cloning problems

Dell's are typically F2 to get into BIOS or F12 to change a one time boot priority

Most other manufacturers use either F1, Delete or Escape to either get into the bios or to change the one time boot priority 

By default, the default boot medium isi often set to primary hard drive (usually disk 0 or 1 in the bios).  Your system is probably booting to your primary hard drive because that is the way the bios has been configured.

Depending on you computer manufacturer, you should be able to get into the bios and change the default boot order so that your CD rom or USB are given priority first, before your internal hard drive.

Alternatively, many bios' let you select a onetime boot option if you press ESC, Delete, F1, F12 or the proper key after completely powering off the computer and booting up.  You'll have to refer to your manufacturer's manual to determin which keys get you into the bios or allow you to select a different one time boot option after the system has been rebooted.

FYI also...  When you purchase Acronis it states that 30 day support is all that's offered.  However, chat support is usually available for free - although can be frustrating at times. I think chat is only available during Acronis business hours though.

i have an HP Pavilion elite desktop I went through the BIOS and did exactly what you and the help video have stated i know a little bit more about computers than the average user i even tried the “one time boot option” it still ran like it was a windows backup disk not the acronis program like it should.

I have also tried this without “bootable media” and all it did was go through the process asked to shut down the computer  i said yes it shut down started its program said preparing to clone drive then about a minute later it shuts down restarts and acts like nothing happened.

Also regarding your “FYI” i want no hassle no wait and the problem to be fixed ASAP now the live chat might not work because i will have to shut down the PC to do the cloning so that will not work i will be cutoff. but thank you for the reply

austen,

You do not say if you are running a UEFI bios or not are you?  If you are the boot media will not start and boot into the on screen boot menu unless you first disable Secure Boot in the bios.

why do they make it so dang complicated why cant it just be push a button and it works

Good point Enchantec!

Also, if you want to rule out your own hardware and just test your bootable media (.ISO or bootable USB), you can at least test the legacy boot mode of it using QEMU.  If you want to test EFI mode, you'll have to look at something like Virtualbox or Vmware Desktop (both are free), but it takes a bit of configuration to get them to read physical disks so QEMU is by far the easiest solution I've found, although it is limited to only being able to boot the Legacy mode stuff.   

QEMU is by far the easiest and can be found in GUI form through an older multi boot disk creator tool called Xboot.  Although Xboot hasn't been updated in awhile, and there are plenty of better multiboot creator tools like Yumi or Easy2Boot now, Xboot still comes in handy for the embedded GUI version of the Qemu emulator.  You can download Xboot and run it as administrator (doesn't require any installation - it's a self reliant application).  Then navigate to the QEMU tab and mount your Acronis bootable .iso or USB thumb drive.  If QEMU can bring up the Acronis bootable media menu's, you know your bootable media is good and there is something in your bios settings that it preventing it from booting up.

http://www.pendrivelinux.com/xboot-multiboot-iso-usb-creator/

austen schulze wrote:

why do they make it so dang complicated why cant it just be push a button and it works

If you are looking for a push button solution, try one of these.

http://www.kingwin.com/storage/docking-stations/ezd-2537u3/

Source disk goes in back slot, target goes in front slot...press the "clone" button.  It is not connected to a computer during the clone.  Does have some limitations:

Target disk must be same size or larger than source disk.  If Target disk is larger, extra space is "unallocated". 

I have one, and it works great.  I have cloned a 2TB to 2TB no issues.

I expect you were venting...in your quote above.

Regards,

FtrPilot

so when i tried to boot from the USB ISO file it stayed blank black screen with a curser for typing. I guess i dont understand how to open a ISO file on the BIOS.

maybe im not as good with tech than i thought

I don’t want to buy  anything else that’s why i bought acronis in the first place so i would have to wait for something to be shipped. its a 750 GB drive to 1 TB  and the 750 has 500 taken so i dont want 500 GB to be "unallocated". unless you know how to merge the unallocated with the rest of the hard drive

Austen,

I originally bought my EZ dock 3 so I could easily attach standard SATA 3.5 and 2.5 disks through USB.  Once a week, I download my latest backups to an external disk for off site storage.  The clone ability was a bonus.

If you had an EZ dock 3, or something similar, you could take your boot disk out of your computer and put your new disk in.  That would force your computer to look for a boot source, which would be your DVD - rescue media.  The old disk would go into the EZ dock 3 and you can then do the clone using ATI.

I have no knowledge of Dell computers, so I can't help there.

FtrPilot

OK, so in Acronis, you either make a bootable ISO file (iso can be saved as an .ISO file and burned to disc, or you just have it create the media on a CD or DVD rom to begin with).  OR, you have it create a bootable USB drive instead of an ISO.  When you create the bootable media, it will let you choose one or the other.  If you have a USB thumb drive, use that instead - no .iso will be created but all of the necessary files and bootable information will be copied to your thumb drive.

Once your bootable thumb drive is created, try to boot to the drive - can you see it in your boot options following these instructions?

http://h20564.www2.hp.com/hpsc/doc/public/display?docId=emr_na-c01443326

This document pertains to HP Notebook PCs with the HP Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) beginning in late-2008.

To access the Boot Device Options window, turn on the computer and immediately press the esc key to display the Startup Menu, and then press the F9 key.

This window presents the standard choices available in your BIOS for determining how your computer will attempt to boot the operating system on its next restart. Using the F9 option does not permanently change the way in which your computer attempts to start. It will only apply to the current startup process. For information about permanently altering your computer's boot order, please refer to HP Notebook PCs - BIOS Setup (F10) .

If you see your thumb drive - boot to it and see what happens.  If it does not do anything but continue to blink or do nothing - give it a few minutes (it is loading into RAM and needs a little time - it shouldn't take more than 5 minutes, but give it a little time to be sure).

If nothing happens after that (I'm not sure which model HP Elite you have, but perhaps this is similar on your model), you may have to try turning off secure boot - I'm assuming these instructions will be similar for your HP, but every device and/or BIOS is a little different so it may not be exact...

http://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Desktop-Operating-Systems-and-Recovery/How…

Disabling Secure Boot

You may want to disable Secure Boot in order to install new hardware or boot from a CD or DVD. Follow these steps to disable Secure Boot:

1. Turn off the computer.

2. Immediately press the Escape key repeatedly, about once every second, until the Startup Menu opens.

   Figure 4: Startup Menu

3. Use the right arrow key to choose the System Configuration menu, use the down arrow key to select Boot Options , then press Enter .

   Figure 5: System Configuration menu

4. Use the down arrow key to select Secure Boot , press the Enter key, then use the down arrow key to modify the setting to Disabled .

   Figure 6: Secure Boot: Disabled

5. Press Enter to save the change.

6. Use the left arrow key to select the File menu, use the down arrow key to select Save Changes and Exit , then press Enter to select Yes .

7. The Computer Setup Utility closes and the computer restarts. When the computer has restarted, the Operating System Boot Mode Change screen appears, prompting you to confirm the Boot Options change. Type the code shown on the screen, then press Enter to confirm the change and continue to Windows.

Once secure boot has been disabled and the bios settings have been SAVED, then try...

o access the Boot Device Options window, turn on the computer and immediately press the esc key to display the Startup Menu, and then press the F9 key.

This window presents the standard choices available in your BIOS for determining how your computer will attempt to boot the operating system on its next restart. Using the F9 option does not permanently change the way in which your computer attempts to start. It will only apply to the current startup process. For information about permanently altering your computer's boot order, please refer to HP Notebook PCs - BIOS Setup (F10) .

If you see your thumb drive - boot to it and see what happens.