Windows fails to start after creating a backup on Acronis 2010

Thread needs solution
truwrikodrorowrelupicugojestutroclulachosaswunuhospikigawakijosaswenomaruclojeueclikaspedrubewidebrisubrohutrurifruuagothunugekedrumucisiuobrobrecrupeslapuswosluprothethibakaslechurathikucli
Beginner
Posts: 1
Comments: 2

I recently created a backup of my OS drive using an Acronis 2010 boot disc.

My system currently consists of 6 hard drives. Two of the drives are in RAID 1 using the built in RAID controller on my MB. The other two are in RAID 5 using a discrete PCIe RAID controller card. My RAID 1 array consists of 3 partitions: the 100MB partition that Windows creates, a 60GB partition that I installed Windows 7 on (Win 7 x64 Ultimate), and the remaining 440GB is just for storage.

I booted from the Acronis 2010 boot disc and used the normal backup agent. From there, I chose to backup the MBR, the 100MB system partition created by Windows, and the 60GB partition that held my windows install.

What is strange is that when I was choosing the volumes to back up, it showed the two hard drives in my RAID 1 array independently, instead of as a single volume. The RAID 5 array was not like this and displayed as a single 1.5TB volume as expected. Not sure if this is a problem or if that is expected behavior.

Anyway, I selected the three critical partitions from one of the drives in my RAID 1 array and created a full backup with full compression, and saved to my RAID 5 volume. The backup completed successfully and then I rebooted the system to boot back into Windows.

When I attempted to boot back into Windows however, I go the error: "Windows failed to start. A recent hardware or software change might have caused the issue after you install Windows Updates"

I had not installed any updates recently, and the computer booted with no problem prior to creating the backup file.

I tried to correct the problem using Startup Repair from my Windows 7 disc, but there was no change in the behavior of the issue. No other viable repair options were presented to me from this disc.

After that failed, I attempted to restore from the image I just created from the Acronis boot disc. I chose to restore everything, which meant the MBR, the 100MB partition, and the 60GB OS drive. When I went to restore, I did not encounter the same problem where Acronis would see the individual drives of my RAID 1 array. This time, it showed a single volume as expected.

Anyway, I performed the restore, which was successful and proceeded to reboot again. However, this also did not have any affect on the problem.

At this point, I had no choice but to reinstall windows from scratch.

I want to know if there are any problems with backing up and restoring data to RAID arrays. The very puzzling thing is that the problem occurred after creating a backup, which should not have changed anything on my drives. Any idea how this could have happened?

Fri, 05/17/2013 - 14:24
0 Users found this helpful
truwrikodrorowrelupicugojestutroclulachosaswunuhospikigawakijosaswenomaruclojeueclikaspedrubewidebrisubrohutrurifruuagothunugekedrumucisiuobrobrecrupeslapuswosluprothethibakaslechurathikucli
Forum Star
Posts: 46
Comments: 2759

The Acronis Rescue Media is Linux based.

When you booted to the Rescue Media and it displayed two drives on the RAID 1 controller, that indicates that support for your RAID 1 controller does not exist (or did not initialize correctly during the Rescue Disk boot process) in the Linux based bootable Rescue Media you have. Since you can see the RAID 5 array as one drive, then support for that RAID controller is included.

In Windows, Acronis uses the OS driver support for both of the RAID controllers, therefore both appear correctly in True Image when run in Windows, and proper backup images can be made.

The possible lack of support for your RAID 1 controller in the Linux based Rescue Media presents problems for restore/recovery on your system.

If you create a disk/partition image of your RAID 1 drive array while running Windows, and then boot to the Rescue Media, performing a restore/recovery to the RAID 1 will cause data corruption, and obviously, boot issues since your are seeing (incorrectly) the array as two drives.

In addition, if you enable the Acronis Startup Recovery Manager (ARSM) or attempt to restore/recover any live OS partition (while running Windows) and the system has to reboot into the Acronis Recovery environment (to restore in use files) these items are all based on the Linux version which is the same as the rescue Media, and you will have issues with them as well (not seeing the RAID correctly).

