Hasleo Backup Suite V5.5.2.1 Released!

[admin]

@al3x,

I don't use Windows Snapshots.  I use FastStone Capture for my screen snapshots.

That’s not what I meant. I was talking about image (drive) snapshots and other NTFS related system files that Windows automatically saves in that mentioned system folder. You could look at that folder and compare sizes with a tool like WizTree.

In fact, MR8 only skips backing up the data of excluded files but retains their file entries. Therefore, after mounting the image, you can still see the excluded files (such as pagefile.sys), though their data is all zeros. Precisely for this reason, tools like WizTree that rely on the file system structure may be unable to identify which files MR8 has excluded.

[garioch7]

@admin,

In your post here: https://www.easyuefi.com/forums/thread-8...l#pid11063, you quoted the MR8 User Manual.  That image from the MR8 User Manual states that pagefile.sys and hiberfil.sys are excluded from its image.

I have told you I have no "hiberfil.sys" file, confirmed by an "Everything" search, because I turned off hibernation; and, my pagefile.sys file is listed as 4,096 MB, as I stipulated, when I stopped permitting Windows 11 to manage my "pagefile.sys" file over a year ago, because Windows 11 was reserving far too much space.  I have 32 GB of RAM on this computer, and it has never had performance issues, even when doing Full High Definition video editing and production with my smaller pagefile.sys allocation.

I don't understand the import of the post by @al3x about VSS snapshots.  Nothing has been stated about MR8 excluding those.  I do have 17.9 GB dedicated to System Restore Points on my Drive C:, one of the six partitions on my Disk 2 SSD.  I would like to have those System Restore Points available if I had to do a Restore.

I don't have WizTree, but I do have Windirstat and Folder Size.

I fail to comprehend all of this conversation about a net difference of 3 GB in the image sizes produced by MR8 and HBSP in that test result.  For me at least, it is not an issue, so I can't understand what mounting an MR8 image and examining it with one of those programs is supposed to prove ... ?  I am very happy with HBSP now that the Full Check Image times have been substantially reduced.  That was my primary and only complaint.

That said, I would like HBSP to adopt an enhancement so that I can permanently select my backup default options ONCE, and have them apply to all future images, instead of having to go through the backup options with each and every image to configure the backup image options to what I prefer.

Thank you, and have a great day.

Regards,
Phil

[al3x]

I don't understand the import of the post by @al3x about VSS snapshots.  Nothing has been stated about MR8 excluding those.  I do have 17.9 GB dedicated to System Restore Points on my Drive C:, one of the six partitions on my Disk 2 SSD.  I would like to have those System Restore Points available if I had to do a Restore.

My point is: Macrium excludes VSS snapshots if you're using the "Intelligent sector copy", see here for details. Macrium states: "This entry is essential and ensures that the shadow copy diff area is excluded from images. Without this entry images may become unnecessarily large."

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In contrast, if you disable the filters in HBS, HBS will save VSS snapshots.
So that's why there might be differences between your Macrium und HBS backups.

For me at least, it is not an issue, so I can't understand what mounting an MR8 image and examining it with one of those programs is supposed to prove ... ?

That's ok. I was just trying to help you finding out why there are differences in size. If you don't care about this, then that's totally fine for me.

By the way: Last time I checked, Windows can't reuse old restored system restore points after a full restore of your Windows.
So keeping those in your backup won't help you most likely. That's why Macrium deletes those and HBS also has a filter for those by default. Just a heads up.

[admin]

That said, I would like HBSP to adopt an enhancement so that I can permanently select my backup default options ONCE, and have them apply to all future images, instead of having to go through the backup options with each and every image to configure the backup image options to what I prefer.

Dear Phil,

Thank you for your suggestion. We will implement this feature in future versions.

Best regards,

[garioch7]

@al3x

By the way: Last time I checked, Windows can't reuse old restored system restore points after a full restore of your Windows.

Why?  My understanding is that if I do a restore of a full system image of all partitions, then my computer is restored to the condition it was in at the time the image was taken ... ?  My understanding is that then, after the restore, my previous Restore Points are valid, and could be restored.

If I am mistaken, then I would like to know because it means that I am creating unnecessarily large images, which I would presume also affect my ETBH image sizes because it too, by default, is backing up all of those VSS snapshots and page files, hibernation files, etc., unless I create filters to exclude them.  


@admin,

Thank you for concurring with my suggestion.  I look forward to its implementation in a future release.



I thought my testing was very clear and documented, which is why I presume we are having this discussion.  I wish all of the posted testing results by other members would list all of their parameters that could potentially affect backup size and speed.

If either, or both of you, can identify parameters that I have failed to include, I would be happy to incorporate them in my future tests.  My sole purpose in testing is to provide, hopefully credible, feedback as to how HBSP performs on my computer with its specs and my backup program defaults, in comparison with MR8 and ETBH.

It is NOT intended to criticize any of the three products.  My initial testing revealed to me that HBSP is a very capable imaging program, comparable to those two products.  That is quite a compliment to a young company, I think. 👍

Have a great day.

Regards,
Phil

[al3x]

By the way: Last time I checked, Windows can't reuse old restored system restore points after a full restore of your Windows.

Why?  My understanding is that if I do a restore of a full system image of all partitions, then my computer is restored to the condition it was in at the time the image was taken ... ?  My understanding is that then, after the restore, my previous Restore Points are valid, and could be restored.

Ok, I've tested again because my last tests were quite some time ago and I don't want to spread misinformation in case something changed.

• MR8, image taken from within Windows: MR8 will remove VSS snapshots so those will not be available in the image file or after an image restore.
  
• MR8, image taken from outside of Windows (rescue media): MR8 will not exclude VSS snapshots. If you restore from the image, VSS snapshots are still available.
  
• HBS, image taken from within Windows or outside of Windows (rescue media): If you disable filters, images will include VSS snapshots as well.
  
• As for ETBH I don't know the details, never used that software.
  

The last time I checked I don't think disabling filters was an option in HBS at that point, that's why I probably still had that in mind. Sorry for the confusion.

It is NOT intended to criticize any of the three products.

I don't think anyone would think that of you, don't worry. I was purely interested in why HBS could produce bigger images for you.
Huge fan of HBS myself and I just want to find possible errors or problems to help with the development. 

[admin]

Thank you very much, @Phil and @al3x. I believe we are all here to make Hasleo Backup Suite better. However, to be honest, what we observed previously was that the images generated by HBS are consistently smaller than those created by MR8, which is why we wanted to better understand the reason behind this difference.