2018 questions
Two question topics from a very unhappy camper: TrueImage 2018 (or 2015 is the same). Win10.
Recovery: I found it necessary to delete an important partition (very large, most of a TB) to adjust partition sizes. I made a backup of that important partition. I also verified it, and I guess it was good. Guessing because Verification just ran hours, and at 100% completion, simply quit silently. It did not say Validation was good, but it didn’t say bad either. It said nothing, simply silently quit at 100% completion.
Specifically:
1. Why doesn’t Validation after working all those hours at least announce if the result was Good?
Then I deleted the partition and adjusted sizes, and tried to restore it (large, nearly a TB). It ran several hours, and at 100% completion, simply announced Recovery Operation Failed. And then to top it off, it deleted the Restored partition. It gave no clue why?
2. Why doesn’t Recovery say what and why it failed? Is there any way to find out why?
3. Why doesn't Validation point out any restore problem in advance? It would have saved me this time.
4. Why is the restoration partition deleted then? Why not keep and show whatever might be there from the many hours of restore operation? It seemed happy enough until the 100% point. Better programming choices seem very possible. I'm suggesting trying harder.
This was repeated a few times, with the same result. It was then also attempted from the previous older backup, with the same failed result, but again giving no clue why. Both the current and older backup still Validate (at least they run and finally quit at 100% without saying anything), but neither are restorable.
My guess (seen now in the user manual) is the reason may have been that some even earlier first version had been deleted? (and it had been deleted) Who knew?
5. But it was a FULL backup. Why isn’t a Full backup file totally standalone? Why is any earlier file version involved in any way with a current FULL backup? My thinking is that a FULL backup file should be complete and always usable. Early versions of TrueImage (meaning versions 10 and 11) were standalone if a Full backup (meaning, at least they could still be recovered by the CD version, but now it cannot be restored). In this case, TrueImage was totally unreliable for me. And I can’t know if any of my other partition Full backups are any good.
Validation apparently is of no use to know this. Why not? Shouldn't it say if not a valid backup file?
Backup: Different topic. The manual (2018 page 27) says: "Full recovery can be performed to the original location or to a new one". Seems clear, and that did used to be true some years back, but not true now for 2015 and 2018. There is a Browse to find the backup file, or to find the location to put the backup file, but there is no Browse for recovery location. It shows ONLY the disk partition where it came from, as the only possibility. Does not show any other disk or partition that I might want to choose. It knows where it came from, and that is the only place it can go back to.
5. Why? Why cannot I relocate the recovery? What do I not understand? How can I relocate it?
Thank you for any assistance possible with either issue. Wayne


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Thank you Steve. Backup and Validation was from Windows, and restoration attempts were from CD.
I just now got your report program, and it never occurred to me that the CD version might have a deep menu that might provide more status. I wish the failing program would simply also copy any logged failure status to the failure screen for the user.
The Windows log says things like this:
7/15/2020 8:12:28 PM: Operation E-DSLR started manually.
7/15/2020 8:12:30 PM: Operation: Recovery
7/15/2020 8:12:30 PM: Priority changed to Low.
7/15/2020 8:12:30 PM: Recover Backup Archive From file: H:\Z77\E-DLR\E-DSLR_full_b2_s1_v3.tib Recovery of: Disks
7/15/2020 8:12:30 PM: Pending operation 20 started: 'Deleting partition'.
7/15/2020 8:12:30 PM: Pending operation 14 started: 'Recovering partition'.
7/15/2020 10:17:13 PM: Error 0x101f6: A format/resize error.
7/15/2020 10:17:13 PM: Bootability restore operation has started.
7/15/2020 10:17:13 PM: Error 0x1d01f4: Disk '\local\hd_sign(DB4BF07B)' has invalid BIOS number (0). The following value will be used: '130'.
7/15/2020 10:17:13 PM: Error 0x390007: Failed to detect GRUB activator.
7/15/2020 10:17:13 PM: Error 0x390007: Failed to detect GRUB activator.
