

To set up deleting the backups:

 In Clean up archive, select Using retention rules. In the Retention Rules window (p. 75), specify

the rules and select If the specified conditions are met: Delete the oldest backups.

 In Apply retention rules, specify when to apply the rules.

To set up moving the backups:

 In Clean up archive, select Using retention rules. In the Retention Rules window (p. 75), specify

the rules and select If the specified conditions are met: Move the oldest backups to another location. Click OK and then specify the location under Where to replicate/move backups.

 In Apply retention rules, specify when to apply the rules.

You can choose to apply the retention rules before creating a backup, after creating a backup, on a schedule, or combine these options. For the second and next locations, creating a backup means copying or moving a backup there from the previous location.

4.5.4 Retention rules for the Custom scheme

In the Retention Rules window, you can select how long to store backups in the location and whether to move or delete them afterward.

The rules will be applied to all the backups taken on the specific machine and put in this specific location by this specific backup plan. In Acronis Backup, such set of backups is called an archive.

To set up retention rules for backups:

1. Specify one of the following (options (a) and (b) are mutually exclusive):

a. Backups older than... and/or Archive size greater than....

A backup will be stored until the specified condition (or both of the conditions) are met.

Example:

Backups older than 5 days

Archive size greater than 100 GB

With these settings, a backup will be stored until it is older than five days and the size of the archive containing it exceeds 100 GB.

b. Number of backups in the archive exceeds...

If the number of backups exceeds the specified value, one or more of the oldest backups will be moved or deleted. The minimal setting is 1.

2. Select whether to delete the backups or to move them to another location if the specified

conditions are met.

You will be able to specify the location where to move the backups and set up retention rules for that location after you click OK.

Deleting the last backup in the archive

The retention rules are effective if the archive contains more than one backup. This means that the last backup in the archive will be kept, even if a retention rule violation is detected. Please do not try to delete the only backup you have by applying the retention rules before backup. This will not work. Use the alternative setting Clean up archive > When there is insufficient space while backing up (p.

47) if you accept the risk of losing the last backup.

Deleting or moving backups with dependencies

To access this setting, click Show advanced settings in the Retention Rules window.

Retention rules presume deleting or moving some backups while retaining the others. What if the archive contains incremental and differential backups that depend on each other and on the full backups they are based on? You cannot, say, delete an outdated full backup and keep its incremental “children”.

When deletion or movement of a backup affects other backups, one of the following rules is applied:

 Retain the backup until all dependent backups become subject to deletion (movement)

The outdated backup (marked with the icon) will be kept until all backups that depend on it also become outdated. Then, all the chain will be deleted at once during the regular cleanup. If you chose moving outdated backups to the next location, the backup will be copied there without delay. Only its deletion from the current location is postponed.

This mode helps to avoid the potentially time-consuming consolidation but requires extra space for storing backups whose deletion is postponed. The archive size and/or the backup age or number can exceed the values you specify.

This mode is not available for Acronis Cloud Storage when you copy or move backups there. In the cloud storage, all backups are incremental except the first backup of an archive which is always full. This chain cannot be entirely deleted because the most recent backup must always be kept.

 Consolidate these backups

The software will consolidate the backup that is subject to deletion or movement, with the next dependent backup. For example, the retention rules require to delete a full backup but to retain the next incremental one. The backups will be combined into a single full backup which will be dated with the incremental backup date. When an incremental or differential backup from the middle of the chain is deleted, the resulting backup type will be incremental.

This mode ensures that after each cleanup the archive size and the age or number of backups are within the bounds you specify. The consolidation, however, may take a lot of time and system resources. You still need some extra space in the vault for temporary files created during consolidation.

This mode is not available if you selected the Archive size greater than rule for any archive location except for Acronis Cloud Storage.

What you need to know about consolidation

Please be aware that consolidation is just a method of deletion but not an alternative to deletion. The resulting backup will not contain data that was present in the deleted backup and was absent from the retained incremental or differential backup.

4.5.5 Usage examples

This section provides examples of how you can replicate backups and set up retention rules for them.

4.5.5.1 Example 1. Replicating backups to a network folder

Consider the following scenario:

 You want to perform a full backup of your machine manually.  You want to store the backups in Acronis Secure Zone (p. 145) on the machine.  You want to store a copy of the backups in a network folder.

In this scenario, create a backup plan with the Manual start scheme. When creating the backup plan, specify Acronis Secure Zone in the Location field, select Full in the Backup type field, select the Replicate newly created backup to another location check box, and then specify the network folder in the 2nd location field.

Result:

 You can recover the machine’s volumes or files from a readily available local backup, which is

stored in a dedicated area of the hard disk.

 You can recover the machine from the network folder if the machine’s hard disk drive fails.

4.5.5.2 Example 2. Limiting the age and total size of stored backups

Consider the following scenario:

 You want to perform a weekly full backup of your machine.  You want to keep all backups that are younger than a month.  You want to keep even older backups, as long as the total size of all backups stays below 200 GB.

In this scenario, create a backup plan with the Custom scheme. When creating the backup plan, specify a weekly schedule for the full backup. In Clean up archive, select Using retention rules.

Click Retention rules, select the Backups older than and the Archive size greater than check boxes, and specify respectively 1 month and 200 GB. In If the specified conditions are met, select Delete the oldest backups.

Click OK. In Apply retention rules, select the After backup check box.

Result:

 Backups that are younger than one month are kept, regardless of their total size.  Backups that are older than one month are kept only if the total size of all backups (older plus

younger) does not exceed 200 GB. Otherwise, the software deletes some or all of the older backups, starting from the oldest one.

4.5.5.3 Example 3. Replicating backups to the cloud storage

This example assumes that you have activated (p. 251) a cloud backup subscription (p. 237) for the machine that you are backing up.

The following scenario assumes that the amount of data you want to back up is relatively small. For larger backups, see “Replicating large amounts of data to the cloud storage” later in this section.