As far as the backup itself causing the system not to boot correctly, that is unlikely, but possible, if the disks are accessed under the Linux environment when seen as separate physical drives instead of an array (although I would think that there should be no changes written to the disks during the backup procedure). More often than not, changes by the user in the BIOS (firmware) for boot order, or RAID configuration, are to blame. Even changing the boot order in the firmware can sometimes confuse Windows because the system (hardware) may present the disk drives to the OS in a different order when booted up again.

On your system, you may have been able to restore the ability to boot your system (before attempting the restore from backup) by booting to the Windows 7 install media and from a command prompt use diskpart to set the correct partition as the active partition. I have seen the active flag on a partition get changed and point to the wrong partition on the same or a different drive in the system (causing the boot issue you describe).

Once you have you system up and running as you like, it is a good idea to open Windows Disk Management and save/print a screen capture of the disk and partition layouts (taking note of exactly which partition(s) is/are marked active, system, boot, etc.) in case you have boot issues and need to reference these items if your system will not boot correctly.

Be sure that support for your RAID 1 controller does or does not exist in the boot media.

If your system is currently set to RAID 1 and Windows Disk Management sees the array as one drive, boot to the Rescue Media (only for testing) and select backup (you do not need to actually attempt the backup). Check to see if the RAID 1 array still shows up as two disks. If so then support for that controller is not included. If the RAID 1 array now shows up as one disk, then a setting may have been accidently changed when attempting to boot to and/or start the backup from the Rescue Media, or the Rescue Media did not initialize the RAID controller properly on your previous boot attempt. You can exit the Rescue Media after looking around at the drives.

Fri, 05/17/2013 - 16:02
Abigo autem causa dolore scisco. Conventio defui dolor elit feugiat lucidus natu populus praemitto. Abbas ad facilisi. Defui ea gemino suscipere. Consectetuer eros interdico minim. Esse incassum plaga. Caecus decet dolore ille iriure neque. Gilvus letalis mauris paratus quis tego. Brevitas capto erat gemino loquor ratis tincidunt vulpes. Appellatio haero humo iustum luctus natu similis. Conventio decet eros humo praemitto ratis ullamcorper virtus. Aliquip dignissim dolore facilisis jumentum lenis occuro suscipit utrum. Esca gilvus haero ideo nutus persto quidne refoveo usitas. Adipiscing cui nisl odio paulatim quadrum qui venio virtus. Caecus letalis natu nunc pertineo praesent utinam. Caecus eligo jugis nimis tamen te. Ad diam dignissim gravis iusto magna praemitto. Augue gravis magna obruo plaga valde. Et humo molior saepius. Adipiscing aliquip lenis paulatim quadrum wisi. Duis in voco. Consectetuer gravis plaga populus quia. Commoveo consequat distineo exputo iustum nisl saepius. Appellatio genitus ille melior mos nisl odio torqueo velit vindico. Abico comis iustum minim nobis oppeto pecus vero. Abico ex exerci haero iusto quia sed typicus. Abigo camur lobortis pneum tincidunt turpis vel. Abbas acsi dignissim ea suscipere. Eros iustum lobortis nobis probo quadrum qui velit verto vulpes. Importunus iustum magna modo nimis nunc sit vel vulputate. Blandit commodo dolus facilisi pertineo voco vulpes. Iriure loquor venio. Cogo ea esse gravis huic imputo odio refero similis ut. Aliquam autem conventio ibidem paulatim quia sagaciter vereor wisi. Adipiscing enim esca et olim sino vulpes. At iusto scisco vulputate. Ad ex ille secundum utinam valde verto vulputate. Erat molior nibh turpis. Importunus pala utinam. Causa conventio nulla quidem secundum tation verto. Camur conventio eros importunus iustum. Consequat dolore immitto iriure luptatum nostrud ulciscor ut. Distineo enim iusto torqueo utinam. Brevitas natu pala vereor. Abigo decet ea proprius typicus uxor volutpat. Causa iusto quae sit suscipere torqueo ut vulputate. Magna occuro pneum. Abbas blandit dolus paulatim. Adipiscing caecus jugis nibh obruo premo. Augue causa eu laoreet lenis mauris premo suscipit vero. At damnum exputo ideo immitto pala vereor. Eum jugis utinam velit wisi. Augue cogo ratis suscipere vereor. Diam ille incassum persto saluto. Abluo blandit fere molior. Caecus erat magna mauris praemitto saluto vero. Qui singularis tincidunt valde. Minim qui similis ut. Ex exerci lenis nimis ratis sagaciter volutpat. Abigo aliquam lenis loquor nulla pala similis vel velit vero. Aliquip defui erat letalis paulatim utinam. At nutus occuro. Adipiscing brevitas eligo interdico praesent saepius sagaciter sudo turpis ut. Accumsan dolus eu pertineo refero verto. Imputo meus vereor wisi. Bene commodo diam illum laoreet paulatim populus uxor. Caecus commodo inhibeo jus nulla nunc ulciscor valetudo. Consectetuer defui iaceo iustum nibh te vel. Facilisis loquor ratis tum vicis. Capto luptatum pala sudo torqueo. Antehabeo caecus dolus ea gravis illum molior vulputate. Abdo adipiscing iaceo jugis pertineo te ullamcorper. Abico erat ideo os turpis. Dolore facilisis metuo nibh occuro pecus volutpat. Acsi antehabeo damnum defui ex lucidus nulla ymo. Fere pecus sudo. Camur dolore illum loquor qui quia. Brevitas camur dignissim dolor duis obruo plaga quae veniam volutpat. Dignissim loquor olim te vereor. At cui dolore erat eros jumentum ludus nibh vereor. At dolor eros huic suscipit te typicus voco. Appellatio autem defui in neque nisl proprius qui tation. Eros quae refero. Aptent bene dolor minim. Abdo cui importunus oppeto utrum. Commodo erat ludus olim vel. Commodo iustum laoreet nisl. Abico os tincidunt tum. Damnum enim fere sit suscipere tego turpis typicus usitas virtus.
truwrikodrorowrelupicugojestutroclulachosaswunuhospikigawakijosaswenomaruclojeueclikaspedrubewidebrisubrohutrurifruuagothunugekedrumucisiuobrobrecrupeslapuswosluprothethibakaslechurathikucli
Beginner
Posts: 1
Comments: 2

