Skip to main content

Using ATI 2016 Backups go to E: but Recover PC points to F: and gives error

Thread needs solution

So my backups are created successfully on the external drive E:.

But when I select Recover PC, it points to F: (that doesn't exist on this computer) and gives an error "Failed to open item F:\Entire PC (Inspiron1520)_full....."

How do I get the drive letters to be the same?

Thanks

 

0 Users found this helpful

Kevin,

Could you take some screenshots of your drives as they show in Windows File Explorer and Windows Computer Management?  Also, take a few screenshots of your backup task to.

It's possible, that Windows actually assigned your poratble hard drive a different letter than what it was originally when the backup task was created. Windows will automatically assign the next availabe drive letter that's availabe.  So, if your backup external drive is normally E: and then it's disconntected for some reason, and you plug in a USB flash drive, it could become E: too.  Assuming that USB is plugged in already and then you plug in your external backup drive, instead of it getting E: it would become F:.  It will remain F: from now on unless you go back and change it or unless it gets bumppd to a letter further down the chain again. 

When you recover, you should be able to select any drive that is available for recovery (in most cases, unless a drive does not meet the criteria for a specific recovery type, such as a drive being too small to recover to, or if it doesn't support multipel partitions fi the recovery has them). 

 

You should also try using the user created Recovery Media as recovery of Windows system disks require a computer to reboot into the recovery environment which is Linux based anyway.  The recovery environment being Linux based will often show drives by different drive letters than Windows because of the way Linux identfies drives. 

It is also recommended that Windows sysem disks be recovered usung the recovery media to avoid possible corruption

Here are the screen shots. 

I've created the Recovery disk (on USB stick). I'll test it after I send this.

Thanks for the quick replies.

Attachment Size
362320-129796.pdf 473.9 KB

Kevin, thanks for the screen shot images, it looks to me as if when your backup task was created your external drive was give drive letter F:, maybe because you had a memory stick plugged in which had taken drive letter E: at that time.

You can circumvent this quite easily by going back into Computer Management / Disk Management and right-clicking on your ATI BackupDrive and choosing to change the drive letter from E: to F: again, so that Acronis will then be able to match the physical drive to the drive information stored in the database for the backup task.

Having said all the above, the advice to boot from the Acronis recovery media is the recommended way of proceeding if you are intending on restoring disks or partitions from your external drive, as this is safest in terms of not changing anything in the Windows Boot Manager configuration, which will occur if you start the recovery from within Windows, as Acronis then needs to create a temporary Linux boot environment on your hard drive / memory to perform the restore.

Thanks for your help. I've done several things following your advice.

1. Using Disk Management, changed the drive letter of my USB Drive from E: to F: then ran ATI2016 Recover. It now points to E: with the same error. I guess ATI2016 is just going to keep changing the drive letter.

2. Created a Recovery Media. I first tried a 32 GB USB 2.0 stick. It had all the right files. I changed the boot order but it was not recognized - just a blank screen (not blue). Maybe this laptop is too old to use USB for boot device, even though it showed up on the list of bootable  devices. I created Recovery DVD, changed the boot order again and it booted sucessfully. I ran ATI and Recover. I was able to find the Backup drive and retrieved one file successfully so I'm sure I could do a complete disc restore if need be.

I'm not sure why the ATI2016 Recover tab is not working for me, but since that's not the preferred approach, the Recovery DVD will work just fine. I suppose I could uninstall ATI2016 and reinstall and see if that helps but not worth the effort now. I run ATI2016 on two other laptops (one uses the cloud backup) and they both work fine. They're also of more recent vintage.

Thanks again for your help and quick response. I now feel confident that I can recover if I have a failure and even learned a litlle along the way. Is there a way to award you guys an "Attaboy'?