Acronis Server Restore Review

The Acronis Backup & Recovery 10 Server for Windows is the long awaited new version of the already renowned Echo series of Acronis Corporate products.  The Acronis Backup & Recovery 10 Server for Windows is a perfect solution for protection of all data stored on Windows server, including the Server Operating System. Acronis Backup & Recover 10 Server for Windows simplifies and automates the data recovery process, even when the need arises to recover to dissimilar hardware platforms. See our review of the Acronis Backup & Recovery 10 Server for Windows. 

In the previous review and tutorial of the Acronis True Image Echo Server, a full image of a Windows Server 2003 was created. In this tutorial, or walkthrough, I will put the product to the test and see if it will restore the entire image. It is best to test the restore of an image before a disaster happens. This should take a matter of minutes to restore. This is a review of the Acronis Server restore process.

The first step is to select the recovery option from the Acronis Server management console.

The following screenshot welcomes us to the Restore Data Wizard. This wizard will help you to recover lost or corrupted files or entire partitions from the backup archive you have previously created.

The following screen lets you choose the backup archive to restore. The Acronis Server found the image on the Lacie 250 gigabyte external hard drive with no problem.

The following screen shows that you can restore entire disks or partitions or just restore specified files or folders. Choose to restore disks or partitions to restore the entire Echo Server image file.

The following screen lets you choose the partition or disk to restore.

Then we need to choose the location that the Acronis Echo image will be restored. I chose to put the image on Disk 1 where it came from.

The following Acronis True Image Echo Screenshot warns you that there are some partitions on the selected restore drive. It tells you that the destination hard disk drive you have chosen contains some partitions that could contain useful data. Hard disk drive image restoring is possible only if the destination hard disk drive is empty. So naturally, I chose to delete all the existing partitions on the destination hard drive before restoring.

The following screen allows you to restore another partition or hard disk drive from the backup archive. I chose not to restore another partition and clicked next.

The following step allows you to use the default options or set the options manually. I wanted to see what the options were so I chose to set the options manually.

Here is where you can set up email notifications, logging options and even validate the archive before restoring.

The following screenshot shows that the Acronis True Image Echo Server is ready to proceed with restoring the data from the backup archive. Here is the complete list of operations that will be performed. So naturally, I saved this page and smacked the proceed button.

Then the Acronis True Image Server told me that a reboot was required. It was an expected warning because I am working on the drive that is to be restored. So I smacked the reboot button.

This is a shot of the Acronis True Image Echo Server in its low level mode restoring the image.

Sure enough, about 4 minutes later the Windows 2003 server rebooted to the login screen allowed me to login successfully. I have never seen a product restore a server so fast and so easy.

The Acronis True Image server performed a quick and flawless restore of the entire Windows Server 2003 installation. For that reason, the Acronis Server gets an honorable Brontobyte on a scale of Bytes to Brontobytes. It is a truly impressive and highly recommended program to have in your toolbox.

The Acronis True Image Echo Server supports backing up and imaging of the following Windows Servers:

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008
• Microsoft Windows 2003 Server x64 Editions
• Microsoft Windows 2003 Server
• Microsoft Windows 2000 Advanced Server
• Microsoft Windows 2000 Server
• Citrix Xen Source

Of course, the Acronis Echo server backup software also allows you to perform reliable, scheduled Full, Incremental or differential backups of your Windows 2000 or Windows 2003 server.

The Acronis Backup & Recovery 10 Server for Windows creates an exact image of your Windows server including the operating system, applications, and configurations. This remote backup and recovery utility can also back up mission-critical databases. Anyway, both your machine and special files or folders will be successfully restored in case of system failure. What is important to an IT administrator, backup procedures run without interrupting server operations. See our review of the Acronis Backup & Recovery 10 Server for Windows.  Save 5% on Acronis Backup & Recovery 10 Server for Windows with Coupon Code: ASOBR10SW5

See all of the Acronis Corporate Edition utilities here.

Post your questions or comments about the Acronis True Image Echo Server

Comments	Date
By Brian	2009-12-10 14:36:27
RAID to RAID, single drive to single drive, it doesn’t matter to Acronis. If you are doing a bare metal restore to different hardware, you will need the help of the Universal Restore feature.
By John	2009-11-25 14:21:34
Has this been answered ? I have the same question. My servers are multiple "disk" (OS drive, data drives, etc.;)machines generated from an SAS raid array (Dell PowerEdge family). Will Echo Server, backup and restore an entire server (bare metal) from raid machine to raid machine? Your tutorial showed only a single drive machine. Or is the raid simply transparent to the process?
By Muhammad Ali	2009-11-01 21:20:03
Thank for sharing
By Randy	2009-08-07 08:26:09
Acronis Echo and the newest version; Acronis Backup and Recovery 10, will backup and restore just about any hard drive configuration. It doesn’t matter if you are using Raid, virtual or a single disk configuration. One thing you may want to keep in mind is if you are restoring to dissimilar hardware you will need the Acronis Universal Restore add on.
By Dennis	2009-08-06 19:32:33
My servers are multiple "disk" (OS drive, data drives, etc.;)machines generated from an SAS raid array (Dell PowerEdge family). Will Echo Server, backup and restore an entire server (bare metal) from raid machine to raid machine? Your tutorial showed only a single drive machine. Or is the raid simply transparent to the process?

Name:
Email:
Comments :