Thinkvantage Recovery vs Windows recovery

I'm unclear about the relationship between Thinkvantage recovery functions and similar Windows functions. I have created a backup and restore points on the hard drive with Thinkvantage. Do I still need to do the same in Windows? Is it the same thing? How does the Q hard drive partition with Thinkvantage recovery (9.76 Gb) fit into the picture? Do Thinkvantage backups affect what is on the Q partition? Is doing a windows backup the same as creating an image of my C drive? My computer is showing 229g free of 286g available. My Thinkvantage initial backup used 15.1 Gb. I have tried to create a backup via Windows onto a 16Gb usb flash drive, but it does not complete due to not enough memory. For those who are using an external HDD for backups, about how much space should a backup require assuming a new computer with few personal files and one or two programs?

 

I do my backups with Thinkvantage Rescue and Recovery onto an external USB disk, which the program has made bootable with the Thinkvantage pre-desktop environment. Bare metal total restores or individual folder and file file recoveries can be done by booting from the disk, or you can use the pre-desktop environment on the system disk, started by the Blue button, to access the backups on the external disk.

I've already used this setup (beyond a test) to totally restore my computer, once to a) replace my main system disk with a larger disk, and several times b) recover from software installations gone wrong.

The Windows 7 Complete Backup is not quite as flexible, in that you need a Microsoft Recovery DVD (not included with the preloaded Windows) to do a bare metal recovery from the backups on an external disk, or, if the system partition on the main system disk is still working, you can start Windows will the F8 key held down (I think), and choose an option to restore your main disk from a backup. (But I've only tried a bare metal restore from DVD backups from Microsoft Complete Backup.)

 

The Q partition contains the Product Recovery software. This allows you to restore your system to factory state (as when you first received it).

I just tried the X220 Product Recovery Disk set on a brand new hard drive. I was given the option to delete C: only, or the entire hard drive. Process went smoothly. Note that you can burn the Product Recovery Disk set for yourself. Look in Lenovo ThinkVantage Tools. First disk can be a CD or DVD. Other three disks should be DVD.

 

Does the Thinkvantage recovery properly align an SSD to mirror over a new hard drive, because the plan is for my mSATA SSD to become the boot drive and the hard disk becomes a storage dump.

 

Yes, it does.

 

+1 for me also.

I think the real answer to that is yes, if you have Win 7. I am not so certain it would be aligned with an XP recovery.

 

The Windows system restore is very picky about the source files. I had no issues for a long time with it then I made a comment on here about the reliability being great and the next time I did a restore... it wouldn't detect the backup data. And then the next time it would tell me my destination disk wasn't the correct size - even though it was the same disk from the backup.

I switched to Acronis after that.

 

I have experienced the same. If you want to restore to exactly the same machine (same partitions), then Windows system restore is great. But when you replace your harddrive with a new one you can run into trouble, and Acronis is the solution. But I cannot comment on Thinkvantage Recovery on that issue.

 

I think a more accurate statement is that Acronis used to be the answer.

Do go over to the Acronis forum and read some of the problems with TIH 2011.

TIH 2010 is fine if you can locate a copy of it.

Perry

 

I just tried to restore a system image on a new HDD (but same Laptop). Absolutely impossible with Windows Backup, with TIH 2010 no problem. Fortunately I made a backup with TIH as well...I find the Windows System Image Backup pretty useless that way...what happens when I am forced to use a new HDD?

Anyway, does someone know how the Lenovo Backup Software behaves? Is restoring to a different HDD possible?