What's the cheapest OS upgrade?

Paul nospam needed.com wrote:

As for Macrium Reflect, it's probably still under development,
so there'd be a version for Windows 7. But the "system image"
capability built into Windows 7 is just as good. While the OS is
running, the "system image" function can make a backup of C: as
a .vhd file. It uses VSS (volume shadow service) just like
Macrium does. And a .vhd can be mounted in a virtual machine, if
you needed to access a single file for some reason. In fact,
when I want to inspect the files on my laptop, I have a 26GB
.vhd from the laptop on my WinXP machine. And if I load that
into VPC2007, I can access single files, count the number of
files, see how many files are hard linked and so on.

Is it easy as Macrium Reflect? Can you see the archive's file
structure, like in Windows Explorer? Can you copy and paste, and
drag-and-drop? Macrium Reflect allows those operations from within
Windows Explorer when browsing a Macrium Reflect drive C archive
image.

And it's because the .vhd is an exact copy of the original
(without sector-by-sector copying - only the busy sectors are
copied). The OS knows where all the metadata is, where the file
clusters are, and copies everything.

As far as adopting Windows 7 or Windows 8, it's all a matter of
whether the interface is to your liking.

Someday we will have to migrate from Windows XP.

--










Paul

John Doe

Is it easy as Macrium Reflect? Can you see the archive's file
structure, like in Windows Explorer? Can you copy and paste, and
drag-and-drop? Macrium Reflect allows those operations from within
Windows Explorer when browsing a Macrium Reflect drive C archive
image.

Macrium Reflect works just fine on Windows 7 x64. With 16 GB of RAM, I
keep a bunch of stuff open all the time and it transitions instantly. I would
never go back to 32 bit Windows. The only thing I don't like is the search
feature. I understand there are some search replacements, but I have not yet
tried any.

John Doe wrote:
Paul nospam needed.com wrote:

As for Macrium Reflect, it's probably still under development,
so there'd be a version for Windows 7. But the "system image"
capability built into Windows 7 is just as good. While the OS is
running, the "system image" function can make a backup of C: as
a .vhd file. It uses VSS (volume shadow service) just like
Macrium does. And a .vhd can be mounted in a virtual machine, if
you needed to access a single file for some reason. In fact,
when I want to inspect the files on my laptop, I have a 26GB
.vhd from the laptop on my WinXP machine. And if I load that
into VPC2007, I can access single files, count the number of
files, see how many files are hard linked and so on.

Is it easy as Macrium Reflect? Can you see the archive's file
structure, like in Windows Explorer? Can you copy and paste, and
drag-and-drop? Macrium Reflect allows those operations from within
Windows Explorer when browsing a Macrium Reflect drive C archive
image.

And it's because the .vhd is an exact copy of the original
(without sector-by-sector copying - only the busy sectors are
copied). The OS knows where all the metadata is, where the file
clusters are, and copies everything.

As far as adopting Windows 7 or Windows 8, it's all a matter of
whether the interface is to your liking.

Someday we will have to migrate from Windows XP.


Windows 7 has a backup function, one which I've never used.
And it's not the traditional "ntbackup" either.

The "system image" function is a separate thing. For me,
it's quick and easy, and I don't have to select anything, other
than tell it which partitions to copy. Right now, it is set to
copy C: and "System Reserved" boot partitions. My "data" partition,
which doesn't have a lot on it, is not on the backup list. I set it
up once, and haven't needed to change it. If I'm about to do
something dangerous to the laptop, I do one of those first.

I use the "system image", whenever the laptop won't boot. The laptop
has refused to boot twice, once recovered by the automatic recovery
procedures (takes up to three reboots or so max, before it gives up).
A second time, the automatic recovery couldn't fix it, and I restored
from the "system image" in about 20 minutes or so. Booted and all fine.
Because I'd made the system image within the last day, there wasn't
even anything to lose. (That was pure luck, as I've only made about
half a dozen of those backups since I got the laptop.)

One minor irritation with Windows 7, is the designers tried to use
every feature that the NTFS file system has got. In the past,
there were a few features they didn't really use (like Alternate
Streams). But it almost seemed like they were on a mission this
time, to use as many features as the file system possessed. And
for me, when trying to maintain the OS, it means there's a bunch
of stuff I don't yet understand. And it makes me nervous when
doing maintenance (fear of breaking stuff). And the two "failure
to boot" situations, did not help matters.

I can't say I've had "failure to boot" with my other OSes.
Even Win98SE was as well behaved as could be here. Never a problem
of note in terms of falling over. I had the usual issues when installing
more than 512MB of RAM in the Win98 computer, but that one is well
understood (recipe available via search engine). I've even installed
Win98 on a 2GB computer (you stop after the first stage of installation
and tell the OS to ignore everything over 512MB, which is cheating).
Win98 screams on a Core2 :-) Even if it is limited to using only one core.

Paul

On Thu, 17 May 2012 09:51:02 +0000 (UTC), David
wrote:

On Thu, 17 May 2012 05:53:07 +0000, John Doe wrote:

Without looking, yet...

I heard that OEM versions are no more? So what's the cheapest upgrade to
the most likely longest lasting Windows OS? Talking about using it on my
homebuilt PC.

Not that I will, unless there is a reason to upgrade from Windows XP. I
don't know of one, yet. Mainly wondering about current Windows upgrade
options.

format C:
http://www.fedoraproject.org

:-)

Or another Linux distro.
--
(\__/) M.
(='.'=) If a man stands in a forest and no woman is around
(")_(") is he still wrong?

On May 30, 7:34*pm, Mark
wrote:
On Thu, 17 May 2012 09:51:02 +0000 (UTC), David
wrote:









On Thu, 17 May 2012 05:53:07 +0000, John Doe wrote:

Without looking, yet...

I heard that OEM versions are no more? So what's the cheapest upgrade to
the most likely longest lasting Windows OS? Talking about using it on my
homebuilt PC.

Not that I will, unless there is a reason to upgrade from Windows XP. I
don't know of one, yet. Mainly wondering about current Windows upgrade
options.

format C:
http://www.fedoraproject.org

:-)

Or another Linux distro.
--
(\__/) *M.
(='.'=) If a man stands in a forest and no woman is around
(")_(") is he still wrong?

which do you recommend ?

KR kenreed1999 gmail.com wrote:

Mark i... dontgetlotsofspamanymore.invalid wrote:
David n... spam.please wrote:
John Doe wrote:

Without looking, yet...

I heard that OEM versions are no more? So what's the
cheapest upgrade to the most likely longest lasting Windows
OS? Talking about using it on my homebuilt PC.

Not that I will, unless there is a reason to upgrade from
Windows XP. I don't know of one, yet. Mainly wondering about
current Windows upgrade options.

format C: http://www.fedoraproject.org

:-)

Or another Linux distro.

which do you recommend ?

When talking about an operating system in this group, you should
assume Windows.

I specifically said "Windows".

You can discuss anything, but you are off-topic in this thread.

You could at least start your own thread.

You are mostly in the wrong group.

You would get more attention or at least better answers in a Linux
group.

....

Then again, this is an excellent application for a newsreader's ignore-
thread-branch function.