Got daughter a new netbook - but how do you make recovery discs!

[Leeky]

You were probably reading the title, and thinking omg just use the recovery console, and bob's your uncle, out spits two DVDs....

... Well its an Acer One netbook, with no optical drive. Acer's recovery console tells me I need to make backups (which is obvious as a HD failure would kill our OS), but its only option is to use a optical drive.

So, the challenge (I've "bing.co.uk" and got nowhere!), is how on earth do I make two DVDs with the data without a) an internal optical drive, or b) an external one.

I'm not prepared to purchase an external one just to do this one job as I have no other use for one.

What I've tried so far:

1. Sharing my PCs DVD RW drive and mapping it on the netbook (which ends up with a folder and thus doesn't work...)
2. checking settings to see if I could make ISO's instead - No go there too.
3. I've even tried using a combination of my E-SATA dock, but the connections are the wrong way around to run my PC's DVD RW drive via USB (which would have given me an external DVD RW).

It really shouldn't be this difficult to make OS backups, and there must be another way of doing this backup without resorting to spending £40+ on a new external DVD RW drive just to do it.

PLEASE help! lol.

 

[Leeky]

OK, I might have a solution:

If I use CloneZilla to make an entire image of the netbook hard drive, am I correct in saying it will capture the entire OS in its current form (e.g. unused), as well as the ENTIRE recovery partition? (They both on one physical disc).

Would that work, enabling me to keep a copy of everything on the entire drive in its current (new) state? I have an external SATA dock I can use to clone it (and put it back if I ever need).

EDIT:
After looking at the above, I decided against it, as it just introduced another issue of mounting suitable hard disc space to make the backup.

So I decided to go with EASUS ToDo backup - And removed the hard disc and I'm now backing it up (the whole drive) in my PC as we speak. It looks very good for a free app.

I wish I'd just thought about this from the start - It took me all of 5 mins to download, install it, turn the pc off, remove the 2.5" sata, and then fit it in my case and reboot. LOL.

Least this post will come in handy for others unsure in the future no doubt.

 

[LukeyJB]

Why don't you just backup everything on an external drive, or buy a copy of Windows or a recovery disc from your manufacturer? they're usually around £25

 

[Leeky]

My external drive is rather full (I need a new one. lol).

Its all sorted now, I connected the drive to my PC and made an image of it - So I'm all sorted now.

I do really see purchasing another windows license, or the media as a way around the problem - At the end of the day it has a license already, and I think its frankly insulting any consumer should be expected to "purchase" media that should be supplied anyway.

 

[LookinAround]

Well, i was going to recommend just using EASUS Todo freeware but I see you already found and used it :grinthumb

One other point of note: Might be quite worth your while to take a look at the Acronis True Image website
> Last i looked it was on sale (at least in US) for 30USD which is quite cheap for all it can do

EASUS is great freeware but it's basically a subset of all the functionality you get in Acronis IMO is very worth the price. A few features found in True Image (but not EASUS freeware)
> Ability to choose between "sector-by-sector" image backup vs "smart" image backup
==> Where "smart" means only backing up allocated sectores and not including things like pagefile which isn't normally needed when you restore an image. Save lots of backup time and SPACE
=> Acronis also allows for both Incremental as well as differential backups (again, so can save lots of space when making periodic backups)

More good stuff for Acronis but above are the "highlights" i think

 

[ravisunny2]

For those who have a Western Digital drive, there is a free Acronis version:

Acronis True Image WD Edition ver. 13.0.0.14010.

http://support.wdc.com/product/downloaddetail.asp?swid=119&wdc_lang=en

 

[LookinAround]

For those who have a Western Digital drive, there is a free Acronis version:

Acronis True Image WD Edition ver. 13.0.0.14010.

http://support.wdc.com/product/downloaddetail.asp?swid=119&wdc_lang=en

Oh yea! I forgot. Thanks for pointing that out ravisunny :approve:

I think there are a few other vendors who also offer free versions of Acronis True Image if you use their hard drives. don't recall who they are... tho i did find a reference link about Seagate and Maxtor (though i don't know if still applies)

 

[Leeky]

Thanks for the comments guys, it completes the thread really and I'm sure I won't be the last to experience these problems - At least those finding this thread in future will be able to sort it easily enough.

I'll have a look into Acronis, I could do with a proper replacement backup tool really, and being able to image hard disks and keep them on a seperate disk is handy.