BACKUP, once and for all

[Gal]

Hi,
Too many theories about how to backup the device are flying around the forum..
I want to know and, of course, that other will know.. How to really backup your device?
Mine is a dual boot but this thread should address both versions.
I tried Macrium Reflect Free  but , honestly, some stuff weren’t very clear to me.
When I opened it in Windows , it offered me to do a backup which eventually was just around 200-300 MB.  I guess it’s just boot essentials ..So I created a bootable USB from it but haven’t tried it.
Now, I installed Win10 with all the latest updates exactly as I wish and also rooted Android and installed the custom ROM.
My tablet is now exactly how I wish it would come out of the box!
I want to clone the whole thing and actually know how to restore everything when the day comes.
I saw that in Macrium Reflect Free there is an option to clone the whole disk (with all ~10 of its partitions).. but I don’t understand why it doesn’t create an ISO or some sort.. I connected an external 1TB hard drive but it says it will delete the whole disk..so I didn’t continue. What exactly should be the output of the clone? where do you store it?  How would you use it?

I know I probably wrote too much but it’s really important to me and the info in the guides I found usually assumed some previous knowledge.

Thanks for the help, I hope this thread will be useful to others too.

Regards,
Gal

[Alexandra]

I’ve never used Macrium, as my tool of choice is Parted Magic. You boot to a Linux desktop that has shortcuts for various disk utilities, one of which (Clonezilla) lets you back up either the entire disk or selected partitions. It’s very self-explanatory if you know even a bit about computers and partitions. (And I generally do not know how to use Linux.)

The final backup is not an ISO but a folder of compressed files. You can restore this backup by booting into Parted Magic again and choosing to restore it in Clonezilla. I have not done this for my X98 yet so there is some small chance I’ve created non-viable backups. But I have restored my desktop computer’s Win7 C: drive many times, and it’s always worked flawlessly.

[Gal]

Can I do it if I’ll install Ubuntu on a VM? Should be OK , right?

[Alexandra]

I don’t follow your question. A VM is not on a real partition (right?) so it would not be relevant to disk/partition backup/cloning with PM/Clonezilla.

[krikkitwar]

made a backup of my new dual boot device directly after getting it… afterwards i did a clean install of windows 10, because i do not need the dual boot feature…

hade some spare time yesterday, so i tried to restore the backup i made at start, i made 2 backups, one with:

-macrium reflect free edition: outcome: device boots only to win10, android does not work, don’t know why…  a bit of strange behavior after restore

and one with

-acronis true image 2016: have not tested restore

 

…so if you wan’t a full backup of the dual boot solution, you should perhaps try something other than macrium reflect first, but i am not sure thats it’s the program fault, the whole boot settings from this tablet are a bit strange 🙂

[pepelu]

Hi,

Some progress?

Someone try with clonezilla?

Thanks

 

[prije svega splico]

I am using Acronis True Image with  Easy2Boot method.

My tablet is windows only A5C6

[polocanada]

According to this post from 2015 – Clonezilla has a limit o partitions it can handle on emmc:

https://sourceforge.net/p/clonezilla/discussion/Help/thread/7f704146/?limit=25

If that still holds true then Clonezilla won’t help.

These two posts promote EaseUS Todo Backup

Full disk clone backup

https://forum.xda-developers.com/x98-air/general/teclast-x98-air-3g-tablet-9-7-2048×1536-t2913035/page1235

Apparently EaseUS can do backup of the entire eMMC including all partitions.

Anybody tried yet?

This post says EaseUS was able to backup and restore but Windows didn’t boot…

https://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/backup-mac-os-x-el-capitan-dual-boot-w-windows-gpt.197801/

However, EaseUS website mentiones GPT backup

http://www.todo-backup.com/products/features/

http://www.partition-tool.com/resource/GPT-disk-partition-manager/partition-gpt-disk.htm

The EaseUS site also says it can convert the physical image to a virtual impage (P2V) function and can be attached to VirtualBox.

http://www.todo-backup.com/products/features/convert-physical-to-virtual.htm

That’s sounds pretty interesting, since it’s an Intel tablet, I should be able to load that virtual image and test in VirtualBox to see if it works??

Sounds too good to be true?

——–

Personally, I have tried Casper software from Future Systems, which I use for many years successfully on windows and was able to restore a Windows-only tablet. Casper is low cost, small size and simple to use, but like others, it can see the entire drive but doesn’t see non-windows partitions.

So options exhausted here I believe. In the event I brick one of the operating systems on the dual boot, I just make it single boot Windows tablet and buy a new one. It’s not an easy picture.

I am wondering if having Windows and RemixOS can make things any prettier ..  Chuwi Hibook and Chuwi Hi10 seems come now with RemixOS.

 

====

POST EDIT: I completed the full disk sector-by-sector backup with EaseUS but didn’t have a need to restore. In any case, if you do backup, make sure you select the sector-by-sector option.

 

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