Solved Macrium Rescue Media

I have just trieď to create a Rescue Medium using the default options from the menu option onto a 240Gb SSD and it failed saying that there isn't enough space. The drive I am trying to create the rescue media for is a 500Gb that only has 80Gb used.

I am sure that the last time I created the rescue media I created it on a 64Gb USB stick, but that could be wrong. Any ideas why the media needs to be larger than 240Gb or ideas on what I am doing wrong?

EDIT - I just created the rescue media as an ISO and it is only 771Mb - why can it not create a 700Mb file on a 240Gb drive!

Many Thanks

In all likelihood the SSD is formatted to NTFS and I believe that when creating the recuse disk it formats it as FAT32.

Try doing this:

Wipe that SSD. Create a small FAT32 partition (1 or 2 GB). Then you dan create another large partition formatted with NTFS
on the same drive so that you can use the same SSD both for Macrium Reflect recovery and something else.

If you need detailed instructions, let me know and I would be happy to provide you step-by-step instructions.

@wimorrison You are either mixing up your terminology or choosing to not utilize your storage device efficiently.The term rescue media/rescue disk refers to a usb recovery drive, usually a small flash drive, that one creates from within Macrium the first time one uses the application. The files are less than 1 gb in size. This usb drive is used to boot from whenever one needs to recover their system from an IMAGE. An image is the actual snapshot Macrium makes of your operating system drive. These images are usually stored on an external hard drive or in some cases, a large flash drive.

Why would you want to use an ssd as your rescue disk? It makes no sense that you would do so. The ssd should be used for storing your images or other data. Rescue media and images should never be on the same disk.

To best utilize the 240 ssd, format it as ntfs and use it to store your images. It should hold 3, possibly 4, images after compression.

glasskuter said:

Why would you want to use an ssd as your rescue disk?

Click to expand...

In general, I'm in full agreement with what glasskuter is saying, but just because I have to be different, here is an oddball scenario where I do this...

I have a large SSD that has 4 partitions on it. The first partition is FAT32 and the other three are NTFS. I have a batch file of my own creation that allows me to boot any Windows based ISO image. This can include Windows install media such as Win 10 or Win 11, a Macrium Reflect recovery disk, and anything else that uses either Win PE or Win RE boot media. On another partition, I have all my personal data, BitLocker protected. I also have my entire software library on that drive. Even if I am sitting in front of a machine that cannot boot into Windows, I can boot from this SSD and select what I want to boot. For example, if I want to restore a backup, I choose to boot the Macrium Reflect recovery disk. If I want to do a clean install of Windows, I choose the Windows 11 installation media. If I want to do an unattended installation of Windows, I choose my unattended installation media, etc.

I also have exported drivers from all my systems on this same SSD and Windows customizations so that after a clean install I can run a single batch file that customizes Windows to my exact liking and installs all system drivers.

I did all this without a single third-party utility.

So, there may be nut cases like me who just have to do things differently necessitating this kind of capability I just like having a single rescue disk that I can use to reinstall Windows from scratch, restore Macrium Reflect backups from, keep backup copies of all my important data, and keep my entire software library on. It's kind of like my Swiss Army Knife of recovery disks

I will however, provide one word of caution: Don't go crazy with the amount of space devoted to FAT32 on an SSD. FAT32 does not allow for TRIM so you want to keep the space devoted to FAT32 to a minimum, or, at the very least avoid using the FAT32 partition for lots or writes because performance can become very poor on that partition.

NOTE: Yes, I know I am putting a lot of eggs in one basket with this method. I do, of course have multiple other backups of everything, including other rescue media. It was just a great exercise in seeing if this could be done, especially without any third-party utilities.

@hsehestedt You're not a nutcase but an innovator. A few years ago I, too,thrived in experimenting with things to see if I could make them work. But for a layman, that is not a normal scenario. I'm just one step above being a laywoman and it's above my head, Using a multiboot Ventoy disk is as far as I am experienced enough to tackle these days . It was not my intention to suggest that my advice superseded yours. It was meant to help the OP get the most efficient use of his storage and to make his backup experience easier and more straightforward.

@glasskuter

You are 100% correct. I was making it way too complex. I should have stuck with the theory of keeping it simple. I just get carried away sometimes.

I just have so much fun digging into strange things sometimes that I forget myself and want to share, but I think I tend to really overdo it at times .

So, to summarize:

Under normal circumstances, you only need a very small flash drive to create the Macrium Reflect recovery disk. 1 GB is enough space, but if you want to be on the safe side, 2 GB is more than enough. To keep things simple and avoid confusion, it would be best to keep that flash drive separate from other data. After all, the only intent of that flash drive should be to get Macrium Reflect running so that you can perform a backup or restore.

Sorry for the over exuberance. That little project that I described was the culmination of what was literally a few years in making. First learning one or two tricks, then building upon that, which led to even more discoveries, and eventually led to my final Frankenstein of a creation.

Sometimes I just need to remind myself to chill a bit.

hsehestedt said:

In all likelihood the SSD is formatted to NTFS and I believe that when creating the recuse disk it formats it as FAT32.

Try doing this:

Wipe that SSD. Create a small FAT32 partition (1 or 2 GB). Then you dan create another large partition formatted with NTFS
on the same drive so that you can use the same SSD both for Macrium Reflect recovery and something else.

If you need detailed instructions, let me know and I would be happy to provide you step-by-step instructions.

Click to expand...

Thank you, an elegant solution to my simple question

I have created a 1gb FAT32 primary partition which is now the rescue disc, and the remainder is a NTFS logical partition holding the actual backup files - a simple one stop disc solution, which was the aim

Glad that worked out for you. Thanks for posting back to let us know that this worked.