Consider the following scenario:

 You want to occasionally back up your machine to a local folder.  You want to keep a copy of the resulting archive off-site in Acronis Cloud Storage.  No matter when you start the backup, you want the replication to take place outside working

hours, when demand on the Internet connection is lower.

In this scenario, create a backup plan with the desired backup scheme. When creating the backup plan, specify a local folder in the Location field. Select the Replicate newly created backup to another location check box, and then specify the cloud storage in the 2nd location field.

In Backup options, go to Replication/cleanup inactivity time (p. 96), and specify the working hours (for example, Monday through Friday from 8:00 until 17:00).

Result:

 After the backup plan starts, the data is backed up to the local folder.  If the backup finishes outside the working hours, replication starts immediately. Otherwise,

replication is postponed until the end of the working hours.

Note: In the cloud storage, the second and further backups of an archive will always be incremental, no matter what type they are in the original location. This leads to efficient use of storage space for your cloud backup subscription.

Replicating large amounts of data to the cloud storage

If you are planning to back up 500 GB of data or more, you may want to send the first backup to the cloud storage on a physical hard drive. This option is provided by the Initial Seeding service (p. 240) which you can buy in addition to your cloud backup subscription.

The Initial Seeding service might be unavailable in your region. To find more information, click here: http://kb.acronis.com/content/15118.

During the subsequent backups, only changes to the original data will be sent to the cloud storage and will not affect network traffic as much.

In this scenario, create a backup plan with the Initial seeding scheme. When creating the backup plan, specify a local folder in the Location field. This can be a folder on the hard drive that you are going to send. For more details, see “How to perform initial seeding?” (p. 242).

After you have sent the hard drive and the order status becomes The data upload has been completed, edit the backup plan. Change the backup scheme, destination, and replication settings to those previously described in this section.

The updated backup plan will produce backups that will be replicated to the cloud storage outside working hours.

4.6 How to disable backup cataloging

Cataloging a backup adds the contents of the backup to the data catalog as soon as the backup is created.This process can be time-consuming. Therefore, you may want to disable cataloging on a managed machine. To do it, go to Options > Machine options and configure the Backup cataloging option.

4.7 Default backup options

Agent for Windows

Bootable media

(Linux-based or PE-based)

Disk backup

File backup

Disk backup

File backup

Additional settings (p. 81):

Ask for the first media while backing up to removable media

Dest:

removable

media

Dest:

removable

media

Dest:

removable

media

Dest:

removable

media

Reset archive bit

- + -

Restart the machine automatically after backup is finished

- - +

Archive protection (p. 82)

(password + encryption)

+ + +

Backup cataloging (p. 82)

+ + -

Backup performance:

Backup priority (p. 83)

+ + -

HDD writing speed (p. 83)

Dest: HDD

Network connection speed (p. 84)

Dest:

network

Dest:

network

Dest:

network

Dest:

network

Backup splitting (p. 84)

+ + +

Each Acronis agent has its own default backup options. Once an agent is installed, the default options have pre-defined values, which are referred to as presets in the documentation. When creating a backup plan, you can either use a default option, or override the default option with the custom value that will be specific for this plan only.

You can also customize a default option itself by changing its value against the pre-defined one. The new value will be used by default in all backup plans you will create later on this machine.

To view and change the default backup options, connect the console to the managed machine and then select Options > Default backup and recovery options > Default backup options from the top menu.

Availability of the backup options

The set of available backup options depends on:

 The environment the agent operates in (Windows, bootable media)  The type of the data being backed up (disk, file)  The backup destination (networked location or local disk)  The backup scheme (manual start or using the scheduler)

The following table summarizes the availability of the backup options.

Agent for Windows

Bootable media

(Linux-based or PE-based)

Disk backup

File backup

Disk backup

File backup

Compression level (p. 85)

+ + +

Disaster recovery plan (p. 86)

+ + -

E-mail notifications (p. 87)

+ + -

Error handling (p. 88):

Do not show messages and dialogs while processing (silent mode)

+ + +

Re-attempt if an error occurs

+ + +

Ignore bad sectors

+ + +

Event tracing:

Windows events log (p. 89)

+ + -

SNMP (p. 89)

+ + -

Fast incremental/differential backup (p. 90)

+ - +

File-level backup snapshot (p. 90)

- + -

File-level security (p. 91):

Preserve files’ security

settings in archives

- + -

In archives, store encrypted files in decrypted state

- + -

Media components (p. 91)

Dest:

removable

media

Dest:

removable

media

Mount points (p. 92)

- + -

Multi-volume snapshot (p.

92)

+ + -

Pre/Post backup commands (p. 93)

+ + PE only

PE only

Pre/Post data capture commands (p. 94)

+ + -

Replication/cleanup inactivity time (p. 96)

+ + -

Sector-by-sector backup (p.

97)

+ - +

Task failure handling (p. 97)

+ + -

Task start conditions (p. 98)

+ + -

Agent for Windows

Bootable media

(Linux-based or PE-based)

Disk backup

File backup

Disk backup

File backup

Volume Shadow Copy Service (p. 99)

+ + -

4.7.1 Additional settings

Specify the additional settings for the backup operation by selecting or clearing the following check boxes.

Ask for the first media while backing up to removable media

This option is effective only when backing up to removable media.

The option defines whether to display the Insert First Media prompt when backing up to removable media.

The preset is: Disabled.

When the option is enabled, backing up to removable media may be not possible if the user is away, because the program will wait for someone to press OK in the prompt box. Hence, you should disable the prompt when scheduling a backup to removable media. Then, if the removable media is available (for example, a DVD is inserted), the task can run unattended.

Reset archive bit

The option is effective only for file-level backup in Windows operating systems and in bootable media.

The preset is: Disabled.

