Restoring from rescue disk - defaults to sector-by-sector
I interrupted a regular restore operation this morning and made Windows 7 unbootable. So now I'm restoring using rescue media. I am trying to restore two partitions plus MBR. The restore is proceeding, but it says it is restoring sector-by-sector and that it has 11 hours remaning. This is for less than 200 gb of data. I've only had to restore a few times, and those in prior versions of TI, but I don't recall restore taking anywhere near that long.
I chatted online with customer support and was told that I should not select "sector-by-sector" and it would go much faster. I told support agent I didn't even recall the option and asked what step it was offered in. Agent referred me to a link about restoring to a different machine(!). I didn't see such an option there either but was assured if I restarted the restore from scratch I would be able to avoid selecting sector-by sector and my restore would go much faster. I've been through all the steps, didn't see it, started restore again and it is doing sector-by sector. I don't believe by backup was done sector-by-sector, but in any case I was assured that didn't matter.
So can anyone point me to how to start the restore without sector-by-sector? Thanks.
Henk, thanks for your reply. I suspect you are right, but the Tech support person definitely stated that I could run the restore with sector-by-sector "unchecked," even if the backup was sector-by-sector.
Thoughts?
I'm surprised! It seems to imply that if you do a sector-by-sector backup of a known file system Acronis is able to use the file system information afterwards. Either this is true and is brilliant or this is a case of the infamous Acronis Support quality...
I'm surprised! It seems to imply that if you do a sector-by-sector backup of a known file system Acronis is able to use the file system information afterwards. Either this is true and is brilliant or this is a case of the infamous Acronis Support quality...
The Agent was very definite about it. I just don't remember choosing "sector-by-sector" as a backup option and can't imagine why I would have. So I still have the question - why is my backup restoring sector-by-sector (assuming my backup is NOT sector-by-sector), and if there is an option to restore a backup that was not sector-by-sector in a sector-by-sector fashion, where is that option selected (or deselected)?
Smoddelm,
The restore will default to sector by sector if it can't read the destination drive correctly. If you have another PC it would an idea to run chkdisk /f on it.
Smoddelm,
The restore will default to sector by sector if it can't read the destination drive correctly. If you have another PC it would an idea to run chkdisk /f on it.
Thanks for the explanation. Still wondering where the mysterious box is to select "restore by sector."
Hello everyone,
Thank you for your comments.
Colin is absolutely right, thank you for helping out.
smoddelm, I have attached a screenshot of the recovery wizard from the bootable media. If the backup was created with sector-by-sector method, you will get this option. Otherwise, it's what Colin suggested.
Please let me know if you have additional questions.
Thank you.
Anton, thanks for posting that. Anyway, my sector-by-sector restore finished after 27 hours and all is working fine. Got a little worried about whether my hardware would make it through, as both the laptop and the external drive got pretty hot during the process.
ONe more question - my restore was from 10 layers of incremental backup. Would a restore from a single full backup of the same drive have been faster? Am thinking about changing my backup options.
Unless the 10 files were large, it would not have made much time difference. Relating to the time issue, by any chance did the program do a validation before doing the restore? If yes, that could added quite a bit of time.
The bigger problem is what caused the program to need the sector by sector backup. Your backup may have included some disk errors within the backup. If it were mine, I would check the win7 disk for disk errors and check all all partitions on the disk. From a command prompt
CHKDSK X: /R (where x is the drive letter for the partition to be checked)
The results of the disk check will be found in the Events log under applications. If the results shows corrections, I would run the test again until you get no errors corrected. If errors found, after correction, do a new backup of the error free disk.
Understand the risk factor with the 10 incrementals. In order to restore to the most recent time, all 10 had to be readable and non-corrupt. If any of the 10 was not good, only the backups prior to the bad one would have been restorable.
The time factor could have other issues. For best results, do not use a usb-hub and keep the cable as short as practical and use a good quality cable. If a desktop, plus the usb cable into the rear connector. If a laptop, next time also use a different plug-in.
Unless the 10 files were large, it would not have made much time difference. Relating to the time issue, by any chance did the program do a validation before doing the restore? If yes, that could added quite a bit of time.
The bigger problem is what caused the program to need the sector by sector backup. Your backup may have included some disk errors within the backup. If it were mine, I would check the win7 disk for disk errors and check all all partitions on the disk. From a command prompt
CHKDSK X: /R (where x is the drive letter for the partition to be checked)
The results of the disk check will be found in the Events log under applications. If the results shows corrections, I would run the test again until you get no errors corrected. If errors found, after correction, do a new backup of the error free disk.Understand the risk factor with the 10 incrementals. In order to restore to the most recent time, all 10 had to be readable and non-corrupt. If any of the 10 was not good, only the backups prior to the bad one would have been restorable.
The time factor could have other issues. For best results, do not use a usb-hub and keep the cable as short as practical and use a good quality cable. If a desktop, plus the usb cable into the rear connector. If a laptop, next time also use a different plug-in.
Thanks for all your comments. I think the issue with sector-by-sector was that my initial attempt at restore got interrupted after about 30 minutes by my accidentally pulling the power cord out of the external drive. So I suppose the C; drive was pretty messed up by having to start over. Unbootable at that point; that's why I had to use the rescue disk.
I now have True Image set to do full backups weekly and keep only 2 prior. Since my schedule has it running in the middle of the night, it seemed like doing a full backup isn't that big a deal. Is that stupid on my part?
Full only backups are fine. It just depends upon your needs. Hopefully your full backup is one that includes all partitions on the system disk. A backup which includes all partitions is the best to have when you need to create a replacement disk. My personal preference is to keep as many backups as my space allows. It is not unusual to need data from old backups so I try not to be in too big a hurry to get rid of my old backups.
I do suggest again that you check both disks for errors because of the power issue.