Share via

Vista Ult 64 Complete PC Restore - won't or can't. Either way it's broken.

  • Article

Question

Thursday, November 5, 2009 7:03 AM

Detected an error on one of the Raid striped drives containing the OS. It's a new system so that's a bit peculiar. OK< the drive is under warranty so I plan to return it but don't want to go thru ____ getting everything re-installed. I run Complete PC Backup of the OS array to a separate mirrored drive array partition in the system. So, there are 2 drives in Raid 0 for the OS and another 2 drives in Raid 1 for data and the Complete PC Backup. The backup image only contains the OS array and nothing else. The data array is already mirrored and on separate drives so is not included. The backup image is ~30GB. The original OS data measures ~ 50GB.

I install another drive in the computer with 120GB capacity to restore to in order to test that this will actually work. It doesn't. Booting to the DVD I attempt to perform a complete restore. It scans the drives but does not list the backup image just made. There is no option to navigate to an image. In fact, there is no navigation possible at all as far as I can tell.  I then try to test if I can back in via the network drive option and that fails. For grins I then click the load driver button and low and behold I can navigate thru all the drives and find the image. But, the image isn't a driver and this tool is only looking for drivers at this point. Augh! How in the $%&@ is this supposed to work?

All replies (6)

Friday, November 6, 2009 5:31 AM âś…Answered

Hi,
Please send me the following file stored in your backup disk, from which the recovery is failing. I will let you know the exact disk requirements for the restore to succeed.
<backup-drive:\WindowsImageBackup\machine-name>\backup-time-stamp>\components*.xml.
Email to: vikas.ranjan at the rate microsoft.com (please fix the email syntax)

Other info,

  1. Backup and Recovery does not take into account the hardware RAID configuration. They treat the RAID array as a Normal Single disk (as it appears in Diskmgmt.msc).
        It's possible to replace a 100 GB RAID 0 array with another 120 IDE Single disk and the restore will work. (It needs to be the BOOT disk)

2) The free disk space is not taken into account for Windows backup/recovery. Only the Total hard disk size is taken into account for backup & recovery. You may have used only 10% of the entire disk but  Windows BMR would  require the new disk size to to more than original disk size.

  1. The Error you mentioned is not expected in normal scenario unless either the disk is not detected or the backup configuration got corrupted somehow.
         Please try the steps 4-9 again and send me the logs. Collect the logs @ x:\windows\logs\ and copy them to another drive (so that they are not lost when you reboot).
         You may zip them and send to my email address or store then in Skydrive:http://skydrive.live.com

  2. For your testing, request you to take another Complete PC backup to the same disk and try Restore from this new backup. (Please Clean the backup disk before triggerring the new backup)

  3. You may get some more info about BMR requirements in this thread:
    http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/windowsbackup/thread/11d8c552-a841-49ac-ab2e-445e6f95e704

Please send me the above mentioned info.

Thanks,
Vikas Ranjan [MSFT]
this information is provided as-is without any warranties, implicit or explicit.

Thursday, November 5, 2009 9:38 AM | 1 vote

Hi,
It seems that the backup does not support Complete PC Restore-(Bare Metal Recovery) - BMR.

Please make sure the following before recovering:

  1. Check the hard disk size of your Windows disk as shown in Diskmgmt.msc. The Recovery Boot disk size should be of greater or equal than the Backup time boot disk.
    E.g.: If Windows(Boot) disk is 150 GB during backup then the recovery boot disk should be greater or equal to 150 GB.

  2. The WindowsImageBackup folder is in the root of the drive. E.g.: D:\WindowsImageBackup and not D:\Myfolder\WindowsImageBackup.

  3. All the files are intact inside WindowsImageBackup folder. User is not expected to change the files/folders inside this directory.

  4. In Windows Recovery environment/Online OS.
    Open command prompt:

  5. Diskpart.exe

  6. List volume. Identify the drive: that contains your backup.

  7. Run: wbadmin get versions -backuptarget:<drive:>

  8. Does it show: Can recovery: Bare Metal Recovery. If Bare Metal Recovery is shown then your backup is recoverable by Complete PC Restore. If not then all the critical volumes are not backed up correctly.

  9. If BMR is shown, please try recovery from Cmd prompt:
    wbadmin start sysrecovery -recreatedisks -restoreallvolumes -version:<backup-version-id> -backuptarget:<backup-drive:> -execludedisks:<DiskID-to-be-excluded>

  10. To take another backup that supports BMR, boot back into Online OS and trigger the following

  • wbadmin start backup -allcritical -backuptarget:<backup-drive:>. It will list all the critical volumes
    OR
    Complete PC Backup.

Please try the above and reply with your findings.

Thanks,
Vikas Ranjan [MSFT]

this information is provided as-is without any warranties, implicit or explicit.