In Windows operating systems, each file has the File is ready for archiving attribute, available by selecting File -> Properties -> General -> Advanced -> Archive and Index attributes. This attribute, also known as the archive bit, is set by the operating system each time the file is changed and can be reset by backup applications each time they include the file in a backup. The archive bit value is used by various applications such as databases.

When the Reset archive bit check box is selected, Acronis Backup will reset the archive bits of all files being backed up. Acronis Backup itself does not use the archive bit value. When performing incremental or differential backup, it determines whether a file has changed by the file size and the date/time when the file was last saved.

Restart the machine automatically after backup is finished

This option is available only when operating under bootable media.

The preset is: Disabled.

When the option is enabled, Acronis Backup will restart the machine after the backup process is completed.

For example, if the machine boots from a hard disk drive by default and you select this check box, the machine will be restarted and the operating system will start as soon as the bootable agent has finished creating the backup.

4.7.2 Archive protection

This option is effective for Windows and Linux operating systems and bootable media.

This option is effective for both disk-level and file-level backup.

This option defines whether the archive will be protected with a password and whether the archive’s content will be encrypted.

This option is not available when the archive already contains backups. For example, this option may not be available:

 When you specify an already existing archive as the destination of the backup plan.  When you edit a backup plan that has already resulted in a backup.

The preset is: Disabled.

To protect the archive from unauthorized access

1. Select the Set password for the archive check box.

2. In the Enter the password field, type a password.

3. In the Confirm the password field, re-type the password.

4. Select one of the following:

 Do not encrypt – the archive will be protected with the password only  AES 128 – the archive will be encrypted using the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES)

algorithm with a 128-bit key

 AES 192 – the archive will be encrypted using the AES algorithm with a 192-bit key  AES 256 – the archive will be encrypted using the AES algorithm with a 256-bit key.

5. Click OK.

The AES cryptographic algorithm operates in the Cipher-block chaining (CBC) mode and uses a randomly generated key with a user-defined size of 128, 192 or 256 bits. The larger the key size, the longer it will take for the program to encrypt the archive and the more secure your data will be.

The encryption key is then encrypted with AES-256 using a SHA-256 hash of the password as a key. The password itself is not stored anywhere on the disk or in the backup file; the password hash is used for verification purposes. With this two-level security, the backup data is protected from any unauthorized access, but recovering a lost password is not possible.

4.7.3 Backup cataloging

Cataloging a backup adds the contents of the backup to the data catalog. Using the data catalog, you can easily find the required version of data and select it for recovery.

The Backup cataloging option specifies whether full or fast cataloging will be performed on a backup as soon as the backup is created.

This option is effective only if backup cataloging is enabled on the backed-up machine or on the storage node.

The preset is: Full cataloging.

If you select Full cataloging, the backup contents are cataloged to the highest possible level of detail. This means that the following data will be displayed in the catalog:

 For a disk-level backup - disks, volumes, files, and folders.  For a file-level backup - files and folders.

You may want to select Fast cataloging if the full cataloging tends to affect the performance of the managed machine or if your backup window is too narrow. The following data will be displayed in the catalog:

 For a disk-level backup - only disks and volumes.  For a file-level backup - nothing.

To add the full contents of already existing backups to the catalog, you can start the full cataloging manually when appropriate.

For more information about using the data catalog, see the "Data catalog" (p. 104) section.

4.7.4 Backup performance

Use this group of options to specify the amount of network and system resources to allocate to the backup process.

Backup performance options might have a more or less noticeable effect on the speed of the backup process. This depends on the overall system configuration and the physical characteristics of devices the backup is being performed from or to.

4.7.4.1 Backup priority

This option is effective for both Windows and Linux operating systems.

The priority of a process running in a system determines the amount of CPU and system resources allocated to that process. Decreasing the backup priority will free more resources for other applications. Increasing the backup priority might speed up the backup process by requesting the operating system to allocate more resources like the CPU to the backup application. However, the resulting effect will depend on the overall CPU usage and other factors like disk in/out speed or network traffic.

The preset is: Low.

To specify the backup process priority

Select one of the following:

 Low – to minimize resources taken by the backup process, leaving more resources to other

processes running on the machine

 Normal – to run the backup process with normal speed, allocating resources on a par with other

processes

 High – to maximize the backup process speed by taking resources from other processes.

4.7.4.2 HDD writing speed

This option is effective for Windows and Linux operating systems and bootable media.

This option is available when an internal (fixed) hard disk of the machine being backed up is selected as the backup destination

Backing up to a fixed hard disk (for example, to Acronis Secure Zone) may slow performance of the operating system and applications because of the large amounts of data that needs to be written to the disk. You can limit the hard disk usage by the backup process to the desired level.

The preset is: Maximum.

To set the desired HDD writing speed for backup

Do any of the following:

 Click Writing speed stated as a percentage of the maximum speed of the destination hard disk,

and then drag the slider or select a percentage in the box

 Click Writing speed stated in kilobytes per second, and then enter the writing speed in kilobytes

per second.

4.7.4.3 Network connection speed

This option is effective for Windows and Linux operating systems and bootable media.

This option is available when a location on the network (network share, managed vault or an FTP/SFTP server) is selected as the backup destination.

The option defines the amount of network connection bandwidth allocated for transferring the backup data.

By default the speed is set to maximum, i.e. the software uses all the network bandwidth it can get when transferring the backup data. Use this option to reserve a part of the network bandwidth for other network activities.

The preset is: Maximum.

To set the network connection speed for backup

Do any of the following:

 Click Transferring speed stated as a percentage of the estimated maximum speed of the

network connection, and then drag the slider or type a percentage in the box

 Click Transferring speed stated in kilobytes per second, and then enter the bandwidth limit for

transferring backup data in kilobytes per second.

4.7.5 Backup splitting

This option is effective for Windows and Linux operating systems and bootable media.

This option is not effective when the backup destination is a managed vault or Acronis Cloud Storage.

