Help with Universal Boot and TI 2015
Hi – I’m struggling with Universal Restore for Acronis 2015. Briefly, this is my situation.
I have an old Toshiba laptop loaded with software – and want to move everything to a new Toshiba laptop. The original laptop is running Windows 7 32 bit.
The new laptop has a brand new HDD with no partitions and no OS on it. My plan was to move everything over from the old laptop and simply enter a new Windows 7 licence on the new machine.
The new laptop has a different motherboard etc. – so I cannot simply clone things over. If I do, the new laptop simple freezes at the point where the Windows ‘graphic’ and the words ‘Starting Windows’ appears on screen. The only way to get out of that is by pressing the power button. So my hope was that I could use Universal Restore to add the necessary drivers that I assume are causing this problem.
I’ve found what I can on the web about using Universal Restore – but it seems to apply to Acronis 2014 not 2015. The screens look different. It may be that I’ve fundamentally misunderstood some part of the process – so hopefully someone can help.
This is what I’ve been doing and this is what happens.
1. I have installed Acronis 2015 on the old Toshiba laptop. It’s been paid for and activated.
2. I then used Acronis 2015 to create a ‘whole disk’ image of the old Toshiba and put that on an external HDD. I then plug this into the new laptop.
3. I then downloaded and installed Acronis Universal Restore.
4. On the old laptop, I then create an Acronis Universal Restore Disk that contains both Universal Restore and Acronis 2015. I’m using the Linux versions.
5. I load on to a USB drive all the missing drivers for the new laptop. I then plug this into the new laptop.
6. I then boot the new laptop from an external DVD Drive containing the DVD created at 4 above.
7. I then reach a screen with three options. ‘Acronis Universal Boot’, ‘Acronis Trueimage 2015’ or ‘Continue to OS’.
8. At this point I select ‘Acronis Trueimage 2015’ and navigate to the Home Screen. Here I have two choices – Backup or Recover. I click ‘Recover’.
9. At the next screen I can choose to navigate to the .tib backup file I created earlier and is located on the external HDD. If I right click on this – I have option to ‘recover’.
10. At the next screen (Choose Recovery Method), I have just two options. ‘Recover Whole Disks and Partitions’ or ‘Recover Chosen Files and Folders’. I was expecting to see a ‘sub-option’ offering me the chance to use ‘Universal Restore’ – but that option is not present.
11. My only option at this point is to proceed with the disk ‘clone’ to the new laptop. This runs and completes without a hitch.
12. I then reboot and the new laptop boots to the ‘Starting Windows’ screen and then freezes.
13. I then power off and reboot to the external DVD where I select ‘Acronis Universal Boot’. This then loads.
14. I then select the OS (actually already selected as Windows 7).
15. Under Automatic Driver Search – I then ‘add folder’ and point the programme towards the USB drive containing the relevant drivers. There are no Mass Storage Drivers to Install.
16. I then press OK and the report suggests that the command applying ‘Universal Boot’ has completed successfully. There is one ‘warning’ in the list concerning DSDT table parsing being ‘stopped’ because of an unknown extended operation.
17. I then hit ‘reboot’. The laptop then ‘reboots’ – but freezes at the Windows Startup screen again. It’s as if the Universal Boot is not being applied.
So what am I doing wrong? Really need some help with this please!
Everything you did before step 13 is useless ;-)
Make sure your drivers are in the right format *.sys and *.inf files. Anything in exe or ZIP is useless: you'd have to unpack the files in these containers
Pat - thanks for responding.
Yes all the drivers are unpacked - so that's not the issue.
Given that the online instructions and the screens I'm seeing don't match - I'm keen to know what's going on.
You are lucky..
at least you get the option to restore. When I boot universal boot it tells me no OS! So I only have option reboot or turn off!
>>>
So?
Use the free tool sysprep from windows 7. You will find a good guideline on the web. Step for step, better than the manuals about universal restore that just tells you to follow the instructions that never come.
One you prepped your system with sysprep on the old laptop make an image of the OS
Then restore this image to your new laptop
Restart your new laptop
Windows will start and ask you for the drivers disk or where it can find it.
What sysprep is doing it removes all the hardware drivers from your OS. That is what you need and and if you don't do it your system will freeze.
If universal restore does this I wanted to check out but I never got it to work and the manuals just promise you anything but tell you nothing what the program actually is doing. And the support stuff does not seem to know it either...
the link for sysprep step by step is here:
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/286053-system-preparation-tool-use…
I tried it out and all my settings and software remained unchanged
So good luck, is probably the easiest way