Every TIB I have shows as being corrupted

Try booting from the Bootable media CD and do the validation from the CD and let us know the results. If the validation fails with the most current CD, try the version which created the backup.

Thanks for the quick reply Grover.
I just tried doing the validation from the CD and it showed the TIB as corrupted. I can't find a bootable CD with the version that was used to create the backup, so I can't try that.
FWIW, I am trying to do the restore into a VMWare virtual PC as per KB article 13671. I can go through the steps listed in that article until I reach step 9 (the final step), and the process ends after a few minutes with a message simply indicating that the restore failed. The Log shows an error that indicates "The archive is corrupted (0x70020)". My backup TIB files are on removaable USB hard drives, which I don't have access to during the recovery phase. I do have access to the "My Documents" directory (by selecting "Computers Near Me" when searching for TIBs), so I had copied the most recent TIB file from my USB hard drive to my "My Documents" directory (at 112GB, that took half an hour). At first, I thought that the "corruption" may have ocurred when copying the TIB from the USB drive to the My Documents folder, so I tried using TIH2011 to validate the original TIB on the USB drive. When that one showed as corrupted, I started checking other TIBs and found that they were all showing as being corrupted.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Blake

I was able to find an old Rescue Media with the version of TIH that had created the backup I am trying to restore, so I was able to do some additional testing. Here are the results, along with some background info:
-Backup was taken 2011-08-14 using TIH 2011 Update 2 (Build 6868) from an HP G60 running Windows Vista.
-I am attempting to restore into a VMWare player partition (as per KB article 13671) on an HP DV7 running Windows 7 Professional
-the Windows 7 Professional PC is running TIH 2011 Update 3 (Build 6942)
-within the VMWare environment, I do not have access to USB devices until such time as I can load VMWare Tools, which requires the OS to be installed. Based on that, I have tried copying the TIB from the USB hard drive to the C: drive on the HP DV7 running Windows 7 so that I have access to it when the VMWare virtual PC loads from the Rescue Media

On HP DV7 using Update 2 Rescue Media, the USB TIB can be verified, but the copy on drive C fails.
On HP DV7 using Update 3 Rescue Media, the USB TIB can be verified, but the copy on drive C fails.
On HP DV7 using Update 3 TIH from within Windows 7, the USB TIB fails, as does the drive C copy. With the Update 3 of TIH 2011 on the Windows 7 PC, every single TIB that I try to validate fails.

So the bottom line seems to be that with the Rescue Media (either Update 2 or Update 3), I can validate the TIB on the USB drive, but not the copy on the local hard drive, whereas with the TIH 2011 Update 3 running in Windows 7, I can NOT validate ANY TIB.

FWIW, I have tried disabling anti-virus, and it makes no difference.

AAARRRRRGGGGHHHHH !!!!!

It is possible that your backup on the internal drive has a problem being copied.

Try the copy again but maybe use a different copy method and maybe use a program such as the free Karen's Replicator to perform the copy. This works very well in file copying individual files or all the files on the disk.

At least, you know you can use the old Rescue CD and restore your files when booted from the CD.

You might also want to check the internal disk for disk errors before you make a new copy.

Thanks Grover. I was thinking that as well, but since I could not verify the TIB on the USB drive when running Windows 7, but I could verify the same TIB on the same PC when I booted using the Rescue Media, I started thinking it must have had something to do with Windows 7.

I tried loading TIH2011 (Update 2) on another PC (Toshiba A200-TH7 running Vista Ultimate), and then tried validating the TIB from the USB drive from within TIH running in Vista - it validated just fine.

I did some more research and discovered that I could make VMWare recognize the TIB from the USB drive while booting VMWare from the rescue media by defining a full share on the USB HDD directory containing the TIB. This allowed me to remove the copied TIB from the equation. I thought I would be home free at this point, figuring that VMWare would be treating things just like the physical PC when booting from the rescue media. I was wrong - as soon as I tried the recovery, it failed with the same error.

This made me think that there must be some Windows 7 driver coming into play, that VMWare must be using when booting from the rescue media. As I was thinking about this, I realized that the USB port that I was connected to was a USB 3.0 port, and thought that perhaps the issue was with the Windows 7 USB 3.0 drivers. I then tried doing the recover using a USB 2.0 port. Although the recovery process runs for a considerably longer time when using the USB 2.0 port (over an hour versus around 2 minutes) , it still does eventually fail.

So, here is a recap of the problem:

Toshiba A200-TH7, booted into Vista Ultimate, running TIH 2011 (Update 2) is able to validate TIB from USB HDD
Toshiba A200-TH7, booted using Rescue Media (either Update 2 or Update 3) is able to validate TIB from USB HDD
HP DV7, booted using Rescue Media (either Update 2 or Update 3) is able to validate TIB from USB HDD (connected to USB 3.0 port)
HP DV7, booted into Windows 7 Pro, running TIH 2011 (Update 3) is ***NOT*** able to validate TIB from USB HDD (using either USB 2.0 or 3.0 port)
HP DV7, booted using Rescue Media into VMWare partition running in Windows 7 is ***NOT*** able to validate TIB from USB HDD (using either USB 2.0 or 3.0 port)

Also, keep in mind that when running TIH2011 in Windows 7, I can't validate ANY of the TIBs that I have available.