The option defines how a backup can be split.

The preset is: Automatic

The following settings are available.

Automatic

With this setting, Acronis Backup will act as follows.

 When backing up to a hard disk or a network share:

A single backup file will be created if the destination disk's file system allows the estimated file size.

The backup will automatically be split into several files if the destination disk's file system does not allow the estimated file size. This might be the case when the backup is placed on FAT16 and FAT32 file systems that have a 4-GB file size limit.

If the destination disk runs out of free space while creating the backup, the task enters the Need interaction state. You have the ability to free additional space and retry the operation. If you do so, the resulting backup will be split into the parts created before and after the retry.

 When backing up to removable media (CD, DVD, Blu-Ray Discs, an RDX or USB drive used in the

removable device (p. 148) mode):

The task will enter the Need interaction state and ask for a new media when the previous one is full.

 When backing up to an FTP server:

The backup will automatically be split into files no more than 2 GB in size. Splitting is needed to allow data recovery directly from the FTP server.

 When backing up to an SFTP server:

A single backup file will be created. If the destination storage runs out of free space while creating the backup, the task will fail.

When you replicate or move a backup (p. 72) to other locations, these rules apply to each location independently.

Example. Suppose that the primary location for a 3-GB backup is a hard disk, the second location is an FTP server, and the third location is a network share. In this case, the backup will be stored as a single file in the primary location, as two files in the second location, and as a single file again in the third location.

Fixed size

Enter the desired file size or select it from the drop-down list. The backup will then be split into multiple files of the specified size. This comes in handy when creating a backup that you plan to burn to multiple CDs or DVDs later on. You might also want to split a backup into 2-GB files if you are backing up to a hard disk, but you plan to manually copy the backup to an FTP server later.

4.7.6 Compression level

This option is effective for Windows and Linux operating systems and bootable media.

The option defines the level of compression applied to the data being backed up.

The preset is: Normal.

The optimal data compression level depends on the type of data being backed up. For example, even maximum compression will not significantly reduce the archive size if the archive contains essentially compressed files, such as .jpg, .pdf or .mp3. However, formats such as .doc or .xls will be compressed well.

To specify the compression level

Select one of the following:

 None – the data will be copied as is, without any compression. The resulting backup size will be

maximal.

 Normal – recommended in most cases.  High – the resulting backup size will typically be less than for the Normal level.  Maximum – the data will be compressed as much as possible. The backup duration will be

maximal. You may want to select maximum compression when backing up to removable media to reduce the number of blank disks required.

4.7.7 Disaster recovery plan (DRP)

This option is effective for Windows and Linux but is not applicable to bootable media.

This option is not effective for file-level backups.

Disaster recovery plan (DRP) contains a list of backed up data items and detailed instructions that guide a user through a process of recovering these items from a backup.

A DRP is created after the first successful backup is performed by the backup plan. If the Send disaster recovery plans option is enabled, the DRP is sent by e-mail to the specified list of users. If the Save DRP as file option is enabled, the DRP is saved as a file to the specified location. The DRP will be created again in the following cases:

 The backup plan has been edited so that the DRP parameters changed.  The backup contains new data items or does not contain items previously backed up. (This does

not apply to such data items as files or folders.)

You can specify a local folder, a network folder, an FTP or SFTP server as a location to save the DRPs.

DRP and post-backup commands

Note that the DRP will not automatically change if post-backup commands in your backup plan copy or move the backups from the original location. The DRP points only to the locations specified in the backup plan.

Adding information to a DRP template

You can append additional information to a DRP template if you are well familiar with XML and HTML. The default paths to the DRP template are:

 %ProgramFiles%\Acronis\BackupAndRecovery\drp.xsl - in 32-bit Windows  %ProgramFiles(x86)%\Acronis\BackupAndRecovery\drp.xsl - in 64-bit Windows  /usr/lib/Acronis/BackupAndRecovery/drp.xsl - in Linux

To set up sending DRPs:

1. Select the Send disaster recovery plans check box.

2. Enter the e-mail address in the E-mail Address field. You can enter several e-mail addresses in a

semicolon-delimited format.

3. [Optional] Change the default value of the Subject field, if necessary.

4. Enter the parameters of access to the SMTP server. For more detailed information, see E-mail

notifications (p. 125).

5. [Optional] Click Send test e-mail message to check if the settings are correct.

To set up saving DRPs as files:

1. Select the Save DRP as file check box.

2. Click Browse to specify a location for the DRP files.

4.7.8 E-mail notifications

This option is effective for Windows and Linux operating systems.

This option is not available when operating under the bootable media.

The option enables you to receive e-mail notifications about the backup task's successful completion, failure or when user interaction is required.

The preset is: Disabled.

To configure e-mail notification

1. Select the Send e-mail notifications check box to activate notifications.

2. Under Send e-mail notifications, select the appropriate check boxes as follows:

 When backup completes successfully.  When backup fails.  When user interaction is required.

3. Select the Add full log to notification check box if you want the e-mail notification to include log

entries for the operation.

4. In the E-mail addresses field, type the destination e-mail address. You can enter several

addresses separated by semicolons.

5. In the Subject field, type the notification subject.

The subject can include ordinary text and one or more variables. In the received e-mail messages, each variable will be replaced by its value at the time of task execution. The following variables are supported:

 %description%

For a machine running Windows, the %description% variable will be replaced by the text that is given in the Computer description field of the machine. To specify this text, either go to Control panel > System or run the following command as an administrator:

net config server /srvcomment:<text>

For a machine running Linux, the %description% variable will be replaced by an empty string ("").

 %subject%

The %subject% variable will be replaced by the following phrase: Task <task name> <task result> on machine <machine name>.

6. In the SMTP server field, enter the name of the outgoing mail server (SMTP).

7. In the Port field, set the port of the outgoing mail server. By default, the port is set to 25.

8. If the outgoing mail server requires authentication, enter User name and Password of the

sender's e-mail account.

