AOMEI OneKey Recovery,
which it says creates a recovery partition (sort of like what
some manufacturers make) and iiuc you can update it periodically so it's
got all your data too!!
https://www.ubackup.com/onekey-recovery.html

Any opinions on this? The first 3 reviews I saw were good.

Not only is my desktop refurbished but I redid my laptop from scratch,
because I was replacing a bad drive with an SSD. Would AOMEI
Onekey-recovery put me in the good situation like an owner of a new
computer with a hidden recovery partition?

micky wrote:
> AOMEI OneKey Recovery,
> which it says creates a recovery partition (sort of like what
> some manufacturers make) and iiuc you can update it periodically so it's
> got all your data too!!
> https://www.ubackup.com/onekey-recovery.html
>
> Any opinions on this? The first 3 reviews I saw were good.
>
> Not only is my desktop refurbished but I redid my laptop from scratch,
> because I was replacing a bad drive with an SSD. Would AOMEI
> Onekey-recovery put me in the good situation like an owner of a new
> computer with a hidden recovery partition?

Two points.

1. It claims to be able to create an ex-factory partition. Without an
already existing partition or at least some data about what should be in
it, how could it do that?
2. Why not simply use a freely available clone-or-image maker such as
Macrium Reflect or Acronis?

Hold back your wallet. You don't need that program. Even if you have a
recovery partition but have lost the ability to restore from it, there
are other methods available.

Tell us your specific problem, and you'll get lots of help here.

Ed

In alt.comp.os.windows-10, on Sat, 2 Dec 2023 18:42:11 +0000, Ed Cryer
<ed@somewhere.in.the.uk> wrote:

>micky wrote:
>> AOMEI OneKey Recovery,
>> which it says creates a recovery partition (sort of like what
>> some manufacturers make) and iiuc you can update it periodically so it's
>> got all your data too!!
>> https://www.ubackup.com/onekey-recovery.html
>>
>> Any opinions on this? The first 3 reviews I saw were good.
>>
>> Not only is my desktop refurbished but I redid my laptop from scratch,
>> because I was replacing a bad drive with an SSD. Would AOMEI
>> Onekey-recovery put me in the good situation like an owner of a new
>> computer with a hidden recovery partition?
>
>Two points.
>
>1. It claims to be able to create an ex-factory partition. Without an
>already existing partition or at least some data about what should be in
>it, how could it do that?

It bases it on what is in your working C: partition now.

>2. Why not simply use a freely available clone-or-image maker such as
>Macrium Reflect or Acronis?

It's big thing is that when the start-up files are ruined, all you have
to do is press F11 and it finds the recovery partition and starts up
your computer. This would be especially helpful when traveling with a
laptop and I dont' have external drives with me.

>Hold back your wallet. You don't need that program. Even if you have a
>recovery partition but have lost the ability to restore from it, there
>are other methods available.
>
>Tell us your specific problem, and you'll get lots of help here.

I don't have a problem yet. I'm planning ahead, LOL. Two years ago I
couldn't start my computer. I didn't want to wipe it and start over, so
I tried all sorts of repair software and procedures, and finally read a
passing remark about F11 and I tried that and it started right up,
looking just like it had 2 months earlier. It was wonderully
convenient.

In this case the HP EliteDesk was really strange since maybe it had a
recovery partition when new but it was refurbished by someone selling
via Amazon, and though it had an HDD and SDD, I used partition managers
and there was only one partition on each drive. No recovery partiton,
but somehow F11 worked anyhow.

>Ed

On 12/2/2023 12:59 PM, micky wrote:
> AOMEI OneKey Recovery,
> which it says creates a recovery partition (sort of like what
> some manufacturers make) and iiuc you can update it periodically so it's
> got all your data too!!
> https://www.ubackup.com/onekey-recovery.html
>
> Any opinions on this? The first 3 reviews I saw were good.
>
> Not only is my desktop refurbished but I redid my laptop from scratch,
> because I was replacing a bad drive with an SSD. Would AOMEI
> Onekey-recovery put me in the good situation like an owner of a new
> computer with a hidden recovery partition?
>

It seems to be putting the recovery, on the SAME hard drive as C: .
I can't tell from the advert, whether it is more clever than
that, or not.

What happens if that hard drive fails entirely ???

"To prevent backup images from damage, the recovery partition is hidden by default."