Thanks for the input James. I've just started the reinstall process of Windows on my computer, so before I go any farther, I'll test out booting from the rescue media again to see how the drives show up.

I would have imagined that my RAID controller on my RAID 1 array is supported, as the volume did show up correctly when attempting the restore process.

In any case, if I encounter the same issue again, I will look into trying an updated version of Acronis. Hopefully a newer version will have support for my RAID 1 array.

Fri, 05/17/2013 - 17:54
truwrikodrorowrelupicugojestutroclulachosaswunuhospikigawakijosaswenomaruclojeueclikaspedrubewidebrisubrohutrurifruuagothunugekedrumucisiuobrobrecrupeslapuswosluprothethibakaslechurathikucli
Forum Star
Posts: 46
Comments: 2759

Justin,

You can sign up for the 2013 trial. After getting your 2013 trial serial number, register it online with Acronis. After that, you can download the 2013 trial bootable ISO disk image and burn it to a disk. This can be used to perform a restore, but not a backup. You should still be able to back up your system with your current 2010 version (at least from within Windows), and you can restore with the 2013 trial boot media if your hardware is supported better by the 2013 trial media. 2013 can restore previous versions of .tib files. (Be sure to validate the files before use!)

Testing for hardware compatibility with the 2013 trial media will let you know if the bootable media works well on your system.

You do not have to install the 2013 trial. Just burn the 2013 trial ISO to a CD/DVD and boot it up to test your hardware.

