Tator

You can install AHCI drivers to WinXP if you want both of your OS to be in AHCI mode. See TBOSDT Pro (the OSDTool script)...

http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/tbosdt.htm

TBOSDT doesn't install, it just unzips to a folder. In the scripts folder are 3 run files. Edit drvins_1.run with Notepad. There are instructions in the manual. This might not work with your SATA controller but the Pro version contains osdtool.tbs which will work and it is easy to use. Again, see the manual.

You need to obtain the press F6 type SATA/AHCI drivers. I put them on a flash drive for the install.

Attempt to restore image using Discwizard 11 fails giving error message that the computer needs to be repaired using the install disk.  Trying different repair options on the Win8.1Pro install disk finds there is a missing partition.  Looks like Discwizard 11 is no good for the newer Windows backups.

I also tried Discwizard 13 which is supposed to work, but it failed to restore image 2 or 3 times in only a handful of tries to restore.  Looks like Discwizard 13 is too unreliable to use for any backup.

Edit:  Above result has proven to be invalid due to operator error by yours truly.  In my Discwizard 11 experiment I tried simply restoring the Win8.1Pro image to a blank partition to avoid tampering with my Win8.1Pro install if it failed to work.  Then I retried same steps using Easeus Todo Backup Free and got identical results.  I then finally tried Discwizard restore image to partition where my Win8.1Pro is installed, and it restored and booted to Windows normally.

Apparently Win8 must create a hidden partition during install which means simply restoring an image to a blank partition will not boot.  The fact that Discwizard still works for newest Windows version is very good news to me.  Discwizard 11 was and still is my all time favorite backup software!

Tator


Tator wrote on Jan 13^th, 2015 at 9:14am:


Here's the link that should work: http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/test-centre/software/3263573/13-best-backup-software-...

I have put an *Edit* in your original post above.

Regarding your two observations above:  The forum software abbreviates hyperlinks that are longer than a certain length.  That started happening one or two forum software updates ago.  Before that, the full hyperlink was shown.  So, that's normal forum software behavior--and somehow the software remembers the *whole* hyperlink, and has nothing to do with your link problem!

Regarding the second highlighted issue--you put a period at the end of your sentence in your original post just after the hyperlink that is not working.  Although good punctuation, that creates a syntax error as far as a hyperlink is concerned--the forum software does not know where the hyperlink ends, and thinks your period is part of the link--that's what's throwing everything off.  A *space* is needed at the end of the link and before the period so the forum software knows when the hyperlink has ended.

You can test your hyperlinks before posting if you use the *Preview* function and click on the hyperlink to see if it works okay. 

Hope that helps in the future.

Tator wrote on Jan 18^th, 2015 at 7:48pm:


Tator, that's a key difference. In a default installation, the BCD is designed to boot a *specific* partition. Imaging one partition and trying to restore that image to another partition seldom works unless you also reconfigure the BCD to tell it where the boot partition has been moved to. That's what a repair with the install disc would fix--and hence is the common solution typically recommended by others.

This is not just a problem with DiscWizard or Easus--you'll encounter the same problem with most imaging/cloning programs (including Acronis, Ghost, Paragon, and even Terabyte), especially if you're not doing a whole disk image/restore or your system uses a separate System Reserved partition.

You can solve the problem either proactively or reactively. The proactive solution involves installing Win8 from the beginning in a manner that does not precisely specify the boot partition in the BCD.  Brian and I have discussed that in earlier threads, and refer to the technique as "generalizing" the BCD.

The reactive solution is to leave as is and simply repair the BCD if the image is restored to a partition other than the original source partition. That's not as hard as it may sound, and can take only seconds once you get used to it so you know what you're doing. Some imaging programs--such as Macrium Reflect or Terabyte's BootIt Bare Metal--offer tools that make fixing the BCD easy.

Tator wrote on Jan 24^th, 2015 at 10:19am:


I don't think it's that straightforward.  My understanding is the BCD method involves GUID parameters so even though you may think you've duplicated the partition layout the partitions will almost certainly have different GUIDs. Note that a whole-disk restore will work more often because it restores all partitions, plus the MBR and boot track of the hard disk.  If you do partition restores you may miss certain pieces of the puzzle.

As for information on generalizing the BCD, do a forum search here for the term "generalize" (in the messages, not the titles) and you should come up with many threads.  A lot of them go back 4 or 5 years, so be sure your search goes back that far.  Some of those threads even have links to tutorials on the Terabyte website relevant to generalization.

In a nutshell, "generalizing" means to configure the BCD to simply boot whichever is the active partition, regardless of location or GUID.  Therefore, the technique only works if the "Active", "Boot" and "System" partitions are one and the same.  IOW, if you install Windows in the default Microsoft layout (which creates a SRP) you cannot generalize the BCD because the default is to create separate "Boot" and "System" partitions.

I've never encountered the "locked drive" message so can't help you there.  I rarely if ever use the install disc for repair because it's kind of a "catch-all" answer and I don't like not knowing what's it fixing, so I mostly use other tools when I can.

I can't tell from your posts whether you have a SRP (I think you probably do) or even whether you have a MBR disk.  You seem to have Win8.x, and by default Win8 will create a GPT disk instead of a MBR disk if given a completely blank hard disk to install on.  Those details are crucial for any discussion of imaging, restoring, generalizing, or multibooting.

Tator

We are interested in knowing your partition layout and OS.

As you have found, free imaging apps can cost in time and worry. Having something that works every time is very comforting.

I've generalized the BCD when running imaging tests with Ghost 2003 but otherwise I don't generalize the BCD. The TeraByte apps have two options which makes this unnecessary. "Automatic Boot Partition Update" for entire drive restores and "Update Boot Partition" for partition restores. You can restore the OS image to any partition or Free Space on the HD and the OS boots.

With UEFI installs in Win8 and Win10 you get 4 partitions....

Recovery 300 MiB
EFI system partition 99MiB
Microsoft reserved partition 128 MiB
Basic data partition (the OS)

Using TeraByte apps you can restore these partitions in random order, anywhere on a blank HD you like and the OS boots. To do this use the "Restore First Track" option with the first image restore and the "Update Boot Partition" option with the last image restore.