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True Image 2018 - Universal Restore - Intel Software RAID

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After recovering image from Precision 7710 Intel Software RAID to Precision 7730 Intel Software RAID using ATI2018 boot usb, then used latest version download of UR. UR reports success with warnings. Warnings related to Intel RST.. failed to open directory... failed to copy inf. Reboot button in UR seems to only exit the UI. Have to type exit at prompt for a reboot. After reboot, get Windows blue screen. Have attempted many different driver file uploads, automatic, manual, backwards, forwards...always Windows loading dots spin for 10-15 seconds and then blue screen. 

Any help out there?

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What OS are you restoring?  If it's Windows 10, you might not even need to use UR at all. Are you using a desktop OS or server OS (keep in mind server OS are not supported by True Image - Backup 12.5 is)

What is the RAID controller in your Precision?  Is it an embedded Intel (IRST), or something like rocketraid or LSI?  You can get Dell specific WinPE and model drivers from Dell at:

https://www.dell.com/support/article/us/en/19/sln312414/dell-command-deploy-driver-packs-for-enterprise-client-os-deployment?lang=en

Best I can tell, it is using IRST from the drivers I see in the latest driver .cab in the link I posted above.  If you're using Windows 10, forget UR.

Deploy the image again (make sure you are booting recovery drive in the same mode as your OS was installed in - legacy or UEFI - most likely UEFI, but double check in system information if you're not sure).

After you deploy, go into the bios and ensure the SATA mode is RAID instead of AHCI and attempt to boot.  Let it boot 3 times (even if it fails).  On the fourth time, you may get an F8 prompt for safe mode.  Try to boot in safemode at least once and if successful, then try to boot normally.

Thanks for the response.

Windows 10 Pro 1803.

Dell Precision 7710 -> Dell Precision 7730

Intel RST RAID volume -> Intel RST RAID volume

Same size

BIOS settings as identical as possible between systems

UEFI without secure boot -> UEFI without secure boot

Legacy options off -> Legacy options off

RAID mode -> RAID mode

I tried using UR because I was getting blue screens after recovery even just with ATI. I figured it was a driver issue, so that's why I started trying UR. I struggled with UR for several tries not seeing OS, but then downloaded "newer?" UR from Acronis account and it does see OS after ATI restore, but regardless of drivers loaded still get blue screen. 

I'll discontinue attempting UR. 

I'll try the multiple boot attempts in hopes of getting safe mode.

If no luck with that, could it be something wrong with the way I made the ATI usb rescue?

Maybe I need to use your links for WinPE to create ATI usb rescue?

I just went through and selected advanced>Win-PE based media>64bit, Windows Recovery Environment>only added Intel RST drivers(ATI won't see RAID volume otherwise). That's it, created usb boot and am able to recover from .tib on external usb drive to existing Intel RAID volume. It just won't boot afterwards. 

That sounds correct. Which version of IRST did you use? The latest is from Dec 2018 and might provide some additional help.  I'd load them up in the original OS for your storage controller driver, reboot and then take an image of that.  

Check out the F8 / safeboot option (if you can get it to pop up after the 4th failed boot) - it worked for me moving from an AHCI SSD to my first PCIe NVME and RAID.  

Let us know how it goes, it's do-able and we'll help you figure it out.

No luck on F8 safeboot. 

Next steps taken:

Loaded latest Dell driver installs for Intel Chipset as well as Intel RST for new model Precision 7730 onto Precision 7710.

Just ran the executables and they both ran without error or saying"these aren't for your machine.." even though I ran them on current Precision 7710. Interesting, because the Intel Chipset and Intel RST downloads under 7710 are not the same version numbers.

Then made changes to original 7710 disabling legacy boot options and enabled secure boot.

Verified multiple boots, all ok.

Made same changes to new 7730 disabling legacy boot options and enabled secure boot.

Went into new 7730 and deleted Intel RAID set and recreated fresh.

Booted original 7710 into ATI usb and ran full disk backup to .tib on external drive.

Booted new 7730 into ATI usb and ran disk recovery from .tib on external drive to fresh Intel RAID volume.

Recovery process currently running.

Will update with results. 

 

Note: First time I pulled the image from original 7710, I was using ATI from within Windows 10 session.

Also did full backup of Intel RAID volume and chose sector by sector option. 

Original 7710 was set to UEFI with legacy option enabled and secure boot disabled, but so was new 7730.

Also originally was just targeting image to existing Intel RAID volume on new 7730 and had not tried deleting/recreating RAID set first.

All that has been changed on this attempt as detailed above.

 

No joy..... :(

Same behavior.

Recovery succeeds, but after reboot spinning dots for 30-35 seconds, the BSOD INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE.

Same BSOD I was getting with all previous attempts including AUR. 