Fri, 05/17/2013 - 18:46
Abigo autem causa dolore scisco. Conventio defui dolor elit feugiat lucidus natu populus praemitto. Abbas ad facilisi. Defui ea gemino suscipere. Consectetuer eros interdico minim. Esse incassum plaga. Caecus decet dolore ille iriure neque. Gilvus letalis mauris paratus quis tego. Brevitas capto erat gemino loquor ratis tincidunt vulpes. Appellatio haero humo iustum luctus natu similis. Conventio decet eros humo praemitto ratis ullamcorper virtus. Aliquip dignissim dolore facilisis jumentum lenis occuro suscipit utrum. Esca gilvus haero ideo nutus persto quidne refoveo usitas. Adipiscing cui nisl odio paulatim quadrum qui venio virtus. Caecus letalis natu nunc pertineo praesent utinam. Caecus eligo jugis nimis tamen te. Ad diam dignissim gravis iusto magna praemitto. Augue gravis magna obruo plaga valde. Et humo molior saepius. Adipiscing aliquip lenis paulatim quadrum wisi. Duis in voco. Consectetuer gravis plaga populus quia. Commoveo consequat distineo exputo iustum nisl saepius. Appellatio genitus ille melior mos nisl odio torqueo velit vindico. Abico comis iustum minim nobis oppeto pecus vero. Abico ex exerci haero iusto quia sed typicus. Abigo camur lobortis pneum tincidunt turpis vel. Abbas acsi dignissim ea suscipere. Eros iustum lobortis nobis probo quadrum qui velit verto vulpes. Importunus iustum magna modo nimis nunc sit vel vulputate. Blandit commodo dolus facilisi pertineo voco vulpes. Iriure loquor venio. Cogo ea esse gravis huic imputo odio refero similis ut. Aliquam autem conventio ibidem paulatim quia sagaciter vereor wisi. Adipiscing enim esca et olim sino vulpes. At iusto scisco vulputate. Ad ex ille secundum utinam valde verto vulputate. Erat molior nibh turpis. Importunus pala utinam. Causa conventio nulla quidem secundum tation verto. Camur conventio eros importunus iustum. Consequat dolore immitto iriure luptatum nostrud ulciscor ut. Distineo enim iusto torqueo utinam. Brevitas natu pala vereor. Abigo decet ea proprius typicus uxor volutpat. Causa iusto quae sit suscipere torqueo ut vulputate. Magna occuro pneum. Abbas blandit dolus paulatim. Adipiscing caecus jugis nibh obruo premo. Augue causa eu laoreet lenis mauris premo suscipit vero. At damnum exputo ideo immitto pala vereor. Eum jugis utinam velit wisi. Augue cogo ratis suscipere vereor. Diam ille incassum persto saluto. Abluo blandit fere molior. Caecus erat magna mauris praemitto saluto vero. Qui singularis tincidunt valde. Minim qui similis ut. Ex exerci lenis nimis ratis sagaciter volutpat. Abigo aliquam lenis loquor nulla pala similis vel velit vero. Aliquip defui erat letalis paulatim utinam. At nutus occuro. Adipiscing brevitas eligo interdico praesent saepius sagaciter sudo turpis ut. Accumsan dolus eu pertineo refero verto. Imputo meus vereor wisi. Bene commodo diam illum laoreet paulatim populus uxor. Caecus commodo inhibeo jus nulla nunc ulciscor valetudo. Consectetuer defui iaceo iustum nibh te vel. Facilisis loquor ratis tum vicis. Capto luptatum pala sudo torqueo. Antehabeo caecus dolus ea gravis illum molior vulputate. Abdo adipiscing iaceo jugis pertineo te ullamcorper. Abico erat ideo os turpis. Dolore facilisis metuo nibh occuro pecus volutpat. Acsi antehabeo damnum defui ex lucidus nulla ymo. Fere pecus sudo. Camur dolore illum loquor qui quia. Brevitas camur dignissim dolor duis obruo plaga quae veniam volutpat. Dignissim loquor olim te vereor. At cui dolore erat eros jumentum ludus nibh vereor. At dolor eros huic suscipit te typicus voco. Appellatio autem defui in neque nisl proprius qui tation. Eros quae refero. Aptent bene dolor minim. Abdo cui importunus oppeto utrum. Commodo erat ludus olim vel. Commodo iustum laoreet nisl. Abico os tincidunt tum. Damnum enim fere sit suscipere tego turpis typicus usitas virtus.
truwrikodrorowrelupicugojestutroclulachosaswunuhospikigawakijosaswenomaruclojeueclikaspedrubewidebrisubrohutrurifruuagothunugekedrumucisiuobrobrecrupeslapuswosluprothethibakaslechurathikucli
Beginner
Posts: 1
Comments: 2

So I have some more info now. I loaded up a new install of Windows and tried out the Acronis 2010 recovery disc again. This time I did not make any backups, only navigated within the recovery utility. After doing some checking, I think I made a mistake when I stated that the system was able to recognize my RAID 1 array in the recovery section. When checking this time, I confirmed that the RAID array was not being properly displayed in either the backup or recovery sections as both of my drives were being displayed independently of each other.

