Paragon Backup & Recovery Community Edition is available completely free for the non-commercial purpose only. For commercial use, check out Paragon Hard Disk Manager. https://www.paragon-software.com/us/free/br-free/ I have been searching for a backup solution for W11P for several months. I tried free versions of EaseUS, Aomei & several others. They all disappointed me in one way or another. Can't remember which EaseUS or Aomei but after creating a recovery boot USB it said couldn't be used to restore an image in the free version. Anyways haven't done a restore yet, But creating the rescue USB required installing Windows ADK & Windows Performance Toolkit free from M$. I imaged 117GB it took 2-4hrs idk exactly because I walked away. There is an encryption option which I require. And on high compression 117GB compressed to 67GB which I consider outstanding. VERY easy to follow GUI.
I just tried it. Installed it. Paragon app took almost 2 minutes to open on the first occasion.. I created a recovery UFD and then a backup image. The backup was slow. I couldn't find a setting to prevent a split backup. The recovery UFD was booted. There was a loading error (two occasions). But a restore was initiated. Very slow. But it worked. If you want a free backup/restore app, look elsewhere.
Paragon free is a good and reliable backup software but keep in mind that it is based on their backup and recovery 17.9.3 from 2019, and to my knowledge has not been updated since then. This is why it lags slightly in performance. My only concern with Paragon is that it is a company in decline. They have not released any new or updated software in a few years and even their flagship software, the Hard Disk Manger, has only received just one update in the last 2+ years. Their FAQ on the HDM page states that HDM is compatible with the latest version of Windows 11, which according to them is still 22H2!
I did not create a UFD. Just installed the software, ran a backup of my C partition, and then restored the backup from within Windows. Paragon asked to restart the PC to complete the restore, and upon reboot loaded itself and performed the restore. Speed was not as fast as paid Macrium, but it was good enough.
See the attached pic below. On Paragon's main window, on bottom left, click on "Restore" and then follow the prompts. Paragon is the only backup software that I know off that lets you restore a backup of locked partitions, like C partition on Windows, without creating or booting through a boot media or downloading a WinPE. It does not protect you against hardware failure, but it is a great option if you want to restore for any other reason.
So if I got this right I can overwrite the current OS as long as the backup is on another drive. All within Windows without booting to restore/rescue media instead of Windows.
No, the op can be started under windows but the process will leave LIVE windows to complete itself (most of the time rebooting into a WinPE OS and finishing the job.
Yes, as long as your backup is on a different partition/HDD, you can restore your Windows OS partition by initiating the restore from inside Windows. Paragon will then ask you to reboot your system, and upon reboot it will load before Windows and perform a restore. You do not need to boot into any rescue media.
