Macrium Reflect

About Macrium Reflect

This is disk imaging rather than file copying, and the distinction is the whole point. An image captures the partition structure, the boot configuration, the installed applications and every setting, so a restore produces a machine that boots and works rather than a folder of documents on a fresh install. For a workstation with a week of software configuration on it, that is the difference between an hour of downtime and three days.

Backups run full, differential or incremental against a defined schedule, with retention rules that prune old images automatically so a destination drive does not silently fill. Images can be verified after writing, compressed, encrypted, and split for awkward destinations. Changed block tracking makes incremental runs quick enough to schedule during the working day without anyone noticing.

The rescue environment is the piece that makes it trustworthy. A bootable image is built from the application and written to a USB stick, carrying the storage and network drivers needed to see the machine's disks and the backup destination. That media restores a system that will not start at all, and it can also restore onto different hardware, injecting drivers so the image boots on a replacement machine.

Beyond full restores, images mount as a drive letter so a single file can be pulled out of last week's backup without restoring anything, and the file and folder backup mode covers the cases where a full image is more than the job needs. The Server editions add support for server operating systems and live database aware backups.

What is included in this build

• Full, differential and incremental disk imaging with changed block tracking
• Scheduled backup sets with retention rules that prune old images automatically
• Bootable rescue environment image with storage and network drivers included
• Restore to different hardware with driver injection so the image boots elsewhere
• Images mount as a drive letter for pulling a single file from an old backup
• Verification, compression, encryption and splitting of image files
• File and folder backup mode for jobs that do not need a full image
• Server and Server Plus editions covering server operating systems and live databases

Changed in version 8.1.8854

• Faster incremental runs through improved changed block tracking
• Rescue environment updated with newer storage controller drivers
• Improved handling of very large destination volumes
• Retention rule evaluation made more predictable on mixed backup sets
• Reduced memory use during verification of large images

Installation walkthrough

These steps assume a clean machine. If a previous release of the same application is present, deal with that first, since an overlapping install is the most common cause of a setup that stops halfway.

1. Extract the archive and run the installer as administrator.
2. Select the edition required during setup rather than installing all of them.
3. Build the rescue media to a USB stick immediately after installing, before it is needed.
4. Define a backup destination on a separate physical drive, never the source volume.
5. Run one full image and verify it before relying on the schedule.

System requirements and file details

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