Well, not Hidden Hidden. It's probably in a 0x27 instead of a 0x07.

It's like a snake oil salesman, discovering you can cook french fries
in Snake Oil. It's good for AOMEI (increased Snake Oil sales), but,
is it good for you ?

You will remember, when we used to get a Dell with a recovery partition,
we would be pestered to feed four DVD blanks into the machine, and
copy the recovery partition onto DVD. Then, if the hard drive failed
two years from then, you could use the four DVDs to reload the PC
when the replacement hard drive showed up. Recovery, was more than
an F-key press -- it also included media redundancy, just in case
of hard drive failure.

Depending on when you make updates to that partition, you could
be copying malware into it.

Paul

On 12/2/2023 2:32 PM, micky wrote:

> Two years ago I
> couldn't start my computer.
if this happens, you won't be able to start AOMEI either.
As its materials may be in the ESP partition (system partition, at the front of the disk).

Paul

In alt.comp.os.windows-10, on Sat, 2 Dec 2023 14:46:16 -0500, Paul
<nospam@needed.invalid> wrote:

>On 12/2/2023 12:59 PM, micky wrote:
>> AOMEI OneKey Recovery,
>> which it says creates a recovery partition (sort of like what
>> some manufacturers make) and iiuc you can update it periodically so it's
>> got all your data too!!
>> https://www.ubackup.com/onekey-recovery.html
>>
>> Any opinions on this? The first 3 reviews I saw were good.
>>
>> Not only is my desktop refurbished but I redid my laptop from scratch,
>> because I was replacing a bad drive with an SSD. Would AOMEI
>> Onekey-recovery put me in the good situation like an owner of a new
>> computer with a hidden recovery partition?
>>
>
>It seems to be putting the recovery, on the SAME hard drive as C: .

It gives you a choice, but it lists it as preferred.

It also allows for external drives, and because of lack of space on the
internal drive, that's what I have to use.

>I can't tell from the advert, whether it is more clever than
>that, or not.
>
>What happens if that hard drive fails entirely ???

One is screwed?

Did I ever tell you all about the time I tried to open a pistachio nut
with my laptop? I squeezed the nut between the laptop and the desk and
the nut went flying across the room, I never found it. But the
computer worked fine.

Until I turned it off that night and tried to turn it on again the next
day. I ran diskchck for 24 hours or so, and that finally finished and
and the next day I was going home, and when I got home I was runing it,
looking at a file manager, and I saw dozens, then hundreds of files and
directories disappear before my eyes. Eventually I think they were all
gone.

Yes, I should have known better. I wasn't trying to be a teenager. I
was 55 years old.

> "To prevent backup images from damage, the recovery partition is hidden by default."
>
>Well, not Hidden Hidden. It's probably in a 0x27 instead of a 0x07.
>
>It's like a snake oil salesman, discovering you can cook french fries
>in Snake Oil. It's good for AOMEI (increased Snake Oil sales), but,
>is it good for you ?
>
>You will remember, when we used to get a Dell with a recovery partition,
>we would be pestered to feed four DVD blanks into the machine, and
>copy the recovery partition onto DVD. Then, if the hard drive failed
>two years from then, you could use the four DVDs to reload the PC
>when the replacement hard drive showed up. Recovery, was more than
>an F-key press -- it also included media redundancy, just in case
>of hard drive failure.
>
>Depending on when you make updates to that partition, you could
>be copying malware into it.

That's icing on the cake!

> Paul

micky <NONONOmisc07@fmguy.com> wrote:

> AOMEI OneKey Recovery,
> which it says creates a recovery partition (sort of like what
> some manufacturers make) and iiuc you can update it periodically so it's
> got all your data too!!
> https://www.ubackup.com/onekey-recovery.html
>
> Any opinions on this? The first 3 reviews I saw were good.
>
> Not only is my desktop refurbished but I redid my laptop from scratch,
> because I was replacing a bad drive with an SSD. Would AOMEI
> Onekey-recovery put me in the good situation like an owner of a new
> computer with a hidden recovery partition?

$29.95 for Pro edition for a single instance on 1 computer. Then
pricing jumps up thereafter.