If the SMTP server does not require authentication, leave the User name and Password fields blank. If you are not sure whether the SMTP server requires authentication, contact your network administrator or your e-mail service provider for assistance.

9. Click Additional e-mail parameters... to configure additional e-mail parameters as follows:

a. From – type the name of the sender. If you leave this field empty, the messages will contain

the sender's e-mail account in the From field.

b. Use encryption – you can opt for encrypted connection to the mail server. SSL and TLS

encryption types are available for selection.

c. Some Internet service providers require authentication on the incoming mail server before

being allowed to send something. If this is your case, select the Log on to incoming mail server check box to enable a POP server and to set up its settings:

 Incoming mail server (POP) – enter the name of the POP server.  Port – set the port of the POP server. By default, the port is set to 110.  User name and Password of the incoming mail server.

d. Click OK.

10. Click Send test e-mail message to check whether e-mail notifications work correctly with the

specified settings.

4.7.9 Error handling

These options are effective for Windows and Linux operating systems and bootable media.

These options enable you to specify how to handle errors that might occur during backup.

Do not show messages and dialogs while processing (silent mode)

The preset is: Disabled.

With the silent mode enabled, the program will automatically handle situations requiring user interaction (except for handling bad sectors, which is defined as a separate option). If an operation cannot continue without user interaction, it will fail. Details of the operation, including errors, if any, can be found in the operation log.

Re-attempt, if an error occurs

The preset is: Enabled. Number of attempts: 30. Interval between attempts: 30 seconds.

When a recoverable error occurs, the program re-attempts to perform the unsuccessful operation. You can set the time interval and the number of attempts. The attempts will be stopped as soon as the operation succeeds OR the specified number of attempts are performed, depending on which comes first.

For example, if the backup destination on the network becomes unavailable or not reachable, the program will attempt to reach the destination every 30 seconds, but no more than 5 times. The attempts will be stopped as soon as the connection is resumed OR the specified number of attempts is performed, depending on which comes first.

If Acronis Cloud Storage is selected as the primary, the second, or a further backup location, the option value is automatically set to Enabled. Number of attempts: 300, regardless of the default value.

Ignore bad sectors

The preset is: Disabled.

When the option is disabled, the program will display a pop-up window each time it comes across a bad sector and ask for a user decision as to whether to continue or stop the backup procedure. In order to back up the valid information on a rapidly dying disk, enable ignoring bad sectors. The rest of the data will be backed up and you will be able to mount the resulting disk backup and extract valid files to another disk.

4.7.10 Event tracing

It is possible to duplicate log events of the backup operations, performed on the managed machine, in the Application Event Log of Windows; or send the events to the specified SNMP managers.

4.7.10.1 SNMP notifications

This option is effective for both Windows and Linux operating systems.

This option is not available when operating under the bootable media.

The option defines whether the agent(s) operating on the managed machine have to send the log events of the backup operations to the specified Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) managers. You can choose the types of events to be sent.

For detailed information about using SNMP with Acronis Backup, please see "Support for SNMP (p.

31)".

The preset is: Use the setting set in the Machine options.

To select whether to send the backup operations events to the SNMP managers:

Choose one of the following:

 Use the setting set in the Machine options – to use the setting specified for the machine. For

more information refer to Machine options.

 Send SNMP notifications individually for backup operation events – to send the events of the

backup operations to the specified SNMP managers.

 Types of events to send – choose the types of events to be sent: All events, Errors and

warnings, or Errors only.

 Server name/IP – type the name or IP address of the host running the SNMP management

application, the messages will be sent to.

 Community – type the name of the SNMP community to which both the host running the

SNMP management application and the sending machine belong. The typical community is "public".

Click Send test message to check if the settings are correct.

 Do not send SNMP notifications – to disable sending the log events of the backup operations to

SNMP managers.

4.7.10.2 Windows event log

This option is effective only in Windows operating systems.

This option is not available when operating under the bootable media.

This option defines whether the agent(s) operating on the managed machine have to log events of the backup operations in the Application Event Log of Windows (to see this log, run eventvwr.exe or select Control Panel > Administrative tools > Event Viewer). You can filter the events to be logged.

The preset is: Use the setting set in the Machine options.

To select whether to log the backup operations events in the Application Event Log of Windows:

Choose one of the following:

 Use the setting set in the Machine options – to use the setting specified for the machine. For

more information refer to Machine options.

 Log the following event types – to log events of the backup operations in the Application Event

Log. Specify the types of events to be logged:

 All events – log all events (information, warnings and errors)  Errors and warnings  Errors only

 Do not log - to disable logging events of the backup operations in the Application Event Log.

4.7.11 Fast incremental/differential backup

The option is effective in Windows and Linux operating systems and bootable media.

This option is effective for incremental and differential disk-level backup.

This option defines whether a file change is detected using the file size and time stamp or by comparing the file contents to those stored in the archive.

The preset is: Enabled.

Incremental or differential backup captures only data changes. To speed up the backup process, the program determines whether a file has changed or not by the file size and the date/time when the file was last modified. Disabling this feature will make the program compare the entire file contents to those stored in the archive.

4.7.12 File-level backup snapshot

This option is effective only for file-level backup in Windows and Linux operating systems.

This option defines whether to back up files one by one or by taking an instant data snapshot.

Note: Files that are stored on network shares are always backed up one by one.

The preset is: Create snapshot if it is possible.

Select one of the following:

 Always create a snapshot

The snapshot enables backing up of all files including files opened for exclusive access. The files will be backed up at the same point in time. Choose this setting only if these factors are critical, that is, backing up files without a snapshot does not make sense. To use a snapshot, the backup plan has to run under the account with the Administrator or Backup Operator privileges. If a snapshot cannot be taken, the backup will fail.

