ATI 2021 and Restore Entire PC on HP Probook 450 G4
I have recently purchased ATI 2021 and have successfully backed up my HP Probook 450 G4. I am able to restore folders and files but when I try to restore the Entire PC, either through Windows or Rescue Media I receive error messages after the system tries to Restart.
I have contacted Support through web chat and after quite a lot of time, having tried various things including creating both Linux and WinPE bootable media, doing the backup on a sector by sector basis and enabling Legacy Support and disabling Secure Boot they advise that the security on the Probook is to secure for ATI to work properly.
While this is a business machine used in a small business nothing has been done to the set up since I bought the machine directly from HP. I do not have an IT department that tinkers with any settings: it is just me.
I do not have Bitlocker enabled on this machine, but I intend to enable it in due course. I have read various KB articles which indicate that Bitlocker and ATI do not really work well together if the machine needs to Restart.
ATI support have suggested I try Acronis Cyber Protect 15. I have had a quick look at this and it seems overly complicated for what I need.
Has anyone experienced any issues with the combination of an HP Probook 450 and ATI when trying to restore an Entire PC? If so, is there a solution that does not render the Probook less secure?
If ATI will not work with the Probook does anyone else know of any software I can use for System Images. Obviously, being able to restore folders and files is great but if disaster strikes I really want to be able to restore the System Image.
Thanks Steve. The errors are 0x1480000 when trying to restore within Windows and Null Reference error when trying to use bootable media. I have attached copies of pictures I took of errors.
The BIOS Mode is shown as UEFI.
As far as I am aware there is one disk installed on the Probook and it is an M.2 Sata Drive.
When I have tried to restore the Entire PC from both within Windows and bootable media I am prompted to Restart the PC and it is after that operation that the errors occur.
I am slightly worried that ATI Support are suggesting I do something that is not necessary or relevant.
Can you please let me have some more feedback on what you think the issue is.
I am not sure whether this is relevent but the PC is running Windows 10 Version 1709 and is having issues updating to newer versions. That is one of the reasons for testing whether I could restore as I am planning to reinstall the OS from media provided by HP and then update to 20H2 but want to know if that goes wrong for any reasons I have a backup I can successfully restore to.
Any recovery involving the Windows OS drive is best performed by booting the PC using the Acronis Rescue Media, and this should be done using the same BIOS boot mode as is used by your Windows OS.
Sorry Steve but I am not entirely sure what you mean here. If I create Simple (which I take to mean one that only really works on the PC I create it on it) rescue media, rather than Linux, how would I have any control over the BIOS boot mode. I apologise for my ignorance but I am not an IT professional.
RF, thanks for the images via the PDF files, the error being shown is one that I have not seen previously but looks to be purely related to the actual rescue media itself rather than the PC.
What media are you using to create the rescue media, i.e. are you using a DVD or using a USB memory stick? If the latter, then what size of USB memory stick?
The 'Simple' build option for the Acronis Rescue Media Builder tool will use your Windows 10 Recovery Environment files to create Windows PE rescue media which in turn will include support for your M.2 SSD drive, and because this is Windows boot media should work fine with your UEFI BIOS with Secure Boot enabled.
Your HP having a M.2 SSD requires that you boot into Windows using UEFI mode and that the drive is using GPT partition scheme for the M.2 SSD to be bootable. So changing the BIOS to use Legacy BIOS boot mode would not work here!
The first check to make is to check the status of your Windows Recovery Environment which is done via an Administrator level Command prompt or Powershell window using the following command: reagentc /info
C:\WINDOWS\system32>reagentc /info
Windows Recovery Environment (Windows RE) and system reset configuration
Information:
Windows RE status: Enabled
Windows RE location: \\?\GLOBALROOT\device\harddisk0\partition4\Recovery\WindowsRE
Boot Configuration Data (BCD) identifier: f613c408-ab3e-11e9-ac1c-a86daa71efa2
Recovery image location:
Recovery image index: 0
Custom image location:
Custom image index: 0
REAGENTC.EXE: Operation Successful.You should be seeing a similar response to the reagentc /info command as above.
I am not sure whether this is relevant but the PC is running Windows 10 Version 1709 and is having issues updating to newer versions. That is one of the reasons for testing whether I could restore as I am planning to reinstall the OS from media provided by HP and then update to 20H2 but want to know if that goes wrong for any reasons I have a backup I can successfully restore to.