Most users would resize the C: partition to provide room for the
recovery partition on the same drive. If the OS fails because its drive
has failed, the recovery partition on the same drive may also fail. Way
too many users buy configurations that have only 1 drive. Presumably
you could save the OneKey recovery partition on a different drive, but
for many folks that means buying and installing another drive in their
computer. They buy pre-builts to eliminate doing that work and having
that expertise.

A recovery partition that is hidden simply by not mounting it, or by not
assigning it a drive letter when mounted, will not protect its contents
from malware, like ransomware that wanders through every drive
enumerated in the registry or found using console-mode commands.

How does this replace [free] backup software that lets you start the
backup program at boot to restore from backup images of which you will
have many in case your system got infected or corrupted requiring you to
step back through backups to find a good one? Backup programs can be
loaded at boot either by using alternative boot media (e.g., CD, another
partition on a drive, USB drive, etc) or by specifying an image file
(e.g., .dat or .img file in boot list). Then once the backup program
has loaded in its instance of an OS (which is not the normal OS which
remains quiescent, so everything can be replaced), you have it choose
whichever backup you want to load atop the OS partition. Once you do a
fresh install of the OS, save a backup. After applying all updates,
save another backup. Schedule periodic backups since requiring user
intervention usually means backups are not performed at regular and
short intervals. Instead of each backup consuming tons of space on the
drive, you use increment, differential, or full backup schemes, and will
have several from which to choose depending on how many backups you can
store on a drive separate from the one where the OS is loaded. Do you
really want to restore your computer back to its factory state (the
backup you created with a fresh setup) and lose all the programs, their
licensing keys, and data that was on the drive? Well, you do that with
backup software provided you saved a backup soon after building or
getting your computer, or you could choose which backup from many to
choose for a restore. Just because you lost some data files, or an
update fucked the OS, doesn't mean you want to start from scratch, or
from a backup made months or years ago.

micky wrote:
> In alt.comp.os.windows-10, on Sat, 2 Dec 2023 18:42:11 +0000, Ed Cryer
> <ed@somewhere.in.the.uk> wrote:
>
>> micky wrote:
>>> AOMEI OneKey Recovery,
>>> which it says creates a recovery partition (sort of like what
>>> some manufacturers make) and iiuc you can update it periodically so it's
>>> got all your data too!!
>>> https://www.ubackup.com/onekey-recovery.html
>>>
>>> Any opinions on this? The first 3 reviews I saw were good.
>>>
>>> Not only is my desktop refurbished but I redid my laptop from scratch,
>>> because I was replacing a bad drive with an SSD. Would AOMEI
>>> Onekey-recovery put me in the good situation like an owner of a new
>>> computer with a hidden recovery partition?
>>
>> Two points.
>>
>> 1. It claims to be able to create an ex-factory partition. Without an
>> already existing partition or at least some data about what should be in
>> it, how could it do that?
>
> It bases it on what is in your working C: partition now.
>
>> 2. Why not simply use a freely available clone-or-image maker such as
>> Macrium Reflect or Acronis?
>
> It's big thing is that when the start-up files are ruined, all you have
> to do is press F11 and it finds the recovery partition and starts up
> your computer. This would be especially helpful when traveling with a
> laptop and I dont' have external drives with me.
>
>> Hold back your wallet. You don't need that program. Even if you have a
>> recovery partition but have lost the ability to restore from it, there
>> are other methods available.
>>
>> Tell us your specific problem, and you'll get lots of help here.
>
> I don't have a problem yet. I'm planning ahead, LOL. Two years ago I
> couldn't start my computer. I didn't want to wipe it and start over, so
> I tried all sorts of repair software and procedures, and finally read a
> passing remark about F11 and I tried that and it started right up,
> looking just like it had 2 months earlier. It was wonderully
> convenient.
>
> In this case the HP EliteDesk was really strange since maybe it had a
> recovery partition when new but it was refurbished by someone selling
> via Amazon, and though it had an HDD and SDD, I used partition managers
> and there was only one partition on each drive. No recovery partiton,
> but somehow F11 worked anyhow.
>
>> Ed

So then, all their program does is look for a hidden restore partition,
copy it to the C drive, and provide the ability to overwrite the whole C
drive with that. To do which, of course, you would boot Windows as
normally, click on the program and wait while it runs. Which requires
Windows to be bootable and the partition to be malware-free.
That appears to call for other considerations from your
forward-thinking. How to ensure those two future requirements will be true.

Ed