Macrium Backup restore: how reliable?

1. All my docs, pictures etc. are on the internal spinning HD. I have made a Macrium backp of my C drive (its a 250 GB SSD) every week for years and I have a bootable Macrium startup DVD. I did two trial restorations a few years ago which were successful. However, after a crash in February my comp. technition changed my log on (startup) PW and re-installed Windows 10. He managed (I don't know how) to also restore most of my programs. I am able to restart the computer at will using that new PW. So far so good.

2. However, having got the comp. working again I decided to restore one of my pre-crash Macrium backups using my bootable Macrium startu DVD (so that the comp would be returned to exactly as it was before the crash including all my programs.) After the restoration the computer started up and as normal asked for the PW. Both the old and the new PWs resulted in something like "not a valid PW" and the comp. refused to go any further. I therefore got my comp. terch. to re-install what he did before and I am using the comp as a result (on the new PW).

3. Following the failure of the Macrium restore (para. 2) I can no longer rely on Macrium getting me out of trouble. That makes me nervous.

Question 1: Why did neither of my PWs work with the pre-crash restore (para. 2 above)? Surely the old PW should have worked.

Question 2: How can I get back to relying on my weekly backups with peace of mind?

Thanks.

Stevekir said:

Why did neither of my PWs work with the pre-crash restore (para. 2 above)? Surely the old PW should have worked.

Do you use a Local account, or do you sign in with a Microsoft Account? If an MS account, had you changed the MS account password since the Macrium image was made?


I have literally lost count of the number of times I have successfully restored a Macrium image (System Two in my specs below is a test machine with multiple images available). However, all my machines use Local accounts.

I use a Microsoft account for my user account and a local account for admin accounts. I've done about 6 full restores over the past 3 years using Reflect and had no problems.You can mount a backup image as a virtual image to check the contents and boot t backup image using ViBoot.

Steve C said:

I use a Microsoft account for my user account and a local account for admin accounts. I've done about 6 full restores over the past 3 years using Reflect and had no problems.You can mount a backup image as a virtual image to check the contents and boot t backup image using ViBoot.

I have downloaded ViBoot but it will not run, stating I need Hyper-version.03 or later. I have searched for that, but it is not found.

Macrium's Restore > Boot image remains greyed out (obviously).

How can I get ViBoot to run so that the Boot image feature becomes active?

Thanks. Steve Kirkby.

Stevekir said:

How can I get ViBoot to run so that the Boot image feature becomes active?

Macrium viBoot requires Hyper-V, and Hyper-V is only available if you have Pro. Your specs say you have Home.

In Home you can still mount an image as a virtual drive and explore it though.

Bree said:

Macrium viBoot requires Hyper-V, and Hyper-V is only available if you have Pro. Your specs say you have Home.

In Home you can still mount an image as a virtual drive and explore it though.

My Macrium Reflect describes itself as "Free Editiopn for both home and commercial use - v7.2.4156 (UEFI). Also, in its Restore tab is says "Details ID B449A1F01D0312DF, Type: Full, Date (yesterday)."
As I said, the "Boot Image" button in the Restore Tab is greyed out, and I cannot find anywhere else that will allow me to "mount an image as a virtual drive and explore it" as you say. How could I do that please?

I have Windows 10 64 bits, up to date.

Thanks.

Stevekir said:

... I cannot find anywhere else that will allow me to "mount an image as a virtual drive and explore it" as you say. How could I do that please?.

If Macrium Reflect is installed you can right-click on the .mrimg file in File Explorer....




...or just double-click on it ('explore' is the default action). Then choose which partition(s) you want to mount as virtual drives.




You may want to tick 'Enable access to restricted folders'.

When done browsing, right-click on the drive letter in 'This PC' to unmount the image.

I have never had a problem yet restoring from Macrium

Very reliable until Changed Block Tracker (CBT) was implemented. Version 6 was rock solid, but with version 7 came CBT which has caused lost of issues over time. And there is very little to be gained from it.

My advice is when you install it, uncheck "Install CBT". And if you have already installed it, go into Control Panel > Programs and Features (or Settings > Apps), find Macrium Reflect, and right click on it (or click in Apps), and select, "Change" > "Next" > "Modify", and uncheck CBT.

Thank you Bee. I now think that the problem is connected with the comp's sign in PW, not the email PW, so I will re-install Windows and my programs - a big job.