There are some further tools / commands that you can try before reinstalling Windows from the HP original media!
DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /CheckHealth DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /ScanHealth DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth SFC /scannow
I would suggest running these in the order shown from an Administrator level Command prompt then run the Windows Update troubleshooter before retrying the update to the latest version of Windows 10 by using the Windows Update Assistant tool.
Dear Steve,
Thank you for your reply.
I am using a 16GB KIOXIA (Toshiba) USB 3.2 drive.
I have run the reagentc /info command and receive a response similar to yours.
I have run the DISM commands in the order specified. These were all successful until we get to DISM.....RestoreHealth where it runs to 83.5% and then tells me that DSIM failed. It refers me a log which I have looked at which has various warnings and error messges suggesting it cannot find providers.
When I ran the Scannow command it went through OK and found no violaions.
I suspect all of this means that my online option is to reinstall the HP OS which I can do.
However, I stil want to know why ATI will not allow me to restore an Entire PC. I will recreate the Simple rescue media and try again.
Any more help with regards to the ATI would be appreciated.
RF, can you confirm that you are running Windows 10 and which build you have, i.e. 2004 or 20H2 (2009)?
Rather than reinstall the HP OS, I would suggest doing an in-place upgrade of Windows 10 using either the same build or a later one if available. This would keep everything in place without reverting back to the much older version from your HP OS media.
There shouldn't be any issues with doing the Acronis recovery when using the 'Simple' WinPE version of the rescue media created on the same PC, but given your reports of error messages, there is obviously some issue here.
The approach that I would be looking at if dealing with this issue myself for one of my PC's would be to first obtain a spare disk drive to use for recovering to, so that I could remove the current working albeit with issues drive and set it safely aside. This would eliminate the original drive itself as a source of any issues.
The next test, if still seeing the same error message, would be to create a Windows 10 install boot media and test booting the PC from that to determine if the error codes you saw are only from the Acronis media or from any WinPE boot media.
Thanks Steve.
It was an in place upgrade from Windows 1709 to 2004 that started all of my problems! It failed part way through, I could not recover from a System Image I had taken from within Windows and so had to reinstall the OS but the version of the OS I was directed to by HP Support was out of date as another one of the support team advised me when I could not move from 1709.
Anyway, I think I shall, when time permits, try and reinstall from the HP OS downloaded from their Cloud Recovery website.
The whole point was I did not want to have to reinstall all of my programs as at least one of them is a multi stage process which takes several hours.
However, if I am going to have to reinstall an OS from scratch I may as well use the one provided by HP and then upgrade to the most recent version of Windows I can, then install ATI and see if I back up the machine and try to restore it it works properly. I will then install the programs and data.
Getting back to ATI, I created the Simple bootable media and tried to restore the Entire PC using that but unfortantely it still does not work. This must mean that something on the OS is missing or corrupted.
For my peace of mind, has anyone else successfully restored to an HP/Dell/Other business laptop? If not, I see no value in ATI. Is Cyber Protect 15 any different?
RF, my main laptop is a HP Omen gaming laptop and I have successfully restored to the internal NVMe M.2 SSD as part of upgrading from the original 128GB SSD to a new Samsung 500GB SSD. See Steve migrate NVMe SSD here where I documented the process with screen images. The only difference is that I was using ATI 2020 rescue media at that time.
I have also recovered to a variety of different PC makes, Dell, Lenovo, Acer etc.
I have never used any of the Acronis business products such as Cyber Protect.
Returning to the core issue for this topic:
How far into the recovery process do you get before you see any error messages?
Thanks Steve.
I will take a look at your screen shots etc and note that you have restored various laptops/systems.
With regards to the error messages I confirm that once I have chosen Recovery, then the backup to be restored, then destination, pressed Proceed the systeem asks me to Restart. Once I have pressed Restart I get the error message shown in image ...213105.pdf above.
Is it normal for the system to ask you to Restart at that point?
RF, if you attempt any OS recovery from within Windows, then yes, a restart is required, and your error message is indicating that the temporary Linux based environment does not have support for your M.2 SSD so cannot find it to continue!
