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Restoring an image on a RAID 0 drive.

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I'm using True Image 2017 on a Win10 Pro 64bit OS. I recently created an Acronis bootable USB recovery drive (thumb drive) and to my surprise, I was able to see my RAID 0 disk including all partitions (RAID disk is comprised of two SSD's). I was also able to select that disk as the destination drive. The RAID drive is what was backed up in Acronis.  Previously (back in 2017), I'd had to create a special recovery drive using WinPE along with some other tools. That worked fine for the one time I'd wanted recover a backup.

I'm wondering if the  Acronis bootable recovery media creation software now includes support or RAID systems; in my case, a RAID 0. I guess I could test it but being my OS is minty-fresh and in no way in need of any tweaking, let alone a recovery, that's not an option. That said, I'd hate to wait until the day when I could use the recovery USB drive only to run into some sort of error message stating 'Storage (RAID) drivers not found' or something along those lines.  

? Thanks.

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David, welcome to these public User Forums.

The ability of the Acronis Rescue media to see any RAID drives as a single entity depends on two factors.

If RAID is configured in the hardware / BIOS settings, then this should be transparent to the rescue media and be shown as if is a single drive.

If RAID is configured via software using such as the Intel RST software drivers, then these drivers need to be injected into or present in the rescue media for ATI to see RAID as a single drive.

Given you are on ATI 2017, then I would suspect the first of the above is probably the case, as the rescue media has not been updated for this version since support ended back in 2017 after the next 2018 version was released.

With later versions of ATI from 2018 onwards, the rescue media created using the 'Simple' method uses the files & driver support taken from the Windows Recovery Environment, so would pick up these drivers in that way.

Hi Steve, the RAID is setup in BIOS (UEFI); that said, my ASUS Z270A motherboard's RAID makes use of Intel's RST. It's 'Onboard' RAID meaning the array is setup and controlled via UEFI software and ultimately by the CPU, not a RAID card. The fact that I'm seeing the RAID disk with all its partitions while in the Acronis rescue media environment and also having the option to select it as the destination drive, I'm assuming that's an indicator that it's doable...?

Thanks!

David, I would take it that way but the only 100% way to know would be to test the recovery, which doesn't sound like an option you want to go for as this is a new OS setup per your initial post.

I agree. Being it's Sunday and there's nothing more exciting to do right about now, I going to attempt a recovery to a different SSD, one that I don't mind erasing prior to a recovery attempt. Will let you know how that goes...

David Lucas wrote:

I agree. Being it's Sunday and there's nothing more exciting to do right about now, I'm going to attempt a recovery to a different SSD, one that I don't mind erasing prior to a recovery attempt. Will let you know how that goes...

It worked. That is, the Acronis recovery USB drive I'd recently created allowed for recovery to a 2nd RAID 0 disk I'd set up and used as a test; didn't need to mess with that 'minty-fresh' OS install...

The recovery app saw the RAID 0 drive I'd created as a recovery destination, one made up of some older Velociraptors HDD's. Booted up into Windows just fine. That said, it's way slow, at least compared to the RAID 0 set of two Samsung SSD's I'm usually running. FWIW, the original customized Acronis recovery media (WinPE) I'd made back in 2017 worked as well.

A note to anyone else reading this thread: 

Don't count on this recovery approach working on your particular motherboard. On my ASUS MB, numerous settings within UEFI need to set in a way that allowed for Acronis recovery media to 'see' my RAID 0 drive. In other words, I'm not counting on it working when I need it.  Safest bet is to just make the Acronis WinPE recovery version. 

David, glad to read of your successful test with the spare drives, thanks for sharing your feedback.

After all's said and done, I ended up creating another USB recovery drive, one using WinPE w/added RAID storage drivers. For whatever reason, the next time I'd used the standard recovery USB drive method, my actual on-board RAID configuration was not detected. It was able to recognize the external RAID drive I'd set up as a test but not the RAID that's on my MB, the one that counts! For me, the customized WinPE with additional drivers USB recovery method is the no risk way to go.

Thanks for your help, Steve; I can see why you're a "Legend"!