Boot recovery sucks from modern Dell laptop - Video included
I bought a New Dell Inspiron 15" 7000 2 in 1 laptop. I set out to clone and recover it with the 2018 version, I had issues so I just decided to bite the bullet and upgrade to the 2020 version. Nothing much has changed.
PE version user interface basically does not work on a UHD monitor. PE version detected Wifi as ethernet (at 1:40, although I hadn't noticed this when I shot the video, my assumption was wrong I did not get a network).
Linux recovery does not detect network or Wifi. Guess I shall try adding drivers in.
How about getting the basics right for modern PC's and laptop, and forget about the bloatware Acronis? Where is the quality control? Thx
EDIT - another thing. Their adverting shows I can back up an android mobile device in the 2020 version, but it's nowhere to be seen in the user interface! EDIT AGAIN - Nevermind - found it, that was well hidden.
Yes I did that straight afterwards, exactly the same issue. It makes no difference. I'm sorry I but I don't think it's the display drivers at all, it's a coding bug with the user interface simply cannot handle UHD resolution.. If they bother with a scalable windows user interface they should code it correctly. They aren't.
Funny how the Linux version can handle it, but I have other issues with that.
And it still thinks my WiFi is an ethernet port.
Alex,
Does your PC use integrated graphics or the NVIDIA discrete option?
Have you tried the MVP media builder tool?
Yes it's nvidia however it's clear True Image just can't handle UHD resolution.
I've tried all options in the advanced section when building media in True Image.
I haven't downloaded any third party tool (only the MS files) will look into it thx.
Yeah, I thought so.
In intensive testing with Mustang, the author of the MVP tool, it became apparent that setting screen resolution was a hit or miss proposition with the WinPE/RE media. I have a true 4k monitor that uses a 4096 x 2180 resolution. I run that monitor using the Intel onboard graphics so I am able to set screen resolution to a degree as desired if I include the graphic drivers in the WinPE/RE build. In testing with NVIDA however that never was achievable.
It really is not the TI application at fault here it is how drivers work in WinPE that cause the issue. We found that even when we had confirmation of successful driver installation it meant nothing at time and we got failure.
The MVP media is bettered suited for high res monitors even though this issue with driver exists. The media created has an app that allows for setting screen resolutions. Not all of the resolutions available in the app will work but you should find one that does. Hopefully you can find one that is acceptable and then build media with that resolution as the default.
Ok so I've used the tool.
1) Apparently latest version supported is 2019 according to documentation, nevertheless used it.
2) Created a stick, booted, True Image UI behaviour exactly the same
3) Can't change resolution to something else (see screenshot). Graphics mode not supported.
4) I note the build comes with 7Zip, explorer++, notepad++, and opera. All these applications work flawlessly. Yet True Image UI is exactly the same as demonstrated in the video. They shows me it does not work well at a higher resolution. It should and it isn't.
Image here:
https://i.imgur.com/9ZnRih4.jpg
Yey all of a sudden my posts have to be approved by admins before they get displayed. Nice.
Where did my last post go?
If you attached something that may trigger a delay in posting due to others actions.
Thx, no doubt you are right...
Throwing out some other ideas to test/try if you want...
Does that version of laptop offer the ability to disable discreet graphics in the bios? In some bootable media (Acronis or otherwise) there are some bios settings that can cause issues with high res monitors. So, I'd start with the simplest (potential) solution and see if you can either disable the nvidia card in the bios... which should then default to intel embedded graphics (assuming it has embedded graphics on the CPU) and may produce better results in the rescue media. Alternatively, if there is an option under display in the bios for Nvidia "Optimus" or something similar, then disable that and try to boot the rescue media after that. Don't forget to save bios changes to make them stay in effect on next reboot when testing. Here are a couple of example pictures from other Dell bios - the setting should be in the same place, but may have different options:
The second option, as mentioned by Enchantech, would be to try the MVP builder of the rescue media. There is a setting in WinPE / WinRE that will allow resolution switching (assuming a driver is present). It is a bit limited, but you can generally switch to 1920x1080 in most cases, which should hopefully be good enough to at least use the recovery media on a high res monitor. The MVP version has a tool called "set res" with some default settings that you can try to switch the resolution with - start with 1920x1080 as that's probably the best you'd get, but likely to be adequate if it works. The MVP tool is available from the links to the right of the Acronis forum, or the Acronis KB article:
The last screenshot I posted already shows me using setres using MVP builder.