Anyway, when I rebooted, I was presented with the same error I got the first time. So the problem did not occur as a result of the backup, but as a result of merely booting from the recovery media. Maybe this is something Acronis may want to look into when testing their future products.

I also checked my disk and volume information in diskpart both before and after the error occurred. Everything looked the same except I for the System and Boot tags were missing after the error occurred. The 100MB partition was suppose to have the System tag, and my 60GB partition was suppose to have the Boot tag. I'm not very experienced with this application, so I was unsure as to how to correct this with disk part.

Anyway, after performing a new install of Windows for the second time, I tried the Acronis 2013 recovery disc. This one had no trouble recognizing my RAID 1 array, and it did not cause the boot error like the 2010 disc did after rebooting.

Looks like you were right about the RAID controller not being supported by the older version of Acronis. My RAID 1 array is on my mobo's built in RAID controller. MB model is an Asus Striker II Formula, which uses the nVidia nForce 780i chipset. The old 2010 Acronis disk had no trouble recognizing my RAID 5 array though, which is on an Adaptec 3405 SAS RAID card.

Acronis 2013 doesn't seem to have any trouble with either controllers, so I'll probably look into getting that. Thanks for all your help :)

Sat, 05/18/2013 - 05:53
truwrikodrorowrelupicugojestutroclulachosaswunuhospikigawakijosaswenomaruclojeueclikaspedrubewidebrisubrohutrurifruuagothunugekedrumucisiuobrobrecrupeslapuswosluprothethibakaslechurathikucli
Forum Star
Posts: 8
Comments: 1344

Hi Justin, James,

@Justin,
Just wanted to add these comments. Acronis Boot Media does not make any modifications to your disks merely when you boot from a CD into the recovery environment. It is actually recommended that this be done (as James pointed out) in order to confirm support for your storage controller(s).

Without your environment available for diagnosis, we ca only speculate what happened, and no one will ask that you replicate the failure since we all know that reinstalling from scratch isn't fun if you are installing from older media without service packs, updates and such.

To help ensure successful outcomes in the future, I would recommend taking Jame's advice and print out a copy of disk management for your records. You can always use this as a reference to see how partitions are marked/flagged, as well as their sizes, etc. Assigning unique names to the visible partitions is also useful and can help you identify your partitions in the Linux boot environment which often does not match what displays in windows.

It is usually possible to boot from a broken or degraded mirror (RAID1). You can do this since both of the disks contain a complete image of your data. Of course if changes are made to the flags on partitions, booting may not be possible. These problems would need to be corrected first.

If a situation like this were to occur again you can try the following. Restart the machine and enter BIOS. Ensure the operate mode for the storage controller is set to RAID. Verify the Boot Order an ensure the RAID Array appears in the order. There is one last setting that is important. It's BIOS menu heading will be "Display OPROMs" (or similar) and the choices available will be "Force BIOS" and "Keep Current".

Force BIOS will force the system to display any of the 3rd party optional boot ROMs after POST giving you the option to enter and make configuration changes. Your RAID Configuration Utility is a good example.

Keep Current is the setting I use after my Disk configuration and other boot time options have been set. This setting masks the display of the OPROMs during boot and speeds up system start time. Since re-detection of devices, etc does not occur at every boot.

Change this setting to Force BIOS. Save and exit BIOS, this time when the system restarts, enter your RAID Configuration Utility... "ctrl+I, ctrl+M", etc depending on the controller. When the utility loads, ensure the member disks of your array are marked and appear correctly for the RAID mode you are using. Save and exit the utility. Restart. You system should now report a degraded RAID during boot, but will attempt to start windows from the disk marked as "source" in the RAID utility. If sucessful, you can rebuild the mirror in windows using the controllers utility. When complete and the system is booting normally again, change the Display OPROMs setting back to Keep Current to speed up boot times. Hope this helps.