Based on the fact that the TIB I am trying to restore can be validated in certain environments leads me to believe that it is in fact a valid TIB. Based on the fact that the validation only fails when booted into Windows 7 leads me to believe that the problem must be related to some driver that gets loaded when running Windows 7.

I am currently using the Norton Internet Security trial software that came with this new PC. Unlike previous versions of Norton, this one does not seem to slow the PC down to a crawl, so I plan on keeping it. I have tried disabling the "Smart Firewall" and the "Antivirus Auto-Protect" when validating the TIBs, but I'm wondering if there is still the possibility that something within the Norton software is causing the problem. Would you happen to know a better way of taking Norton out of the picture without uninstalling it?

I really appreciate the help on this extremely frustrating problem.

Thanks,
Blake

Blake,
As I am not familiar with Norton or VMWare, maybe another MVP will see this posting and provide some additional help.

HP DV7, booted using Rescue Media (either Update 2 or Update 3) is able to validate TIB from USB HDD (connected to USB 3.0 port)

Were you using usb3? My usb3 works great in Windows 7 but external not recognized in CD when connected via usb3--only works with usb2.

Hi Grover

Thanks again for your assistance with this - it is greatly appreciated. Hopefully someone familiar with Norton can enlighten me on the proper method of configuring things so that I can either identify it as the problem, or definitely eliminate it from consideration. Based on what I'm seeing, I don't think that there are any VMWare issues at play (considering that TIH 2011 fails to validate the TIBs even when VMWare isn't part of the picture).

Another option for me may be to convert the TIB into a VHD that I could then somehow coersce VMWare into accepting. Unfortunately, the only way that I am aware of to convert a TIB to VHD is from the TIH 2011 "Backup and conversions" tools, and since the TIB is being seen as corrupted from within TIH 2011 on Windows 7, that doesn't seem to be a valid option. Is there a way of converting a TIB to VHD after booting from the rescue media???

In response to your question, all of my initial attempts involved having the USB drive connected via a USB3 port. As I had mentioned, the only apparent difference between the USB3 and USB2 attempts were the length of time it took before the validation and/or recovery failed.

Again, thanks for your help.

Blake

Blake,

Can you create a new backup task with ATI 2011 in Win7 and validate the backup successfully?
If yes, compare the file attributes of the new TIB files with the files attributes of the TIB files that you cannot validate. In particular, hidden/not hidden, windows security settings.

Pat,

Thanks for the reply. Sorry for the delay in responding.

I created a new backup TIB in Win7 - could not validate the backup on that same Win7 machine (HP-DV7) , however I could validate it on another Vista PC (Toshiba A200-TH7).

Based on the difficulty I was having with the TIBs, I decided to try a different approach. I downloaded the free VMWare Converter and tried converting the TIB to a VMWare format. I first tried on my Win 7 HP-DV7, and that converion process failed. I tried with the USB HDD connected to both a USB3 port and to a USB 2 port - both failed. I then loaded that same VMWare converter software on my Toshiba A200-TH7, and it was able to run that conversion without a problem. The bottom line appears to be that there is something different on my Win7 machine that is causing problems, and even though I initially discovered the problem when working with TIH 2011, I suspect that TIH is not the cause of the problem, but rather a victim of the problem.

I will try posting on an HP forum and/or Win7 forum, but if anyone on this forum could suggest something, I'd really appreciate it.
Thanks,
Blake

Pat
It looks like I mis-spoke. The validation of that TIB on the Toshiba failed as well.
I still think that the issue is with Win7 and not with ATI itself, based on the fact that I have similar problems with the VMWare conversion, and I can succesfully validate TIBs on my HP-DV7 if I boot into ATI from the rescue media.
Thanks
Blake

You might want to take a look at the post from RayG here:
http://forum.acronis.com/forum/24164

That might get you where you want to be.

Thanks Pat - I will give that a try over the weekend and report back.
Just as an aside, I was able to definitely eliminate the anti-virus software from the picture. The HP-DV7 PC I am using came with a trial of Norton Internet Security, which I had removed from my system last night. Before installing new anti-virus software, I tried validating some TIBs and had the same unsuccesful results, so obviously it's not the anti-virus software causing the problems.
Thanks,
Blake

Good luck.. this software is useless, support is useless! Once it screws up, it's highly unlikely that you'll get it working again. I think it's done on purpose so one buys the new crap hoping it will work, and ultimately that won't either. By the time you wade through all the BS, enough time will inevitably pass by and you won't be able to get a refund, just like I couldn't. You'll get a real "Too bad so sad.." response from this farce of a company.

I went through months of headaches with this junk. Other than one simple thing that I did to get it to work, which by the way, according to ALL the documentation I read, forum messages I read, and so called support, said couldn't be done, the software will "magically" work and then "magically" won't work without reason, notice, warning, etc. Noticed you already pissed away nearly 8 days, probably without a solution or answer.

Did you give up yet?

This company, companies like them, should all, and I mean people running them, working for them, etc., should be liable. Legally, there should be some kind of regulatory organizations, ombudsmen, and laws preventing new versions of this swill to be released until the existing version works, works as claimed and advertised, and otherwise, it should fall into a white collar crime, punishable offense category of some sort.