Creating ISO images

[danger47]

Hello all
I'm new to this so please bear with me and have a little patience.
I'm trying to figure out how to make a bootable image of my C: drive with all the apps I have installed on it. I'm so tired of formatting and re-installing win 7 and my apps.

So is it possible to make an ISO image of C: and my apps that I can save to DVD's? I have made a clone of this drive to another drive for safety right now, but I"d like to know how to make a bootable image.

I hope I explained myself so that you understand what I'm trying to do. I should let you all know that I have 2 brain tumors and I need things explained to me in very simple instructions right now. Hopefully my health will improve and I can grasp things the way I used to.

Thanks in advance

 

[patcooke]

You don't need to create ISO's. Your best way is to use something Acronis True Image. It will create a complete image of your system drive including op sys, all installed apps, drivers etc. The best place to save the image is on another drive such as an internal or external hard drive. You can recover you system in inutes by running True Image from within your Windows system (it will reboot to run the restore). The Acronis system incorporates the ability to burn a bootable version of itself to a dvd. In the event that your system becomes unbootable you can boot from the dvd and fully recover to your existing hard drive, or, in the case of a complete hard drive failure to a newly installed drive.

To make the best of this sort of system you should store only your op sys and installed apps on your system drive. All user data files should be stored on another drive or partition. This means your system drive should never exceed about 40GB in size (unless you have and awful lot of very large apps installed). The Acronis image is compressed for you and will typically be about 50% or so of the imaged drive. I save the latest three images I have made and make a new one one on a regular basis (like weekly) and also immediately after make major changes like a large program install or a major system update.

This plan for system security will also get you out of trouble in the case of things like a bad install, serious malware infection or file corruption. All in all a strongly recommended strategy.

You can get a full working trial copy of Acronis True Image from here:

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Do get back to us if you need further advice or clarification.

 

[danger47]

Thanks for the fast response. I bought Paragon Hard Disk Manager 11 a few months ago because someone suggested it. I made what I believe is an image of my C: drive and put the image on another hard drive, created the boot disk that Paragon suggested. When my system crashed I put the Paragon Recovery disk in and found where the image was saved, I tried to recover from it but it didn't work. I tried different things for over 4 hours and still couldn't boot so I reformatted and started all over again. Now someone is suggesting Macrium and I downloaded the full evaluation version and tried using this one after another crash and still couldn't get my image to work right. I doing something wrong but don't know what it is and have no-one around with enough computer knowledge to show me. Is there a video tutorial somewhere that I could try to study?

 

[Drew]

Most external drives when you tell 7 to Back-up to them will grab an image of the OS before anything else. And then one can 'recover' from that image. But, I guess that isn't the answer you're seeking. Anyway, just a thought, none the less.

Cheers,
Drew
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[danger47]

Thanks anyhow Drew, but to be quite honest I've never tried to backup using windows 7. I'm so afraid to screw things up because I've formatted way tooooooo many times. I'm not enjoying the use of my computer because I spend more time re-installing the OS and all my apps.... but I have to figure out how to back things up and make an image I can actually use.... lol....lol....

 

[patcooke]

Sorry to hear of your bad experiences with a number of "solutions". I do strongly recommend Acronis - relied on it for years - my pc would have gobne through the nearest window a long time ago without Acronis - do give it a try.

 

[danger47]

Thank you patcooke for the info. I did buy True Acronis a few years ago but I'm not sure if I'll be able to find it anymore. That being said, I will download the trial version and see how I make out with it. As I said earlier in this post, my memory and thinking capabilities are somewhat limited at this time so I really need software that's easy to understand. If all goes well with the trial version, I'll try to save up and buy the full version when my disability cheque comes in next month.

I'm so glad that I stumbled across this site. This seems to be a very informative forum and I hope that I'll be able to help others as well as time goes on.

I really appreciate the help from all of you, and for the extra time and patience you're using to respond with easy to understand instructions. You'll never know how good it feels not to be so upset, or frustrated, because I can tell that you know exactly what I'm trying to say and do by the answers you're all giving me.

I tire very easily so give me about a week to try the Acronis and I will post and let you know how I made out.

 

[Joe S]

One thing about the imaging programs like Acronis. Make the boot CD first and run the backup from that. Another thing Acronis recommends not to defrag the drive with the image stored on it. I use Acronis 2010.
Joe

 

[davidhk129]

Windows 7 has its own system image backup app.
Have you tried it ?

I do that every week with an external hard drive.

 

[Drew]

Windows 7 has its own system image backup app.
Have you tried it ?

I do that every week with an external hard drive.

So does Windows 8. My OS is constantly backing itself up to an external drive. Embedded & easy.

Cheers,
Drew