As mentioned previously, this is where booting from the Acronis Rescue Media (Simple - WinPE) is recommended.
How far do you get when using the Simple rescue media?
Dear Steve, My previous answer relates solely to using the Simple rescue media rather than trying to restore via Windows.
RF, if you are using the Simple WinPE rescue media, then can you clarify that your statement below is still correct?
With regards to the error messages I confirm that once I have chosen Recovery, then the backup to be restored, then destination, pressed Proceed the systeem asks me to Restart. Once I have pressed Restart I get the error message shown in image ...213105.pdf above.
At what point, when using the WinPE Simple media are you asked to Restart?
My reason for asking is that I have not seen any request shown to do a Restart when in the rescue media. Typically, if doing a Recovery, you go through the selection for what to recover, then press Proceed to perform the operation, see progress information and then either see Success or Failure.
Dear Steve,
When using the Simple WinPE media I get to the point where Proceed is and click that. I then see the progress bar on the screen for a second or so and the system the tells me I need to Restart the PC. The error message then appears as soon as I press Restart.
Ok, then that definitely is not correct or anticipated behaviour, and have never seen it reported in these forums!
Time for an alternative approach here methinks!
Assuming that I understand the reasons we are having this discussion! That you are wanting to create a backup image that will / would allow you to recover back to how the laptop is today after doing any reinstall of your HP OS to try resolve the upgrade issues you have been seeing?
Download a copy of an alternative backup application such as Macrium Reflect free or MiniTool ShadowMaker, install the application and create the associated rescue media, create a full disk backup using the application in Windows, then test the rescue media to see if you can achieve a successful recovery using that media?
Thanks Steve.
I have downloaded Macrium Reflect and followed your instructions.
The good news is that I am able to successfully restore the system image to the laptop.
I have looked at a couple of tutorials on Youtube regarding creating the ATI Rescue Disk. One thing I notice is that during that process when system tells me the size of the files to loaded onto the USB there is not the tick box towards the bottom left of the screen which reads on the tutorials "Format the selected media and permanently delete all data."
I have created the rescue media on several other USB drives just to check if there is something wrong with the orginal USB drive I used (there should not be as it was a brand new drive, but you never know). The alternative USBs ranged in size from 1GB to 4GB.
On each creation, apart from one, the "Format...." tick box did not appear and each time I tried to restore the system image using the USB it failed at the same point.
Unfortunately, on the one occassion when the "Format..." tick box did appear I chose not to use the USB and repeated the process. On the second attempt the "Format...." tick box did not appear again and on trying to restore the system image it failed again at the same point.
This leads me to believe that there is something wrong with the process for creating the Rescue Disk on that laptop which leads to the failure of the restore process.
I will try and create an Advanced (as I assume I cannot use Simple if I want to use the Rescue disk on a different laptop) WinPE disk on another laptop (HP Probook 450 G6) and see if that makes any difference.
Can you confirm whether I should download the ADK files to the 450 G6 or to the USB disk as I see from briefly running through the process without completing it that I have this opton. Is the same true for the Addon files?
Do you know what the maximum capacity of the USB file I have and what file format it should be using. I suspect that if the Create Rescue Disk works properly it does not matter as the process will format the USB to the file system it wants.
RF, good to read that you have a recovery solution using MR if needed!
For the rescue media, the recommendation is to keep to a maximum of 32GB for USB memory stick media with a minimum of 2GB being needed for the later versions of ATI.
My own rescue media is typically on a 16GB USB stick, though I tend to use a bootable external HDD drive for the most part. This can be created as an Acronis Survival Kit from with ATI when creating a new disk backup to the drive, or alternatively (and the method I use), simply use a partition tool to create a 2GB FAT32 partition at the start of the external HDD, then assign a drive letter to that FAT32 partition, which will allow you to point either the Acronis Rescue Media Builder tool or the MVP Custom PE Builder script at that drive letter and create bootable media for the external HDD in that partition.
If you are going to use the Advanced method of creating rescue media using the Windows ADK and PE kits, then these need to be downloaded and installed on the PC where the media will be created. Note: the size of the ADK & PE media is around 6GB to download.