 Create a snapshot if it is possible

Back up files directly if taking a snapshot is not possible.

 Do not create a snapshot

Always back up files directly. Administrator or Backup Operator privileges are not required. Trying to back up files that are opened for exclusive access will result in a read error. Files in the backup may be not time-consistent.

4.7.13 File-level security

These options are effective only for file-level backup in Windows operating systems.

In archives, store encrypted files in a decrypted state

This option defines whether to decrypt files before saving them to a backup archive.

The preset is: Disabled.

Simply ignore this option if you do not use the encryption. Enable the option if encrypted files are included in the backup and you want them to be accessed by any user after recovery. Otherwise, only the user who encrypted the files/folders will be able to read them. Decryption may also be useful if you are going to recover encrypted files on a different machine.

File encryption is available in Windows using the NTFS file system with the Encrypting File System (EFS). To access a file or folder encryption setting, select Properties > General > Advanced Attributes > Encrypt contents to secure data.

Preserve file security settings in archives

This option defines whether to back up NTFS permissions for files along with the files.

The preset is: Enabled.

When the option is enabled, files and folders are saved in the archive with the original permissions to read, write or execute the files for each user or user group. If you recover a secured file/folder on a machine without the user account specified in the permissions, you may not be able to read or modify this file.

To completely eliminate this kind of problem, disable preserving file security settings in archives. The recovered files and folders will always inherit the permissions from the folder to which they are recovered or from the disk, if recovered to the root.

Alternatively, you can disable recovery (p. 128) of the security settings, even if they are available in the archive. The result will be the same - the files will inherit the permissions from the parent folder.

To access file or folder NTFS permissions, select Properties > Security.

4.7.14 Media components

This option is effective for both Windows and Linux operating systems, when the backup destination is CD, DVD, or Blue-ray Disc (BD).

When backing up to this media, you can make this media work as regular Linux-based bootable media (p. 259) by writing additional components to it. As a result, you will not need a separate rescue disc.

The preset is: No bootable components.

Choose one of the following components you want to put on the bootable media:

 Acronis Bootable Agent is a bootable rescue utility (based on Linux kernel) that includes most of

the functionality of the Acronis Backup agent. Put this component on the media if you want more functionality during recovery. You will be able to configure the recovery operation in the same way as under regular bootable media; use Active Restore. If the media is being created in Windows, the disk management functionality will also be available.

 Acronis Bootable Agent and One-Click Restore. The One-Click Restore is the minimal addition to

a disk backup stored on removable media, allowing for easy recovery from this backup. If you boot a machine from the media and click Run Acronis One-click Restore, the disk will be immediately recovered from the backup contained on the same media.

Caution: Because the one-click approach does not presume user selections, such as selecting volumes to recover, Acronis One-Click Restore always recovers the entire disk. If your disk contains several volumes and you are planning to use Acronis One-Click Restore, include all the volumes in the backup. Any volumes missing from the backup will be lost.

4.7.15 Mount points

This option is effective only in Windows for a file-level backup of a data source that includes mounted volumes or cluster shared volumes.

This option is effective only when you select for backup a folder that is higher in the folder hierarchy than the mount point. (A mount point is a folder on which an additional volume is logically attached.)

 If such folder (a parent folder) is selected for backup, and the Mount points option is enabled, all

files located on the mounted volume will be included in the backup. If the Mount points option is disabled, the mount point in the backup will be empty.

During recovery of a parent folder, the mount point content will or will not be recovered, depending on whether the Mount points option for recovery (p. 128) is enabled or disabled.

 If you select the mount point directly, or select any folder within the mounted volume, the

selected folders will be considered as ordinary folders. They will be backed up regardless of the state of the Mount points option and recovered regardless of the state of the Mount points option for recovery (p. 128).

The preset is: Disabled.

Tip. You can back up Hyper-V virtual machines residing on a cluster shared volume by backing up the required files or the entire volume with file-level backup. Just power off the virtual machines to be sure that they are backed up in a consistent state.

Example

Let's assume that the C:\Data1\ folder is a mount point for the mounted volume. The volume contains folders Folder1 and Folder2. You create a backup plan for file-level backup of your data.

If you select the check box for volume C and enable the Mount points option, the C:\Data1\ folder in your backup will contain Folder1 and Folder2. When recovering the backed-up data, be aware of proper using the Mount points option for recovery (p. 128).

If you select the check box for volume C, and disable the Mount points option, the C:\Data1\ folder in your backup will be empty.

If you select the check box for the Data1, Folder1 or Folder2 folder, the checked folders will be included in the backup as ordinary folders, regardless of the state of the Mount points option.

4.7.16 Multi-volume snapshot

This option is effective only for Windows operating systems.

This option applies to disk-level backup. This option also applies to file-level backup when the

Pre-backup

command

Backup

Post-backup

command

file-level backup is performed by taking a snapshot. (The File-level backup snapshot (p. 90) option determines whether a snapshot will be taken during file-level backup).

The option determines whether to take snapshots of multiple volumes at the same time or one by one.

The preset is: Enable.

When this option is set to Enable, snapshots of all volumes being backed up will be created simultaneously. Use this option to create a time-consistent backup of data spanned across multiple volumes, for instance for an Oracle database.

When this option is set to Disable, the volumes' snapshots will be taken one after the other. As a result, if the data spans across several volumes, the resulting backup may be not consistent.

4.7.17 Pre/Post commands

This option is effective for Windows and Linux operating systems and PE-based bootable media.

The option enables you to define the commands to be automatically executed before and after the backup procedure.

The following scheme illustrates when pre/post commands are executed.

Examples of how you can use the pre/post commands:

 Delete some temporary files from the disk before starting backup.  Configure a third-party antivirus product to be started each time before the backup starts.  Selectively copy backups from an archive to another location. This option may be useful because

the replication configured in a backup plan copies every backup of an archive to subsequent locations.