7/15/2020 10:17:13 PM: Error 0x0
7/15/2020 10:17:13 PM: Error 0x0
7/15/2020 10:17:13 PM: Error 0x0
7/15/2020 10:17:13 PM: Error 0x0
7/15/2020 10:17:13 PM: Error 0x0
7/15/2020 10:17:13 PM: Error 0x390007: Failed to detect GRUB loader.
7/15/2020 10:17:13 PM: Error 0x0
7/15/2020 10:17:13 PM: Error 0x390007: Failed to detect GRUB loader.
7/15/2020 10:17:13 PM: Error 0x0
7/15/2020 10:17:13 PM: Bootability restore operation has finished.
7/15/2020 10:17:13 PM: Error 0x390007: Failed to detect GRUB loader.
7/15/2020 10:17:14 PM: Error 0xbe004a: Error occurred while opening registry subkey.
7/15/2020 10:17:14 PM: Error 0x13c0005: Operation has completed with errors.
Start: 7/15/2020 8:12:28 PM
Stop: 7/15/2020 10:17:14 PM
Total Time: 02:04:46
It took more like 6 or 8 hours, maybe it kept running somehow? The progress bar kept growing to 100%. And I tried several more times than I have log files for this partition. And no report I recognize about a missing initial file.
Your web site has a page saying GRUB doesn’t matter, and the restores that did work OK say all the same things except for Error 0x0 and that last line: “Operation has completed with errors”. And that pops a box saying Error, and the partition is deleted.
But I have finally had success. Since Restore Partition fails, I was able to use the Files & Folder option to recover all the folders individually. The huge one (700 GB) worked OK, but it did pop a box three times saying three image files could not be recovered, but Ignore simply proceeded on uneventfully. I can live with that. :) Log file reports those, saying three files were corrupted. But why partition recovery fails is a mystery.
So I am OK, I did recover my data. A reasonably happy camper now. :)
So from what you said, failure with the CD version must be for some other reason than the "missing initial file" that I suspected. I used the CD version because I knew that any first initial file was gone. From past experience, I was aware that the CD restore didn’t care about that but Windows did, but I didn’t know if still true. But mine was still failing at completion, and I don’t know why.
So not the problem this time after all, but I've never understood how the developers of a disk recovery program would give priority to their notions about this initial file being so important somehow, and actually abort a FULL standalone backup if it is missing? The CD version apparently has no issues doing a successful recovery without it, so it’s not all that important, and it is unrelated to the current Full backup. So possible is possible, and recovery is the only purpose, and users would vote a different way about pass or fail recovery of their data. As is, this “feature” deserves much more prominent warning to the user.
I did wonder why my Full backup was in three parts:
07/15/2020 02:15 PM 700,729,696,256 E-DSLR_full_b2_s1_v1.tib
07/15/2020 03:06 PM 33,659,830,272 E-DSLR_full_b2_s1_v2.tib
07/15/2020 03:24 PM 103,335,235,584 E-DSLR_full_b2_s1_v3.tib
3 File(s) 837,724,762,112 bytes
Perhaps these divisions were caused by the three files that could not be recovered? But it Validates. At least, I imagined it did. It just terminated silently. I see now that the log file does say Validation was successful, but it would seem the program might say that on the screen.
Then (a different situation, a different case), if recovery to a different location is Files and Folders only, the Acronis manuals have a serious error about it. It clearly says for both modes: (page 27 of both the 2018 and 2020 manuals)
Backups are useful primarily for two purposes:
To recover an operating system when it is corrupted or cannot start (called disaster recovery). Refer to Protecting your system (p. 15) for more details about protecting your computer from a disaster.
To recover specific files and folders after they have been accidentally deleted or corrupted.
Acronis True Image 2018 does both by creating disk (or partition) images and file-level backups respectively.
Recovery methods:
Full recovery can be performed to the original location or to a new one.
When the original location is selected, the data in the location is completely overwritten with the data from the backup. In case of a new location, the data is just copied to the new location from the backup.