With regard to formatting your USB stick, then you can do this very easily by using diskpart as described below:
Preparing USB drive for use by Acronis using Diskpart
diskpart
list disk (to identify USB drive, i.e. 1)
select disk 1
clean
create partition primary
active
format fs=fat32 quick
assign
exit
Please take lots of care when using the above and ensure you select the correct disk as it will just as quickly wipe clean the wrong disk without asking for confirmation if it is selected.
This needs to be performed from an Administrator Command prompt.
Dear Steve, thank you for your further help.
I have re formatted a couple of USBs and this has made no difference to my ability to use ATI Rescue Media!
Have you had any experience of the missing "Format...." tick box I mention above? As I say, I suspect that neither machine is creaing the Rescue media correctly (the system says it has been created successfully but clearly it cannot be the case).
You mention ATI saying there must be at least 2GB to create the Rescue media. Whenever I create the Rescue media the capacity used ranges between 732 and 812MB rather than anything approaching 2GB. Would you agree that this is an indication that the Rescue media is not being created correctly?
I suppose I can go back to ATI Support and ask them why the Rescue Media is not being created correctly but given their previous advice to Enable Legacy Boot and Disable Secure Boot I have little confidence in their ability to solve the issue.
RF, as it has been a while since I last used the Acronis Rescue Media Builder tool, I have just used it to recreate one of my 16GB USB memory sticks and there was no format option offered and none was done to the USB media either!
My reason for saying 2GB as the minimum size is simply because that is the size that Acronis have chosen for when creating the Acronis Survival Kit partition on an external HDD. Also when running the media builder, the size shown is over 900MB so getting close to the limit if using a 1GB USB stick. I tend to create an extra folder on the USB media so that I can save a copy of any logs etc when booted from that media.
Looking at the size of the ATI 2021 boot.wim file in the USB \sources folder shows as 795,269 KB in Explorer for the 'Simple' media with no additional device drivers added when creating.
Some screen shots attached from the above process.
Dear Steve, thank you for the update.
That is interesting, especially that no format has occurred. I have again created a Simple USB memory stick and my sizes are shown as 803.2MB and 651,130KB.
I realsie that this may not be possible and will put you to a lot of trouble but do you think you would be able to test the USB memory stick rescue disk by trying to restore a system image of your PC?
The more this goes on the more I think that there appears to be an issue with the way ATI is creating the rescue disk. I thought it might just be my laptop but if the same happens to you then I suspect it is an issue with the software rather than our PCs.
Dear Steve, one thing I did not mention was that I also created the MVP Rescue Tool following the instructions in the link in your signature. Unfortunately, this made no difference whatsoever.
RF, I don't believe that my demonstrating that my recovery media works would help greatly here and may just cause you more frustration! This is not because I would not want to do this to help you but because the symptoms you are seeing are so unique to your HP Probook machine - and in particular that you are being asked to Restart when booted from the rescue media!
When you tested using MR to do a Backup and Recovery, did you do the recovery when booted from the MR rescue media?
Out of interest, where (generally) are you located?
Dear Steve, OK.
I did the MR backup from within Windows but recovered using the rescue media.
I am in the UK.
Dear Steve, also when I recovered using MR rescue media at no point did that program ask me to Restart the PC.
I appreciate that you believe it is my laptop which is the issue, which it may well be, but notwithstanding the fact that your success at recovering a system image using the USB stick you created yesterday may cause me further frustration I would ask that you prove the point for me. At least then I can narrow down the issue.
RF, drop me a private message to let me know whereabouts you are in the UK please? I am in North Hampshire.
Thanks Robert, just doing some testing - will reply a little later.
Thank you Steve.
Robert, see topic: Error 0x1480008 cannot get file kernet64.dat from the partition - TRUE IMAGE 2021 just opened in the ATI 2017 Forum but for ATI 2021 which sounds very similar to this topic via the error codes!
Thanks Steve. I have read the other topic and it seems to be the same as my error but there appears to be no solution provided.
Did you have time to use your USB memeory stick to try and restore a system image from? If so, what was the result.
If there is an issue with ATI2021 Rescue Media how do you suggest I get ATI Support to resolve this. Do they take any notice of the posts on this forum? I know that it is totally separate but does it have any weight as to them trying to resolve the issues posted with their software?
Robert, the other topic was just for cross reference in case something is discovered that will help here too!
