TI 2014 and Rescue Media
I've been very happy with TI 2014 for many years. Finally needed it to restore a trashed hard drive. I had created and tested bootable rescue media on a USB stick and while it did indeed boot to TI, it had no option to connect to my network, where all my backups live on a NAS. This leads me to a couple of questions...
1- Is TI 2014 rescue media not capable of reaching a network for a restore process?
2- If it is, please provide a step-by-step guide as to how to accomplish this.
3- If it isn't, can TI 2020 rescue media do it?
4- If TI 2020 rescue media can reach my network, please point me to the URL for upgrading. I have one standard and one premium version and would like to upgrade them both to premium. All I can find on the TI 2020 upgrade page is upgrading three computers (or 1) to TI 2020 -standard- which I don't want.
Thanks for your help
Thanks Steve, for the welcome and the reply.
The LAN in the house is all CAT5 ethernet, so I'm not dealing with a potential WiFi issue.
Once the rescue media has booted, there is no option to select the network as a location for the backup file(s). There are options for FTP and NAS, along with my local partitions. Clicking on the NAS option does nothing.
A quick look at the four links leads me to believe that the first may be the most relevant. I will spend some time with that tomorrow and report back. I do see that the screenshots in that link show TIH 2016, so the suggestions made there may not work for me on my TIH 2014 installation.
I'd really not like to buy the 2020 version unless it can (easily) do what I want and that my 2014 version can not.
Again - thanks.
Fred, when you are using the ATI 2014 rescue media, look at the top menu and click on the 'Tools & Utilities' option to show the drop-down menu, then click on 'Options' at the bottom of that menu and check that you are seeing your network adapter being detected and given a valid IP address for your network.
The next 2 images were captured from the ATI 2018 Rescue Media (using WinPE) as I could not authenticate with my Synology NAS using the ATI 2014 media (perhaps due to not having SMB 1.0 enabled on the NAS), but show the principle here.
Thanks Steve. First off, I haven't had time to test out the first link in your initial reply. Sometimes life just gets in the way of technology.
As for your most recent post, in TIH 20104 I have previously done what you suggest, but there is nothing showing. No 'eth0', no adapter settings, and obviously, no request for credentials. This is happening on two machines, both Win 10, but one 'standard' version of TIH and the other the 'premium' version. Both versions paid for and activated.
I'm hesitant to contact support directly because from what I've read in the forums, they're piss-poor in understanding the issue and/or responding correctly.
I usually have good luck with user-run forums, so here I am. Any further suggestions?
Fred, if you are using ATI 2014 with Windows 10 then you are already in an unsupported environment as the earliest version of ATI to be supported with Windows 10 was ATI 2015.
The next issue is that the ATI 2014 rescue media uses an old version of Busybox Linux as the boot OS and this is probably the reason why your network card is not being detected and therefore no IP address etc.
The only supported versions of ATI are now 2020 and perhaps 2019 for users who get in very quickly, so to get support for ATI 2014 would be on a Pay Per Incident fee basis!
Acronis have moved away from the Linux rescue media in ATI 2018 and later versions, where these now create Windows PE media using files from the Windows Recovery Environment, so that this ensures the greatest compatibility with the hardware devices found in the computer. The older Linux media can still be downloaded as an ISO file or created via the Rescue Media Builder tool, but this lacks support for some modern devices such as NVMe M.2 SSD's and any using RAID for performance.
Personally, I would recommend biting the bullet and upgrading to ATI 2020 either when you are given an upgrade offer, or else when such offers are published in the Acronis Current Promotions KB 46984: Current Promo where Acronis offer any discounts for upgrades etc.
ATI 2020 will look and feel different to your ATI 2014 application but has much better support for Windows 10 and the newer hardware devices etc found in modern computers.
I would recommend taking a 30-day Trial of ATI 2020 to check out the differences etc. Also see KB 2768: Trial version limitations of Acronis products for what can / can't be done with trial software.
Finally, if considering ATI 2020, take a browse in the ATI 2020 Forum for a better understanding of some of the outstanding issues present in the new version.
Again, great information, Steve. Thanks.
I do see that it may indeed be time to bite the bullet. Especially if I'll be able to boot from rescue media and see my network. I have downloaded the trial as suggested and will install it on a virtual machine. I have also email Acronis as I feel my upgrade situation is different from what I see available online. I've asked them for the cost of upgrading my current 2014 Standard and 2014 Premium to two 2020 Premiums. And if I can get two licenses or would three be more cost-efficient.
I guess I won't even try to follow the instructions on your first post.
Do you know if my current backups made with 2014 still be readable on 2020? I guess I'll find out once I install the trial, but that could still be a few days away - or perhaps not until the weekend.
Thanks again.
Fred, follow the link in my signature for Backup archive compatibility as this shows that your ATI 2014 backups should be fine with ATI 2020.
