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Clone and resize Raid 1

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Our Dell running Windows 2008 server is out of space. It has two HD's are raided (raid 1) using the built in Dell raid card. Can Acronis True Image Clone the drives to larger newer drives and also resize the existing partitions?

Thanks!

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Nope.  You cannot clone any RAID, dynamic or hybrid drives.  

You can, however, take a full backup of the system and restore an image to RAID, dynamic or hybrid drives.  The key is that you need to setup the RAID with the new drives first so they appear as a single drive to the Acronis OS and then restore the image to it.  

In the process, yes, it will allow this to go from smaller drives to larger ones and it will resize the existing space.  worse case, you can extend the volume in Windows disk management if it does not for some reason (but it should).

CAVEATS:

1) must be done with the offline bootable rescue media

2) default bootable rescue media is linux and wont' work in this case because Linux RAID controller drivers stink.  You wold need to build a winpe version.  Basically, just install the latest Windows 10 ADK (best driver supprt out of the box) and pick the WinPE build option.  Build it to a USB flash drive because you then need to manually update the WinPE by injecting the proper RAID controller drivers.  If you use Windows 10 ADK, needs to be Windows 10 PE drivers.  If there are none for this   .... BUT, then you have to go and inject the IRST drivers or the dell controller drivers in the WinPE separately using DISM ADK commands.  There's  a simple way to do this with DISMGUI as outlined here: https://forum.acronis.com/forum/112372#comment-387006

Glad to help.  Good luck :) If possible, try to test on a non-production server (just in case).  As long as you have a good backup though, you should be able to restore with your recovery media, but better to try and not use production equipment for testing if you can avoid it. 

Make sure to take a bakup of the existig system first with your ADK/WinPE Acronis recovery.  That way, you'll know if it is seeing your RAID disk and can back it up.  If it can, it should be able to restore the image just fine to the same hardware (well, with the large disk in the new RAID set as the only major change), without issue. 

I have a follow up question. Will I be able to Install Acronis True Image 2017 on Windows server 2008 in order to make the initial clone of the drive (and or the boot media)? Or will I have to install Acronis on a Windows 10 desktop computer to create the boot media with WinPE, drivers, etc. 

1. Will acronis True Image install on Windows server 2008?
2. If it does, can I clone the drive while windows 2008 server is running?
3. If True Image does install on Win2008, can I create the boot media from the 2008 machine?

Thank you

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David B wrote:

I have a follow up question. Will I be able to Install Acronis True Image 2017 on Windows server 2008 in order to make the initial clone of the drive (and or the boot media)? Or will I have to install Acronis on a Windows 10 desktop computer to create the boot media with WinPE, drivers, etc. 

1. Will acronis True Image install on Windows server 2008?
2. If it does, can I clone the drive while windows 2008 server is running?
3. If True Image does install on Win2008, can I create the boot media from the 2008 machine?

Thank you

1. It might, but it's not supported.  Technically, Server 2008 matches Vista on the release dates, so should be compatible in that regard.  If you have server 2008R2 that would match Windows 7 (in theory).   Oddly enough, VISTA isn't listed at all, but neither are any current server OS.

 http://www.acronis.com/en-us/support/updates/changes.html?p=39386

Operating systems:

  • Windows 10
  • Windows 8.1 (all editions)
  • Windows 8 (all editions)
  • Windows 7 SP1 (all editions)
  • Windows Home Server
  • Windows XP SP3 (32-bit)

2. Never start a clone from within Windows.  You're asking for trouble.  When you start a clone or full disk recovery from Windows, the system must reboot and then the Windows bootloader is overwritten with Acronis which is LINUX.  If the drivers are not there (a big problem if you have a RAID setup or any RAID controller), chances are it will fail to load.  Bigger chance that if it fails to load, it won't properly return the bootloader back to the original and then you will have to deal with that.  This can all be avoided by using rescue media and is the only way I will ever recommend doing a clone or full disk recovery

Also, if you are using RAID (or have RAID as the SATA mode) or any dynamic disks, clone is not an option at all.  You would need to do a full disk image and restore.

3. If it installs, yes, you should be able to create the boot media from that system.  Personally, when dealing with a server, I would always use WinPE to boot so that you can inject additional drivers (especially if you have a RAID controller on the hardware - Linux default media usually doesn't have RAID controller drivers - not even IRST).  I would recommend installing the Windows 10 ADK (which should install with server 2008) and then build WinPE rescue media using our MVP WinPE builder (linked below along with a link for Windows ADK from Microsoft).  

Do you have any advise for if the server does not want to boot from the WinPE Win10 ADK USB recovery media? Is there also a chance if I use a bootable CD, True Image will recognize the raid without injecting the RAID controller drivers? If I have to build a CD I'm wondering how to add the RAID controller drivers.
Thank you,

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WinPE is the best chance of the recovery media to detect all hardware of your server.  If you can build it, it should boot.  Use our MVP winpe builder. (linked below in all of my posts)  Try it just as is, using the advanced 7.2 method and give it a go.  If it doesn't detect your drives by default, you probably have a custom RAID controller and would need to just put your drivers in the x64 driver folder of our tool.  We already include the Intel IRST RAID controller drivers, that might be enough.  