Acronis Backup performs the replication after executing the post-backup command. For more information see "Sequence of operations in a backup plan" (p. 54).

The program does not support interactive commands, i.e. commands that require user input (for example, "pause").

To specify pre/post commands

1. Enable pre/post commands execution by checking the following options:

 Execute before the backup  Execute after the backup

2. Do any of the following:

 Click Edit to specify a new command or a batch file  Select the existing command or the batch file from the drop-down list

3. Click OK.

4.7.17.1 Pre-backup command

Check box

Selection

Fail the task if the command execution fails*

Selected

Cleared

Selected

Cleared

Do not back up until the command execution is complete

Selected

Cleared

Result

Preset

Perform the backup only after the command is successfully executed. Fail the task if the command execution fails.

Perform the backup after the command is executed despite execution failure or success.

N/A

Perform the backup concurrently with the command execution and irrespective of the command execution result.

To specify a command/batch file to be executed before the backup process starts

1. In the Command field, type a command or browse to a batch file. The program does not support

interactive commands, i.e. commands that require user input (for example, "pause".)

2. In the Working directory field, specify a path to a directory where the command/batch file will

be executed.

3. In the Arguments field specify the command’s execution arguments, if required.

4. Depending on the result you want to obtain, select the appropriate options as described in the

table below.

5. Click Test command to check if the command is correct.

* A command is considered failed if its exit code is not equal to zero.

4.7.17.2 Post-backup command

To specify a command/executable file to be executed after the backup is completed

1. In the Command field, type a command or browse to a batch file.

2. In the Working directory field, specify a path to a directory where the command/batch file will

be executed.

3. In the Arguments field, specify the command execution arguments, if required.

4. Select the Fail the task if the command execution fails check box if successful execution of the

command is critical for you. The command is considered failed if its exit code is not equal to zero. If the command execution fails, the program will remove the resulting TIB file and temporary files if possible, and the task run result will be set to Failed.

When the check box is not selected, the command execution result does not affect the task execution failure or success. You can track the command execution result by exploring the log or the errors and warnings displayed in the Log view.

5. Click Test Command to check if the command is correct.

4.7.18 Pre/Post data capture commands

This option is effective for both Windows and Linux operating systems.

The option enables you to define the commands to be automatically executed before and after data

<--------------- Backup --------------->

Pre-backup

command

Pre-data

capture

command

Data

capture

Post-data

capture

command

Post-backup

command

Check box

Selection

Fail the backup task if the command execution fails*

Selected

Cleared

Selected

Cleared

Do not perform the data capture until the command execution is complete

Selected

Cleared

Result

capture (that is, taking the data snapshot). Data capture is performed by Acronis Backup at the beginning of the backup procedure.

The following scheme illustrates when the pre/post data capture commands are executed.

If the Volume Shadow Copy Service (p. 99) option is enabled, the commands' execution and the Microsoft VSS actions will be sequenced as follows:

"Before data capture” commands -> VSS Suspend -> Data capture -> VSS Resume -> "After data capture" commands.

Using the pre/post data capture commands, you can suspend and resume a database or application that is not compatible with VSS. As opposed to the Pre/Post commands (p. 93), the pre/post data capture commands will be executed before and after the data capture process. This takes seconds. The entire backup procedure may take much longer, depending on the amount of data to be backed up. Therefore, the database or application idle time will be minimal.

To specify pre/post data capture commands

1. Enable pre/post data capture commands execution by checking the following options:

 Execute before the data capture  Execute after the data capture

2. Do any of the following:

 Click Edit to specify a new command or a batch file  Select the existing command or the batch file from the drop-down list

3. Click OK.

4.7.18.1 Pre-data capture command

To specify a command/batch file to be executed before data capture

1. In the Command field, type a command or browse to a batch file. The program does not support

interactive commands, i.e. commands that require user input (for example, "pause".)

2. In the Working directory field, specify a path to a directory where the command/batch file will

be executed.

3. In the Arguments field specify the command’s execution arguments, if required.

4. Depending on the result you want to obtain, select the appropriate options as described in the

table below.

5. Click Test command to check if the command is correct.

Preset

Perform the data capture only after the command is successfully executed. Fail the task if the command execution fails.

Perform the data capture after the command is executed despite execution failure or success.

N/A

Perform the data capture concurrently with the command and irrespective of the command execution result.

* A command is considered failed if its exit code is not equal to zero.

Check box

Selection

Fail the task if the command execution fails*

Selected

Cleared

Selected

Cleared

Do not back up until the command execution is complete

Selected

Cleared

Result

Preset

Continue the backup only after the command is successfully executed. Delete the TIB file and temporary files and fail the task if the command execution fails.

Continue the backup after the command is executed despite command execution failure or success.

N/A

Continue the backup concurrently with the command execution and irrespective of the command execution result.

4.7.18.2 Post-data capture command

To specify a command/batch file to be executed after data capture

1. In the Command field, type a command or browse to a batch file. The program does not support

interactive commands, i.e. commands that require user input (for example, "pause".)

2. In the Working directory field, specify a path to a directory where the command/batch file will

be executed.

3. In the Arguments field specify the command’s execution arguments, if required.

4. Depending on the result you want to obtain, select the appropriate options as described in the

table below.

5. Click Test command to check if the command is correct.

* A command is considered failed if its exit code is not equal to zero.

4.7.19 Replication/cleanup inactivity time

This option is effective only if you set up replication or retention rules (p. 72) for the backups.

This option defines a time period when starting replication or applying retention rules is not allowed. The operations will be performed when the inactivity time ends, if the machine is powered on at that

moment. The operations that had started before the inactivity time began continue without interruption.

The inactivity time affects all locations, including the primary one.

The preset is: Disabled.

To specify the inactivity time, select the Do not start replication/cleanup within the following time check box, and then select the days and the time period during the day.