I'm embarrassed to admit I didn't read your sig. And you've got enough info there that should satisfy any issue :-)
Thanks again.
@Steve- I still haven't been able to trial 2020. I have three machines - Win7, Win10Pro, & Win10Enterprise. My virtual machine is also Enterprise and when I install the trial on the VM and launch it, it will not accept my credentials. Nor will it accept them when I try to create a new account.
I had a live chat with support yesterday and it appears that 2020 will not run on Enterprise even though it is essentially a stand-alone install. It's not in a domain, but it is on a wired LAN. As are the other two machines.
Today I bought a 2TB portable USB drive and attached it to the Win10Pro machine and ran a b/u with the portable as the destination. I then rescue booted and while the portable appears as a source, I doesn't show any tib files. It also has a different drive letter than when it was used as the destination, but I don't think that's the problem. I will attempt to trial 2020 on this Pro machine at some point over the weekend.
It's now most unlikely I will purchase 2020 even if it works on the 10Pro box as that would mean I'd have to have a different solution for the Enterprise machine. This is pretty damn frustrating.
Any thoughts or suggestions would be appreciated.
I had a live chat with support yesterday and it appears that 2020 will not run on Enterprise even though it is essentially a stand-alone install.
The ATI 2020 User Guide: Supported operating systems states clearly!
Acronis True Image 2020 has been tested on the following operating systems:
- Windows 10 (all editions, including May 2019 Update, except for Windows IoT edition and Windows 10 LTSB) *
- Windows 8.1 (except for Windows Embedded editions)
- Windows 8 (except for Windows Embedded editions)
- Windows 7 SP1 (all editions)
- Windows Home Server 2011
* Beta builds are not supported. For more information, refer to https://kb.acronis.com/content/60589
The above clearly contradicts what support have told you about Win 10 Enterprise so you should reply quoting their own user guide statement!
Today I bought a 2TB portable USB drive and attached it to the Win10Pro machine and ran a b/u with the portable as the destination. I then rescue booted and while the portable appears as a source, I doesn't show any tib files. It also has a different drive letter than when it was used as the destination, but I don't think that's the problem. I will attempt to trial 2020 on this Pro machine at some point over the weekend.
Fred, if the Win10Pro machine is running an older version of ATI, then there should be no issue with seeing the .tib files on your external drive. With ATI 2020, the default now is .tibx files for any Disk backup but the rescue media can default to showing .tib files rather than both .tib & .tibx, so the file type would need to be changed in the selection box to show .tibx files.
Acronis True Image 2020 has been tested on the following operating systems:
- Windows 10 (all editions, including May 2019 Update, except for Windows IoT edition and Windows 10 LTSB) *
* Beta builds are not supported. For more information, refer to https://kb.acronis.com/content/60589
The above clearly contradicts what support have told you about Win 10 Enterprise so you should reply quoting their own user guide statement!
Okay, now I'm confused. Live chat tech told me Enterprise is not supported on 2020. Your quote says the same thing. Yet you say the quote contradicts what support told me.
if the Win10Pro machine is running an older version of ATI, then there should be no issue with seeing the .tib files on your external drive.
Yes, I was using TIH 2014 and it saw the portable drive, but when I browsed to it, no files show at all. There are six .tib files there. The are seen if I launch 2014 from the desktop icon on a normal boot, but not when booted from the rescue USB stick. I will try this again later today.
EDIT: I had a few minutes and can confirm there are six .tib files on the portable. And they are seen with file manager and with 2014 when launched via a regular boot to Windows. Yet when I use the rescue boot, and browse to the directory where they are stored on the portable, they do not appear. Even when I change 'file type' to all files. I even went so far as to share out the files. So the only conclusion I can come up with is that there is something wrong with 2014 when it creates the rescue media.
I may gather the strength to try again but on the Enterprise machine.
Fred, are you saying that the Enterprise edition of Windows 10 is shown as either IoT or LTSB? If so, then this is my misunderstanding and misquote! I do not have any Enterprise edition software.
Strange about the .tib files if they can be seen correctly from Windows but not from the boot media?
Fred, are you saying that the Enterprise edition of Windows 10 is shown as either IoT or LTSB? If so, then this is my misunderstanding and misquote! I do not have any Enterprise edition software.
Yes, it shows as LTSB - see attachment.
Strange about the .tib files if they can be seen correctly from Windows but not from the boot media?
Strange indeed. I have two experiments in front of me. One is to try the Win 10 Pro machine but with a different portable drive and see if they show up when booted from the rescue media. The other is to try it on the Enterprise machine, just to see if the files show up on the boot media.
Strange about the .tib files if they can be seen correctly from Windows but not from the boot media?
