Alert – Macrium Reflect Option to Purge Old Backups

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I’m not sure at what point this changed or whether an update or I changed it, but… I discovered this morning that the default setting for Macrium reflect on my computer was to automatically purge old backups if there was not enough room left on the drive for the new backup.

I guess that in many cases, that might be OK but it’s been my practice for a long time now to backup a new computer as soon as I got it and then again after I have cleaned out the crud that usually comes on one and installed a couple essential tools I use and do a few UI tweaks so I can find things better. Well, if I let Reflect prune the oldest backups, that’s what’s going to get wiped.

I noticed this today as I was getting ready to run a backup prior to installing some test software and I barely stopped it in time from potentially wiping out some backups I wanted to keep (there are copies elsewhere, but not convenient). I’m going to assume that if it were to delete files, it would be files in the same directory so I’m rearranging the directory storage into current and archive just to be sure. I’ve also remove the check in Other Tasks / Edit Defaults / Retention Rules / Purge oldest backup set(s) if…

You might want to check your setup.

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I noticed this as well, but will always have sufficient space for it to be a non-issue.
However, although I always uncheck the “purge the oldest backup set(s)” box on the Retention Rules page, Macrium ignores it and the log shows the 5GB rule is present.
Not good in the scenario you mention. :^_^:

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I’ve found that each backup XML has the same setting. Likely inherits it from settings when you create a new backup.

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I just went to Other Tasks/Edit Defaults on the left hand column and changed the settings there.
That solved the issue and a backup was just done without the 5GB rule in place.

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Thanks to you all for this information! I never thought to investigate Other Tasks. All three computer Macriums have been adjusted accordingly. Again, thanks!

"Take care of thy backups and thy restores shall take care of thee." Ben Franklin, revisted

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You’re welcome.
The part I like is that I no longer have to remember to go to Advanced Options on every backup to check the “Auto Verify Image” box.

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…every backup…”Auto Verify Image”…

Let’s assume a backup took 1 hour to complete, how much extra time does auto verify image add to the backup session?

"Take care of thy backups and thy restores shall take care of thee." Ben Franklin, revisted

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Let’s assume a backup took 1 hour to complete, how much extra time does auto verify image add to the backup session?

I’ve never timed it, but I’d guess another 20 minutes or so.

If it doubled it I’d still do it, as a corrupt image would be worthless.

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Trev, absolutely! Meanwhile, to reduce chances of one worthless image, I usually make a ful-image of OS and data partitions on at least two usb ext HDs. Sometimes, time is of the essence, however, I’ll try a few Auto Image Verifys and time them.

"Take care of thy backups and thy restores shall take care of thee." Ben Franklin, revisted

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Takes me no longer than 30-35min max to image and auto-verify.

If it takes more than an hour then you have too much data on the drive you’re imaging.
This defeats the purpose of a fast recovery because it will take at least twice as long to recover the image.
The longer this process takes the more prone to errors and other issues.

Auto-verify does NOT ensure that you will be able to recover your image. The only way to do so is to test and
ensure that your target drive is healthy.

I’ve got no use for the “Purge oldest backup set(s)” setting and I encourage all to turn it off.
You’ll be notified very quickly if an image you’re attempting to make doesn’t have enough space on the target drive, so there is really no need.
It’s always a solid insurance policy to backup to an external drive as well.

MIND your backups and don’t delegate the thinking you should be doing, to some software’s settings.

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Clint, I did not mention earlier I do two full-images, pretty much tri-monthly:
OS partition and data partition. It’s far easier for me to simply pull out of the data partition the folder and/or file I need rather than trying to differentially or incrementally backup.

"Take care of thy backups and thy restores shall take care of thee." Ben Franklin, revisted

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