Full computer (disk image) backup and restore in Vista Ultimate works great!

Hi,

I had a total hd breakdown on my laptop this morning. Under normal

circumstances I would have had hours of restore work after I had

installed a new drive. I would have had to first install Vista, then go

through tons of backups to get my user files back, and finally I would

have to reinstall all my programs. It would have been a weekend

dedicated to disaster recovery.

Since I have Vista Ultimate I've been creating complete disk image

backups on an external USB drive. But to be honest, I didn't expect the

restore to work. But it did! I made sure I purchased the exact same

drive I had before, put it in the laptop, booted from the install CD

and got the the repair option where full system restore was an option.

It found my images on the USB drive. The restore started and went to

the movies. When I came back I I was presented with the login prompt as

if nothing ever happened! I have tried programs like Ghost and True

Image from Acronis, but the built in one that comes with Ultimate is

faster than anything I have tried before and works without any problems

of any kind. The user interface is so simple that it made me think:

This can't just work. Well, even my encrypted volumes residing on the

disk mounted without problems after the restore. It's like it never

really happened.

What I wonder is if I had to purchase the same kind of drive, and if it

would have to be the same size? I know you can restore images to

different drives using dedicated software like True Image, but I am not

sure you can with images made while Windows is running like the ones I

make in Vista are?

I have to say that I am really impressed with both System Restore and

the backup capabilities in Vista Ultimate (and Business also as far as

I remember). This alone is worth the extra cost for Ultimate, much more

so than any of the other extras that is added. Actually, being a long

time Linux user and Microsoft sceptic I have to admit that Vista is

better than anything I have ever used from Microsoft. It's just working

for me, and this painless recovery process tops it off. I used to be

booted into my Linux install all the time, but these days it's not very

often.

--

//ceed