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I am looking for a device of which I don't know how it should be called.
The current situation is that we provide computer services and often have to take disk images of hard disks before doing whatever we are going to do. We are using Acronis software for this (which works great) to make disk images to another hard disk (2TB). This way that single hard drive contains multiple images of hard drives and we don't have to clone every hard drive to a seperate hard drive. Also Acronis does a good job on compression, so we can store 10-15 backups on one drive.
Now, since you can attach hard drives using USB docking stations (probably USB 3.0 for speed) we could start doing that instead of powering down the computer we use for that, attach the hard drive using SATA, boot up the computer again, start the application, start the backup,..
But instead, I am wondering if nobody created a device to which you can attach a SATA drive (2.5 or 3.5 inch), press some magic button and that it would clone the hard drive to a location. I am aware of devices that support "one touch cloning", but then we would need a seperate hard drive for every backup again. Of course it would be required that we can afterwards access those backups again, to restore a subset of files or the entire drive if necessary.
Maarten Ureel
Posted 2014-07-05T09:03:14.893
Reputation: 31
Surely Acronis can read from a USB/eSATA disk cradle? E.g. http://www.startech.com/m/HDD/Docking/eSATA-USB-to-SATA-External-Hard-Drive-Docking-Station-for-25-or-35in~SATADOCKU2E - it doesn't have a "one-touch" cloning function but it's essentially a hot-swap cradle...
– Kinnectus – 2014-07-05T10:44:32.583@BigChris I don't see why you are saying that. He said he wants one-touch/one button, -and not cloning- (i.e. he wants it to a location i.e. making an image). He never said Acronis can't read USB. He also clearly knows(as most do) that USB devices are hot-swappable and he made that clear in his post. – barlop – 2014-07-05T12:50:00.847
Your title is wrong and you know it. Your title says cloning, but your question says to a location. What you mean is Making an image / imaging. And you mention in your question that you know of devices that do one touch cloning. So within your question, you answered your incorrect title. To correct your title from cloning to imaging / imaging to a location, is a big change so better if you do it. – barlop – 2014-07-05T12:57:55.583
Interested in a networking based solution? You can setup a PXE server on a computer, use network booting (typically F12) and select an image to restore. For speed you would want gigabit. – cybernard – 2014-07-05T15:11:59.927
@barlop: it is still cloning, but to an image instead of a hard drive - but I can see where it may lead to confusion so I changed the subject. – Maarten Ureel – 2014-07-06T13:37:01.217