Incremental recovery is performed only to the original location and only from a cloud backup. ...
Perhaps I misunderstand the "does both by creating disk (or partition) images?
But you’re right that the partition mode does Not allow choices of different partition locations to restore it.
Thank you for your help Steve. I had given up, but I have recovered the data now. And I appreciate knowing about the log files.
Wayne
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Wayne, glad to read that you have been able to recover your folders and files.
The Grub error is worrying unless you have had a Linux type OS installed on this disk drive at some point and it has been left over. I have not seen any such reports in the forums that I can remember.
Recovery of a disk backup to another location (other than the original) would be actioned early on in the process when you select the target / destination disk to recover to, whereas with the Files & Folders recovery it comes later in the process.
I would recommend creating the ATI 2018 'Simple' version of the rescue media which uses files from the Windows Recovery Environment to create WinPE media instead of the older Linux based media.
KB 60820: Acronis True Image 2018: how to create bootable media
KB 60091: Acronis True Image 2018: how Simple bootable media creation mode works
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Thanks Steve. My log files seemed to be fussing about Not finding GRUB.
I was using the latest Simple media built by 2018 15470 on 1/21/2020. I see that I do have a log file from that date, but it was from a backup, any CD build is not mentioned. I see your link say WinRE is the default build, but my Win10 Pro does not have the WinRE.wim file said to trigger building that version. I don't know how to identify my copy, but I suspect it is still Linux. Seems like adding what version it used would be a good addition to the log file. :)
I also have a Windows PE version built from 2018 10640 3/19/2018, and its contents do look very Microsoft-ish (where the above does not). And it works, but it loading Windows is pretty slow.
Wayne
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Wayne, you can check on the status of your WinRE partition by using an Administrator command prompt and typing the command REAGENTC /INFO
Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.19041.388] (c) 2020 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. 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\partition5\Recovery\WindowsRE Boot Configuration Data (BCD) identifier: bfb80be6-a2b4-11ea-ad10-a2228913a61a Recovery image location: Recovery image index: 0 Custom image location: Custom image index: 0 REAGENTC.EXE: Operation Successful. C:\WINDOWS\system32>
If there are problems with WinRE then first check if you have more than one Recovery partition on your system (ignoring any OEM factory recovery partitions which are normally much larger size, i.e. around 10GB).
One option is to download and install the Windows 10 ADK & PE files to match your Win 10 build (i.e. 1909, 2004) and create the Advanced WinPE version that uses those files.
If you are not on Win 10 #2004 build, then upgrading to 2004 would also refresh the WinRE partition (but may not remove any older 'left-over' recovery partitions from say Win 7).
WinPE boot media can seem to be a little slower to start than the Linux media but it is loading a larger set of files and better device drivers etc.
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The command on my system says: Windows RE status: Disabled
Based on your comment, the reason must be because I had deleted the one Recovery partition. I didn't know its purpose, knew I didn't use it for Recovery, and was surprised it was even there. It interfered with my plans to expand the preceding partition. I assumed it was something left over from the past.
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Wayne, the recovery partition gives a selection of different tools to help with issues that may be encountered on your Windows 10 system, including Startup Repair, access to System Protection restore points or image recovery, selecting a different boot device etc.
Each new build / upgrade version of Windows 10 will create a new Recovery partition if not present or update existing.
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You are extremely helpful Steve. In spite of my grumbling and trying to go my own way. :) Thank you, I really appreciate the help and the education you provide. I will make room for a Recovery partition again, and it also appears that True Image even offers to restore it. The Volume name was Recovery as I recall.
I thought not being able to relocate a recovered Full backup was inexcusable (because dang it, that's what I want to do), but a good reason finally occurred to me. Disk drive letters and Volume names are unfamiliar and have little meaning to many users, and so forcing recovery to only the same original partition likely saves many overwriting blunders. I can appreciate that as a fine goal, but still, some hard to access override would be handy too. :)
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