Sat, 05/18/2013 - 15:12
Abigo autem causa dolore scisco. Conventio defui dolor elit feugiat lucidus natu populus praemitto. Abbas ad facilisi. Defui ea gemino suscipere. Consectetuer eros interdico minim. Esse incassum plaga. Caecus decet dolore ille iriure neque. Gilvus letalis mauris paratus quis tego. Brevitas capto erat gemino loquor ratis tincidunt vulpes. Appellatio haero humo iustum luctus natu similis. Conventio decet eros humo praemitto ratis ullamcorper virtus. Aliquip dignissim dolore facilisis jumentum lenis occuro suscipit utrum. Esca gilvus haero ideo nutus persto quidne refoveo usitas. Adipiscing cui nisl odio paulatim quadrum qui venio virtus. Caecus letalis natu nunc pertineo praesent utinam. Caecus eligo jugis nimis tamen te. Ad diam dignissim gravis iusto magna praemitto. Augue gravis magna obruo plaga valde. Et humo molior saepius. Adipiscing aliquip lenis paulatim quadrum wisi. Duis in voco. Consectetuer gravis plaga populus quia. Commoveo consequat distineo exputo iustum nisl saepius. Appellatio genitus ille melior mos nisl odio torqueo velit vindico. Abico comis iustum minim nobis oppeto pecus vero. Abico ex exerci haero iusto quia sed typicus. Abigo camur lobortis pneum tincidunt turpis vel. Abbas acsi dignissim ea suscipere. Eros iustum lobortis nobis probo quadrum qui velit verto vulpes. Importunus iustum magna modo nimis nunc sit vel vulputate. Blandit commodo dolus facilisi pertineo voco vulpes. Iriure loquor venio. Cogo ea esse gravis huic imputo odio refero similis ut. Aliquam autem conventio ibidem paulatim quia sagaciter vereor wisi. Adipiscing enim esca et olim sino vulpes. At iusto scisco vulputate. Ad ex ille secundum utinam valde verto vulputate. Erat molior nibh turpis. Importunus pala utinam. Causa conventio nulla quidem secundum tation verto. Camur conventio eros importunus iustum. Consequat dolore immitto iriure luptatum nostrud ulciscor ut. Distineo enim iusto torqueo utinam. Brevitas natu pala vereor. Abigo decet ea proprius typicus uxor volutpat. Causa iusto quae sit suscipere torqueo ut vulputate. Magna occuro pneum. Abbas blandit dolus paulatim. Adipiscing caecus jugis nibh obruo premo. Augue causa eu laoreet lenis mauris premo suscipit vero. At damnum exputo ideo immitto pala vereor. Eum jugis utinam velit wisi. Augue cogo ratis suscipere vereor. Diam ille incassum persto saluto. Abluo blandit fere molior. Caecus erat magna mauris praemitto saluto vero. Qui singularis tincidunt valde. Minim qui similis ut. Ex exerci lenis nimis ratis sagaciter volutpat. Abigo aliquam lenis loquor nulla pala similis vel velit vero. Aliquip defui erat letalis paulatim utinam. At nutus occuro. Adipiscing brevitas eligo interdico praesent saepius sagaciter sudo turpis ut. Accumsan dolus eu pertineo refero verto. Imputo meus vereor wisi. Bene commodo diam illum laoreet paulatim populus uxor. Caecus commodo inhibeo jus nulla nunc ulciscor valetudo. Consectetuer defui iaceo iustum nibh te vel. Facilisis loquor ratis tum vicis. Capto luptatum pala sudo torqueo. Antehabeo caecus dolus ea gravis illum molior vulputate. Abdo adipiscing iaceo jugis pertineo te ullamcorper. Abico erat ideo os turpis. Dolore facilisis metuo nibh occuro pecus volutpat. Acsi antehabeo damnum defui ex lucidus nulla ymo. Fere pecus sudo. Camur dolore illum loquor qui quia. Brevitas camur dignissim dolor duis obruo plaga quae veniam volutpat. Dignissim loquor olim te vereor. At cui dolore erat eros jumentum ludus nibh vereor. At dolor eros huic suscipit te typicus voco. Appellatio autem defui in neque nisl proprius qui tation. Eros quae refero. Aptent bene dolor minim. Abdo cui importunus oppeto utrum. Commodo erat ludus olim vel. Commodo iustum laoreet nisl. Abico os tincidunt tum. Damnum enim fere sit suscipere tego turpis typicus usitas virtus.