I checked logs in the ATI console before booting and see that it lists several  "Failed to detect GRUB loader." and "An invalid sector size.", but found another ATI KB article that says this can be ignored. https://kb.acronis.com/content/30598

 

From the other ATI KB/forum posts it looks like the recommendations for issues like this almost always go back to making sure UEFI and boot settings are the same in both locations. I have done that and done that again and then again.

 

Maybe it's just time to punt and spend a couple weeks doing a clean install and setup.

 

This is my work laptop. I'm an admin and have tons of specialization that I really don't want to have to rebuild. 

 

 

 

 

 

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It may or may not be a driver issue. I have two suggestions:

1. The issue could be caused by the BCD file. On the new computer with the Windows system that fails to boot, boot into WinRE. You can use a Windows installation DVD or an Acronis recovery media created with the Simple method so that it was created based on WinRE rather than WinPE. At the command prompt enter the following line.

bootrec /RebuildBCD.

When it finds the Windows installation enter yes to rebuild the BCD.

2. If that doesn't work, make a clean install of Windows so that you can get to Device Manager and identify the driver being used by the RAID controller. Once you have the proper driver, you can restore your original backup to the new computer. This time don't apply Universal Restore. Just use WinPE from the command line to inject the proper RAID driver. The command would look like:

dism /image:C: /Add-Driver /Driver:"Full_Path_to_inf_file" 

You need to check that WinRE has assigned C: to your Windows system. Do this with the following lines:

C:

dir

If the Windows system is not at C:, find it by trying D: and dir until you find it.

The new system will surely boot after these two things are done.

I think I see the reason for your problem. The 7710 is using IRST 15.7 and the 7730 is using IRST 16.8. You need to inject the drivers for 16.8 in the restored system. Don't do it with Universal Restore! Use method 2 above to manually inject the driver.

Here's a link to IRST 16.8:

https://downloadcenter.intel.com/download/28400/Intel-Rapid-Storage-Technology-Intel-RST-User-Interface-and-Driver-for-Intel-7th-8th-Generation-Platforms

Download f6flpy-x64.zip to get the driver in the correct format.

Thank you for the reply. I’m back in the office Monday morning and will try this first thing. It feels like there’s so many different ways to do the WinPE or WinRE. Can I just boot to Windows 10 install dvd, choose repair, advanced/troubleshoot, command prompt and then inject the driver from there maybe with the  source path for the driver being from a usb flash drive? Or do I need to be in some WinPE for this? If WinPE, can you suggest best method? Should I still do the bootrec bcd as well or skip that? The checking c: dir is just so I’m adding the driver to the right place..correct?

Using the Windows installation DVD and getting to a command prompt will work fine. The only reason I said you needed to use WinRE instead of WinPE is that the bootrec command is only available in WinRE.

After more analysis, you should inject the IRST 16.8 driver first. Any WinPE you have will work for this. If you do need to rebuild the bcd, then you need to use WinRE which is available from the Windows installation DVD.

Yes, checking the directory is to make sure the driver is being injected to the right place. Depending on how many drives are in a computer the Windows partition could be assigned a letter other that C. Even with only one drive in the computer, WinRE may assign C to the Recovery partition which is usually first on the disk. If you do specify the wrong drive letter, you will receive an error message. Having the driver on a USB will be fine. Again, you need to figure out what drive letter WinPE assigned to the USB drive.

Just so you know, the best method for creating WinPE or WinRE media with Acronis programs is the MVP PEBuilder tool. You get a Windows like desktop with file managers that make it really easy to determine what drive letter has been assigned to what partitions. You get many options during the build process including the choice to use WinPE or WinRE.

There's another thing I should mention. There are four inf files in the IRST 16.8 driver. You can get them all to install with one command by specifying just the folder with the driver and adding /recurse to the end of the command. This will pick up all the inf's in one shot instead of using four command.

dism /image:C: /Add-Driver /Driver:"Full_Path_to_driver_folder" /recurse

***ISSUE RESOLVED***

 

Thanks to Mustang and Bobbo for your help!

 

Booted from Windows 10 1809 dvd>repair computer>troubleshoot>command prompt

Verified "C" was being given to boot drive containing Windows install.

Placed Intel RST drivers on usb media in a subfolder "Drivers", inserted and it was given "E".

 

dism /image:C: /Add-Driver /Driver:E:\Drivers /recurse

 

Drivers successfully installed.

Removed dvd and usb and rebooted

 

System booted to Windows

 

This has saved me days and weeks of customization. Maybe it will help someone else as well.

 

Thanks again!!!

Excellent news! So glad to hear all is well again and appreciate the info. We can definitely reference this for others that might be in the same boat as you too!

You're very welcome. Glad to hear it worked.