Sorry but not had time to do any restore and not sure when I would find the time at present. I would want to do this to a spare drive which I don't have at present.
To get Acronis Support involved will require that you open a Support Case direct with them and then jump through some hoops! I always give links to any forum topics related to the cases I have opened in the hope that they will actually review them, but am not convinced that they do so! It is very rare for anyone from Acronis other than Ekaterina (forum moderator) and occasionally, Slava (now involved with Acronis Protection) actually visit the forums or add any comments to topics here!
Robert,
The next step from my side will be to try to recreate this issue on my own HP Omen laptop but I am waiting on a spare Samsung 970 Evo Plus 500GB SSD to be delivered before doing this! The laptop is my main work horse and I would rather remove the current NVMe M.2 SSD and do the test recovery to an identical new SSD, where I have the working one as fallback!
I have done similar restores previously when I upgraded the original SSD to the Samsung 970 but that was using the ATI 2020 rescue media at that time (which I still have as an option).
I will post updates in this and the other topic when I have done the test recovery!
Dear Steve, thank you for the update and I really appreciate the amount of trouble you are putting yourself to to help with this.
I look forwad to hearing from you in due course.
Robert
Robert, I obtained a new Samsung 970 Evo Plus 500GB SSD (NVMe M.2) and followed the steps outlined below on my HP Omen laptop to perform a successful full disk backup, followed by a successful full disk recovery to the new disk, both done from my external USB 3 2GB HDD survival kit drive.
Recreate scenario steps.
- Booted from ATI 2021 #35860 WinPE survival kit HDD drive.
- Created full disk backup of Disk 0 Samsung 970 Evo Plus SSD to HDD drive.
- Saved log file for backup operation to HDD drive.
- Shutdown the PC, removed current disk & installed new disk in its place.
- Booted from ATI 2021 #35860 WinPE survival kit HDD drive.
- In ATI application, clicked on Tools > Add new disk
- Initialised new disk as GPT partition scheme as needed for NVMe M.2 SSD / match old disk.
- Recovered full disk backup of Disk 0 to new disk.
- Saved logs for add new disk and recovery.
- Restarted PC and booted Windows 10 from new disk.
- Reconfigured Source disk for backups to prevent error 'No current disk' for existing tasks!
Notes:
- When migrating to a new disk I always make a full disk backup (as per 1. above) using the rescue media so as to avoid issues with my regular scheduled backup tasks that run in Windows.
- The new Samsung EVO SSD came uninitialised hence steps 6 & 7 to prepare it but leaving it as unallocated drive space.
- Any logs created in the rescue media boot environment are lost on rebooting hence steps 3 & 9 to save these for if needed later.
- My survival kit was created using the MVP Custom PE builder script which includes the ability to capture screen images to document these actions.
See attached zipped files, first for the Backup operation, second for the Restore.
I am updating this topic from the same laptop with the new SSD recovered per above.
Dear Steve, thank you for the update and thank you for doing this.
I note that you used your HDD based media rather than the USB Rescue disk you created last week. As I said in one of my other posts I believe, but may be wrong, that the issue lies with the creation of the USB Rescue Disk.
Whilst I appreciate that, technically, there should be no difference between your HDD based rescue media and the USB Rescue media being created from within ATI 2021, I think that there must be.
Therefore, if you have time over the next few days can you please create the USB Rescue disk from within ATI 2021 and try to restore the system image using that USB Rescue disk.
Robert
Dear Steve, can you please explain to me why you need to undertake Steps 6 and 7. I assume that this is because it is a new disk drive which has not been formatted previously but please confirm.
If you now try and restore your backup using the USB Rescue disk to that disk drive (your replacement 970 EVO) am I correct in thinking that you would not need to undertake Steps 6 and 7 again? If you do, why do you?
Robert, the recovery media I used was freshly created from #35860 just the same as any other USB media I use, I use the MVP tool to create the .WIM file then copy this to the media being used, so this is the same .WIM file as was on my USB stick but running from the HDD.
The reason for steps 6 & 7 was given in my notes below the steps.
- The new Samsung EVO SSD came uninitialised hence steps 6 & 7 to prepare it but leaving it as unallocated drive space.