Usage example

You may want to use this option to separate the backup process from replication or cleanup. For example, suppose that you back up machines locally during the day and replicate the backups to a network folder. Make the inactivity time contain the working hours. Replication will be performed after the working hours, when network load is lower.

4.7.20 Sector-by-sector backup

The option is effective only for disk-level backup.

To create an exact copy of a disk or volume on a physical level, select the Back up sector-by-sector check box. The resulting backup will be equal in size to the disk being backed up (if the Compression level (p. 85) option is set to None). Use the sector-by-sector backup for backing up drives with unrecognized or unsupported file systems and other proprietary data formats.

4.7.21 Task failure handling

This option is effective for Windows and Linux operating systems.

This option is not available when operating under the bootable media.

This option determines the program behavior when any of the backup plan's tasks fails.

The preset is not to restart a failed task.

The program will try to execute the failed task again if you select the Restart a failed task check box and specify the number of attempts and the time interval between the attempts. The program stops trying as soon as an attempt completes successfully OR the specified number of attempts is performed, depending on which comes first.

If the task fails because of a mistake in the backup plan, you can edit the plan while the task is in the Idle state. While the task is running, you have to stop it prior to editing the backup plan.

4.7.22 Task start conditions

This option is effective in Windows and Linux operating systems.

This option is not available when operating under bootable media.

This option determines the program behavior in case a backup task is about to start (the scheduled time comes or the event specified in the schedule occurs), but the condition (or any of multiple conditions) is not met. For more information on conditions please see Scheduling (p. 60) and Conditions (p. 69).

The preset is: Wait until the conditions are met.

Wait until the conditions are met

With this setting, the scheduler starts monitoring the conditions and launches the task as soon as the conditions are met. If the conditions are never met, the task will never start.

To handle the situation when the conditions are not met for too long and further delaying the backup is becoming risky, you can set the time interval after which the task will run irrespective of the condition. Select the Run the task anyway after check box and specify the time interval. The task will start as soon as the conditions are met OR the maximum time delay lapses, depending on which comes first.

Time diagram: Wait until conditions are met

Skip the task execution

Delaying a backup might be unacceptable, for example, when you need to back up data strictly at the specified time. Then it makes sense to skip the backup rather than wait for the conditions, especially if the events occur relatively often.

4.7.23 Volume Shadow Copy Service

These options are effective only for Windows operating systems.

Using Volume Shadow Copy Service

The option defines whether a Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS) provider has to notify VSS-aware applications that the backup is about to start. This ensures the consistent state of all data used by the applications; in particular, completion of all database transactions at the moment of taking the data snapshot by Acronis Backup. Data consistency, in turn, ensures that the application will be recovered in the correct state and become operational immediately after recovery.

The preset is: Use Volume Shadow Copy Service.

Use VSS

When Use Volume Shadow Copy Service is selected, choose a snapshot provider from the following list:

 Hardware/software - Select automatically

VSS will use the hardware-based provider that supports the source volume. If none is found, VSS will use Acronis VSS Provider.

 Software - Select automatically

In most cases, VSS will use Acronis VSS Provider.

 Software - Acronis VSS Provider

VSS will use Acronis VSS Provider for taking snapshots.

 Software - System provider (selected by default)

VSS will use the system provider (Microsoft Software Shadow Copy provider) for taking snapshots. We recommend choosing the system provider when backing up application servers (Microsoft Exchange Server, Microsoft SQL Server, Microsoft SharePoint, or Active Directory).

 Software - A software provider

In most cases, VSS will use the Microsoft Software Shadow Copy provider.

 Hardware - Select automatically

VSS will use the hardware-based provider that supports the source volume. If no hardware-based provider is found, backups will be created by means of Acronis Backup without taking snapshots.

Note: Using a hardware snapshot provider may require administrative privileges.

Do not use VSS

If you select Do not use VSS, the data snapshot will be taken by Acronis Backup.

Choose Do not use VSS if your database is incompatible with VSS. Backup process is fastest, but data consistency of the applications whose transactions are not completed at the time of taking a snapshot cannot be guaranteed. You may use Pre/Post data capture commands (p. 94) to indicate which commands should be performed before and after taking the snapshot. This ensures that the data is being backed up in a consistent state. For instance, specify pre-data capture commands that

will suspend the database and flush all caches to ensure that all transactions are completed; and specify post-data capture commands that will resume the database operations after the snapshot is taken.

About volume shadow copy writers

Before backing up the data of VSS-aware applications, make sure that the volume shadow copy writers for those applications are turned on by examining the list of writers that are present in the operating system. To view this list, run the following command:

vssadmin list writers

Note: In Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2003, the writer for Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 is turned off by default. For instructions on how to turn it on, see the following Microsoft knowledge base article http://support.microsoft.com/kb/838183/.

Enabling VSS Full backup

The preset is: Disabled.

This option can be useful when you protect Microsoft Exchange Server with a disk-level backup (p.

193).

If enabled, logs of Microsoft Exchange Server and of other VSS-aware applications (except for Microsoft SQL Server) will be truncated after each successful full, incremental or differential backup.

Leave this option disabled in the following cases:

 If you use Acronis Backup Agent for Exchange or third-party software for backing up the

Exchange Server data. This is because the log truncation will interfere with the consecutive transaction log backups.

 If you use third-party software for backing up the SQL Server data. The reason for this is that the

third-party software will take the resulting disk-level backup for its "own" full backup. As a result, the next differential backup of the SQL Server data will fail. The backups will continue failing until the third-party software creates the next "own" full backup.

 If other VSS-aware applications are running on the machine and you need to keep their logs for

any reason.

Enabling this option does not result in the truncation of Microsoft SQL Server logs. To truncate the SQL Server log after a single-pass backup, enable the Log truncation setting in the Single-pass disk and application backup section of the Create backup plan or Back up now page.

Acronis Backup for Windows Server User Guide

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