Friday, November 6, 2009 3:16 AM

Good eveing Vikas,

Answers:

  1. 120GB (new drive) >> 50GB (OS data). The 120GB is a drive capacity whereas the 50GB is the space occupied by the OS and Apps on C:. The C: drive array is 2TB though most of it is presently empty.
  2. The image directory is located at the root of a secondary partition (200GB) of the mirrored array, i.e., H:\WindowsImageBackup\PC\Backup 2009-11-04 062459
  3. Having no knowledge or tools to inspect said backup image I cannot verify the integrity of the image or associated catalog files beyond verifying the existence of a 30GB VHD file.
    4 ~ 9) "Error - specified location cannot be used to store backups" That's interesting given that no warning was provided when that location was originally specified to store the backup.
  4. Using wbadmin from normal boot and same backup location - reported successful.

Sunday, November 8, 2009 10:32 PM

The replacement drive arrived. So before swapping it for the failing one I created a fresh PC backup. Then, I swapped it in and performed the Complete PC restore. It worked.

Now, I'm trying to re-install XP on a secondary partition but despite following the instructions at Integration of the Intel SATA AHCI or SATA RAID drivers by using nLite I can't get past an IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL error after the automatic setup reboot that takes place during install. After the reboot Setup continues to install devices with the progress bar progressing until about 50% completion then pauses and BSODs. I've tried neutralizing BIOS to defaults, removing extra drives, removing RAM down to 2GB but still it persists in BSODing. So, how do I determine what is causing the BSOD?

This is the last entry in the setupai.log file. It appears to be trying to recognize the processor but I suspect that because my system uses an i7 Xtreme 950 that that may be the problem, i.e., XP has no compatible inf file.
[2009/11/08 13:21:59 368.820 Driver Install]
#-019 Searching for hardware ID(s): acpi\genuineintel_-_x86_family_6_model_10,*genuineintel_-_x86_family_6_model_10,acpi\genuineintel_-_x86_family_6,*genuineintel_-_x86_family_6,acpi\genuineintel_-_x86,*genuineintel_-_x86
#-018 Searching for compatible ID(s): acpi\processor
#-199 Executing "J:\WINDOWS\system32\setup.exe" with command line: setup -newsetup
#I022 Found "ACPI\Processor" in J:\WINDOWS\inf\cpu.inf; Device: "Processor"; Driver: "Processor"; Provider: "Microsoft"; Mfg: "(Standard processor types)"; Section name: "Processor_Inst".
#I023 Actual install section: [Processor_Inst.NT]. Rank: 0x00002000. Effective driver date: 07/01/2002.
#-166 Device install function: DIF_SELECTBESTCOMPATDRV.
#I063 Selected driver installs from section [Processor_Inst] in "j:\windows\inf\cpu.inf".
#I320 Class GUID of device remains: {50127DC3-0F36-415E-A6CC-4CB3BE910B65}.
#I060 Set selected driver.
#I058 Selected best compatible driver.
#-124 Doing copy-only install of "ACPI\GENUINEINTEL_-_X86_FAMILY_6_MODEL_10\7".
#-166 Device install function: DIF_REGISTER_COINSTALLERS.
#I056 Coinstallers registered.
#-166 Device install function: DIF_INSTALLINTERFACES.
#-011 Installing section [Processor_Inst.NT.Interfaces] from "j:\windows\inf\cpu.inf".
#I054 Interfaces installed.
#-166 Device install function: DIF_INSTALLDEVICE.
#I123 Doing full install of "ACPI\GENUINEINTEL_-_X86_FAMILY_6_MODEL_10\7".

This is the last entry from the setupact.log file. Dunno if it says anything important or not. I would think exit code 0 is a good thing. I include it because the file has the latest timestamp on it so I assume it contains whatever happened just before the BSOD.
The external program RUNDLL32 shell32,Control_RunDLL intl.cpl,,/f:"J:\WINDOWS\System32\winnt$.inf" /s:"L:\I386" returned exit code 0.
NetSetup: SetupMode: 0x1, ProductType: 0x0, OperationFlags: 0x8028

Monday, November 9, 2009 8:54 AM

Hi,
It's good to know that you were able to restore through Complete PC Restore. This newsgroup is only for backup/restore discussions.
For drive issues, please raise the question in an appropriate forum, e.g.: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/winserversetup/threads

Thanks,
Vikas Ranjan [MSFT]
this information is provided as-is without any warranties, implicit or explicit.

Tuesday, July 26, 2011 8:48 AM

Hi Vikas!

I have a similar issue to tocgay001 by Total Restore from SBS 2008 Server.

My Configuration:

Software Raid 1 (Windows Server OS) 2 500GB HDDs System=78 GB, Daten=387,70 38MB free!!!

by Total Restore I get Failure Code 0x80042408 not enough free place, but Hdds are the same!

Any Ideas?

 

Wikont.

MfG Wikont