It gets somewhat stranger. From some initial testing, I've either got a bad USB port or a funky USB portable drive. When the portable is plugged into a port in the back of the machine, it doesn't see the tib files, but does see everything else on the drive. (This is when booting with the rescue media.) When the same portable is plugged into a front port, the tib files are there. But the first part of this doesn't make any sense. How/Why can the rescue media be 'selective' in what files it shows when browsing through the disk?
And when booting normally and running TIH 2014 when I point to the portable whether it's plugged into the 'bad' back port or the front port, the tib shows. This is a real head scratcher. Perhaps I haven't consumed enough beer to understand why this would be.
Fred, in the forums, it is normally the rear USB ports that are most reliable because they are usually soldered directly on the PC motherboard, whereas the front ports are connected by cables, so it is unusual to read of this problem occuring with the rear ports but not those on the front?
The only other thought is whether there are different USB controllers involved here and used for the separate sets of USB ports?
Ideally, I would recommend using the Windows PE version of the Rescue Media for the greatest degree of compatibility but with ATI 2014 this is a much more difficult media to create than it is with the later versions, especially with 2018 and later versions where WinPE is now the default type used.
Thanks Steven.
Yes, I know about front vs rear USB ports and that only adds to the mystery. I've now gotten hold of an Acronis tech person via email and going back and forth with him and his Level Two support folks, it appears that 2020 -should- work with Enterprise. I've been asked to gather logs and screenshots and send to them. Unfortunately I won't be able to send some of the screensshots as I can't actually launch to program. It's rejecting my credentials upon first launch after install. But I'll send them what I can. And if need be, I'll uninstall 2014 from my 'real' machine and try 2020 there.
I'll keep you updated.
The issue on the Win10 Pro machine not seeing the network when booting from a rescue USB with the backup files on a portable drive has been resolved by replacing the portable drive. The original was a 2tb Seagate and the new one is a 2tb Western Digital. And despite they are both owned by one company (I can't remember if WD bought Seagate or visa-versa) the WD works just fine.
On the Win10 LTSB machine, Acronis support is still gather files and logs from me. The impression they gave is that it 2020 should work with LTSB, although they didn't say it outright. But they keep asking me for logs and files, and I feel they wouldn't be spending time with it if it wasn't supported.
While there hasn't been complete resolution of the main issue, I'm documenting it here in case others are having similar problems.
I'll provide more info as it becomes available.
Fred, thanks for the update. It is interesting that Acronis support is pursuing the Win 10 LTSB based issue, which makes me wonder if that is simply a version of the OS that they have never had their hands on for testing?
I received an email from support this morning notifying me of the release of "Acronis True Image 2020 update 1 which has fixed issues."
I don't have time this morning to install and test, but the updated release notes shows (among other things) that one of the required operating systems is " Windows 10 (all editions, including September 2019 Update, except for Windows IoT editions.)" Note that Windows 10 now does not show LTSB as an exception.
I will be testing later today and reporting back, but this is very encouraging. Both with my contact tech who stuck with me, and with the folks behind him who apparently got the info they needed from me to correct this issue. (I hope.)
Fred, thanks for the update and good to read of your continued support for this issue.
Bad news and good news...
The updated version of TIH2020 will still not accept my credentials on the virtual Win10 LTSB machine.
I decided to bite the bullet and try it on my 'real' LTSB box and it worked. The trial is running. My backup plans came over with no new configuration needed. I created the rescue USB stick with Windows PE and booted to it. It's still not seeing the network, nor offering me a way to find it. This may be due to not copying the NIC drivers to the rescue media. (@Steven- can you confirm that this is likely what the issue is?) If so, I'll have to dig around to find them and experiment a little more with building the rescue media.
But other than that, TIH2020 appears to be working well. I will play with it for a couple of days and then purchase the update. It'll be good to get out of 2014.
Fred, the Acronis Rescue Media only has support for common wired network adapters with minimal, if any, support for wireless adapters. So the recommendation would be to ensure that you are using a wired connection with the rescue media.
This is a wired ethernet connection using an onboard Intel I219-V card. Seems to be fairly common. The problem is with the way Intel distributes their drivers. I have downloaded a zip from their site for many (many!) cards, mine among them. It would easy if I wanted to update the existing drivers on the PC. But it's not so easy to find which .inf file relates to the card in question so that I can extract it and then point the rescue media builder to it for inclusion.
We've now drifted off from the part of the OP dealing with 2014, but the 'rescue media' portion of the OP still exists only with TIH 2020. Should I start a new thread or continue here?
Fred, how are you creating the rescue media in ATI 2020?
If you are using the top 'Simple' option, this should pick up the device drivers from your Windows Recovery Environment without the need to add further drivers.
I used the 'advanced' option initially. I'm now creating the rescue media again using 'simple.' This will get tested later tonight or tomorrow. As always, thanks for the pointer.