I was able to boot using the CDrom, it would not boot to the USB. True Image was able to see the drive, so I was able to create an image and restore that image to a drive, and I also created a clone to another drive. I tried booting from both the cloned drive and the drive with the restore, having connected them to the SATA on the motherboard. When booting the server from either of the drives, it starts to boot, I see the Windows logo, etc. then it goes to a black screen with the mouse. It won't go any further. I can use dos tools and see that the C: drive has all the data and is intact. Any ideas? I noticed something about drive signature during the processes, do I need to re-image and check that option during another restore process?

Thank you!

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Check to make sure your storage controller seetings in the machine bios are set the same as that of the machine from which the image was taken.  If the source image booted as RAID so would the new target machine.

Originally the machine was booting from RAID with a controller card. After imaging to a new drive it's just booting from a SATA drive connected to the motherboard. Will this work?

Or, do I have to build the RAID with the new drives and restore the image to the RAID array to make it boot propertly?

Note: I have noticed that I can boot to a local computer account using F8 and selecting the "Directory Services Restore Mode" option.

Thank you, 

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You would probably want to use AHCI as a storage controller mode I would think,  as long as your board supports it which it should.

The problem is that the image you are using is looking for raid driver even though you're not using raid.  you need to supply the proper AHCI driver for the controller on your board.  I would think you could use Universal Restore to do that.   There is a sticky guide at the top of the True Image 2017 Forum main page that provides the steps necessary to add UR to WinPE.

I'm sorry I don't understand. It does seems like the system is either looking for the old RAID controller, or that it needs a driver for the SATA HD, but it will boot into Windows with "Directory Services Restore Mode".  The BIOS on this system is very basic, I've looked a dozen times and there are no options for storage controller settings or any options other then to turn off SATA or ATA mode (which turns off all SATA MOBO ports). I also don't have ACHI in the bios. I've physically removed the RAID card. I looked at the sticky post, "MustangPE plugins are now available for TI 2017 and Universal Restore", but it does not explain how to add UR to the WinPE. It seems like there should be a way to get Windows to realize that it's using a SATA connected HD now and not RAID. Would rebuilding the BCD be an option? I found this: https://www.lifewire.com/how-to-rebuild-the-bcd-in-windows-2624508

Thank you!

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When building WinPE, Acronis does not build WinPE with both Acronis and UR - you have to build seperate media.  MustangPE will let you add both though.

That said, you can build a seperate WinPE for both the Acronis rescue media and UR restore.  When building WinPE, I would suggest trying our MVP WinPE media create (advanced mode brings some really nice features like a file explorer, IRST drivers for Win7-10, a web browser and more).

To build your UR WinPE, you need to launch the UR media builder "C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Acronis\UniversalRestore\UniversalRestore.exe" and pick the WinPE option.

FYI, I would recommend that you intall the Windows 10 ADK 1511 for your builds (it's compatible on Win 7 - Win 10) and will give you better driver support "out of the box" than older ADK versions. 

Last... unfortunately, Windows is "dumb" when it comes to switching your bios SATA mode from AHCI to RAID or vice-version.  Windows 10 does this much better than previous OS versions and usually can do this on it's own.  However, Windows 7 is very bad at this and requires that you prep the OS in advance:  Here is the Microsoft KB article:  https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/922976.  If you run the fixit tool BEFORE you make the bios change, with Win 7, then you should be in good shape.  

Please disregard my comments for the WinPE and UR.

I believe that you should be able to activate AHCI for the SATA controller by modifying the Windows registry key to turn on the feature so that default drivers are then available for Windows to run.

As always there are risks when modifying the registry so a backup of the registry is recommended prior to following the steps below.

1. While booted in Directory Services Restore Mode open regedit using the Search or Run box.

2. Locate and then click one of the following registry subkeys:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\Msahci

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\IastorV

3. In the pane on the right side, right-click Start in the Name column, and then click Modify.

4. In the Value data box, type 0, and then click OK.

5. On the File menu, click Exit to close Registry Editor.

Once you perform the above reboot the machine, it should start normally.  The second registry key ending with IastorV you should only find if the machines SATA controller is an Intel controller.  If you have another make of SATA controller on board then you should only find the Msahci key in the registry.

I wish I could try this registry change, but I ran out of time and had to put the server back into production for the upcoming week. I'll be able to remove the server in a few weeks to try again. I want to thank you both for your help! The reason I chose Acronis over all of the other software on the market is because of the support I received in this forum.

Thank you!

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Keep us posted on your progress.

Just wanted to post an update. Maybe it will be helpful for anyone that runs into this issue. First I want to thank Bobbo and Enchantech for the help.

I wasn't able to get the server to boot from a restored image of the raid array when it was restored to a HDD and plugged into SATA port on the motherboard. It would boot part way and stop at a black screen and the mouse arrow, but no further. Just for fun, I put that same drive that wouldn't boot in the server in a more modern desktop computer, (also a Dell) and it booted. So maybe a registry or BiOS issue. The solution I came to was to purchase the same SCSI card that was in the server.

1. Created Acronis image of Windows server OS
2. Removed old SCSI card and HDD drives
3. Install newer SCSI card, configured raid on two new drives
4. Booted to the Acronis CD and restore image to new raid array
-- The drive partitions were too small, and for some reason I was unable to resize during the Acronis imaging
5. Purchased Partition Magic Server, resized the drive and fixed something with the D: drive. All before booting the restored image
6. Booted normally