I'll poke around in the BIOS, I appreciate everybody's help.
Regardless this app should work like all the other apps bundled with MVP, if Opera can work flawlessly, or 7ZIP, then something with such a basic UI as True Image should work just as well in UHD.
Nothing in the BIOS helped. Can't turn off the graphics card. I put in a 1tb Samsung evo plus 970 nvme ssd today, doesn't recognise that either with the boot media either :(
Not a good ride.
I will do a full review of drivers. I guess I need to talk to support now... This truly sucks.
I'm not impressed but I do appreciate people's help.
Alex,
Did you mean Samsung evo 970 plus rather than 870?
Having been running NVMe M.2 Samsung drives for several years now I would bet that your drive not being recognized is due to settings in your bios. You should look to the dell support site for help with that.
The drivers in MVP media are older drivers as it was written a couple of years ago. I have anticipated that the time would come when these storage drivers would have to be updated to the latest versions or, those versions added to the build routine.
I suggest that you download the latest Intel IRST OPTANE Premium drivers and add them to the boot media just in case that time has come since you have a new laptop.
I did some research on the Dell Inspiron Dual graphics and what I find is that such systems actually are running a non standard Hybrid Graphics setup where the base adapter, in this case Intel, is used for all applications and the driver is written in such a way as to artificially detect when acceleration is needed which then triggers the NVIDIA acceleration through the Intel adapter.
With such a configuration I believe you will find limited support for this Hybrid approach. The setup is designed to work in an installed Windows environment not in a Pre environment like WinPE/RE. The driver tightly integrates with the OS including right click context menus where you should find a context entry to enable the acceleration when it fails to do so on its own.
The best you will do with resolution for your machine is trial and error adjusting resolutions that work on your machine. The resolutions I have found that work on my 4k monitor with the WinPE media built with the MVP tool and using the setres app are:
Alex,
I looked a bit deeper into your graphics issue. The latest Dell driver and Intel are now using a Unified driver. The installer downloads some applications from the MS Store. Therefore you cannot use that driver for a WinPE/RE build.
On the Intel site the latest driver for Win 10, (that I assume you are using), the latest pre Unified driver is version 15.33.48.5069 This version of the driver can be downloaded from Intel, then the contents of the download extracted, and then used for injection into a WinPE/RE build.
What I propose here has at best a 50/50 chance of working for you. You can download the driver from HERE
Available downloads are listed on the left side of the linked page. Scroll the list and select the appropriate driver in .ZIP file format. Save the file in a temporary folder location that you create that is preferably in your C: root.
After you have downloaded the file to this location, open the location. Extract the contents of file in this temporary folder location. Once extracted you will find a file named igdlh64.inf (IGDLH in caps so there is no confusion). This is the driver information file which will tell the injection tool where all the necessary files are to install the driver.
As an example your information file would be in C:\temporary\igdlh64.inf
Open the MVP tool folder and look for folder Drivers_Custom. Expand it and find the x64 folder.
Open the x64 folder and create a new folder naming it Intel for example. Now, copy the contents of C:\Temporary to this folder. The driver files found the Driver_Custom folder will be injected in the WinPE/RE build when you run the tool and select to Add Custom drivers.
You can now run the tool and build new media with the drivers you have included. Once the build is finished boot the machine with it and see if that changes anything. If you are lucky the driver will fix your issue. If your not you can try running setres to select other resolutions that may now work to hopefully display a workable application interface for you.
Let us know if it works for you as we are looking at updating the MVP tool.
I made a schoolboy error with the SSD. Fixed now sorry for confusion.
Managed to workaround with Linux recovery for the moment but I will need to go back to Win media as I need it to read exFAT.
I have an MX250 display adapter although it doesn't want to handle Nvidia drivers just Dell. I'll check out your advice later in the week on Intel. Appreciated!
Alex,
In review of my last post I find that I omitted one step in the instruction on adding the graphics driver to the WinPE build using the MVP builder. It appears below.
After all files are copied into the x64\Intel folder you created, you will need to locate the igdlh64.inf file in that folder and rename it custom_dd.inf. This must be done prior to using the tool to build new media. The tool used in the MVP builder to inject custom drivers by default looks for the custom.inf file to operate.