The first step of any disk level recovery should always be to wipe the target drive then recreate both the partition scheme and partition structures based on the image being recovered, so doing these steps should not matter but I tend to use that approach to avoid any errors where it says the disk cannot be locked and to use Linux media! If the target disk is initialised as GPT and left as unallocated space, then it also speeds up the recovery operation.
I am not intending to repeat the recovery as cannot see any reason why it would be any different to how I have seen each time I have done this.
Whilst I appreciate that, technically, there should be no difference between your HDD based rescue media and the USB Rescue media being created from within ATI 2021, I think that there must be.
Robert, if you believe that there is any issues with the way ATI 2021 creates the USB rescue media, there is a way to test the media as follows:
Assuming that you still have the MR rescue media created previously, then open the \sources\ folder of that media where you will see a 'boot.wim' file used by MR.
You can use the Acronis Rescue Media Builder tool to create a 'Simple' rescue media as a .WIM file, rename the ATI .WIM file to be 'boot.wim' and then use it to replace the one in the MR media \sources\ folder, then test this alternative media to boot your PC.
Dear Steve, thank you for your two further posts.
I have followed the second one and created the ATI .wim file and then renamed this and copied it to the MR rescue media.
When I boot from the MR rescue media rather than opening the MR recovery window it opens the ATI recovery window. I assume that this is what should have happened but please confirm (I apologise if this seems like a stupid question but I am not an IT expert)
I do not have access to my HDD at present so cannot see if this makes any difference. I will do this over the next few days.
Another silly question but should I be trying to restore the ATI or MR system image? I assume the ATI one but plrease confirm.
Robert, the boot.wim file is what gives the rescue environment, the other files are just the boot medium to launch that environment, so using the ATI boot.wim will launch Acronis.
This is how I normally update my own rescue media by just creating a new, updated .wim file then copying it to the media without needing to reformat the drive etc, plus by keeping different .wim files from other versions of ATI, I can switch in a different version very simply using the same method.
The file to recover must match the medium being used, MR will have no understanding of what to do with an ATI .tib/.tibx backup file, and ATI have no clue about the MR equivalent!
Steve, thank you for the clarification. All makes sense, just wanted to check I was not missing something/liable to cause more problems for myself.
I take a new image backup from within ATI and then try and restore this using the rescue media in the next few days an let you know the outcome.
Robert
Just an update. I have created a new system image backup through ATI2021 and used the MR rescue media, which has the ATI2021 boot.wim file instead of the ATI2021 .wim file as suggested.
Unfortunately, the restore process fails at exactly the same point as before with the same error message.
I am now at a loss to know what the cause of the problem is. You might think it was my laptop but given I am able to restore the system image using MR I fail to see why the laptop is stopping the recovery to work.
It may be that I ditch ATI and buy MR as this seems to work perfectly.
Robert, in your position I would definitely be using the free version of MR at a minimum to ensure that I have a working backup & recovery solution!
Beyond that, then if you have an existing / open Support Case with Acronis Support, then I would put this whole scenario back to them with a clear statement that this works perfectly fine when using MR (a competitor product) so why doesn't it work with ATI 2021 ??? Point them to this lengthy forum topic to show all the investigation already performed!
Steve, your thoughts were mine. I will retain MR for now so at least I know it works and have gone back to ATI Support. I will let you know if they come up with the solution.
Thank you again for all of your help with this.
Robert
Just an update. I have been corresponding with Acronis Customer Service over the issue since my last email above.
To date, they are unable to resolve the issue. They have forwarded my case to the Development Team but still not joy.
They suggest disbaling Bitlocker on both backup and restore processes and even this does not solve the issue. They continue to look into this but given it has been over 2 months I do not hold out much hope.
Has anyone else experienced the issue with HP Probooks and if so how was it resolved without turning off Bitlocker?
After much effort I have found that the only way I am unable to restore an ATI backup to a drive which is Bitlocker encrypted is to unlock the drive and then turn Bitlocker off (decrypt it). The restore procedure then works and there is no need to reboot the pc (which is what causes the failure I believe).
This seems logical but wonder whether this is how ATI is supposed to work or whether there is still something peculiar about my machine.
Interestingly, MR seems to enable you to add the Bitlocker tools to its bootable medai and then either automatically remove the Bitlocker password or do so manually.
Is ATI supposed to work in that way?