Impossible to get TI 11 to perform even basic function
Yet again I fall foul of Acronis's completely opaque behaviour and cryptic so-called "information"!
I was forced (because of a failed attempt to configure some TCP/IP software, which virtually paralysed my computer) to reinstall Win XP Home edition on my C: drive. But that was only after I had first tried instead (using TrueImage 11) to restore my system drive to an earlier state, from the disk backup I had on my ASZ. I tried from within Windows and then from the Acronis rescue disc: both attempts failed, inexplicably.
So I then resigned myself to reinstalling Win XP, on the same partition as before (formatting that partition as NTFS - it was previously FAT32 - in the process) thinking that Acronis's failure to restore must somehow have resulted from the same cause as had wrecked the rest of the os's functioning, and that once I had made a clean os install from the Windows CD I would then have no difficulty restoring my earlier system state from my TI backup to that. How wrong I was!
Having reinstalled Acronis TI 11 and pointed it at the backup file on ASZ to my amazement instead of a restore I got an Acronis read-out saying that no backups were present on my computer. So what happened to the one that was there? Acronis isn't saying. Once again, I tried to do the restore operation from the rescue disk as well - with the same result. By this stage it seemed obvious that Acronis had somehow and for some inexplicable reason junked a perfectly good backup.
I hastened to create a new one, not wanting to be exposed to the risk of being without any. Guess what? - error message (error code 5 (0x64005) ""operation has completed with errors". WHAT errors, and WHY? Acronis isn't saying.
So I ran the Backup Archive Validation Wizard to see what it might tell me. When I point it at Acronis Secure Zone, my backup location, I see a read-out saying 'Free space: 2.448 GB Total size 28.73 GB'. BUT SUPERIMPOSED ON THAT READ-OUT IS AN ERROR MESSAGE SAYING:- "ACRONIS SECURE ZONE HAS NO BACKUPS"!!!!!!!!! That was what it said the first time around, and it seems it must in fact have been lying then just as it is now.
To add insult to injury a "helpful" message now displays on a bright yellow background warning me that no backups have been scheduled and prompting me to schedule some. What for, for Christ's sake? - they won't work anyway.
WTF is going on with this crap software of yours, for which you have on more than one occasion charged me good money, I'd like to know?
AND nowhere in my copy of TI 11 (latest build, 8101) can I find how to generate a System Report, so I'm unable to attach one.
Well Pat L, you may for all I know be right.
But before I wrote my post I had already run Spinrite on the Acronis SZ partition of my system disk. It found no evidence whatever of any damage - not one single flaw.
I can appreciate of course that to have the ASZ on a medium physically separate from the system drive would be the ultimate protection in the event of complete disk failure (which obviously has to be an ever-present possibility, in the nature of things). But mine hasn't failed: on the contrary it shows every sign of being in a perfectly healthy condition.
So I'm afraid I remain deeply sceptical of that as an explanation for ATI's indefensibly pathetic behaviour. What's the use of backup software that doesn't back up, or which does but which then refuses to make the back-up available when you need it for the very purpose you made it for in the first place?
I really do despair of Acronis.
I see that no one from Acronis has seen fit to respond to this, despite the criticisms levelled.
I wonder why not...
In case there's still any doubt, I AM A TOTALLY DISSATISFIED CUSTOMER.
The older versions of TI didn't include the System Report program. It's necessary to download it to use it. Don't expect any fixes, though. Older versions don't get updated or supported.
It's possible that the SZ has become corrupted. However, the backup image may still be in it and may be valid. You could try changing the partition type of the SZ to standard FAT32 (this is NOT the same as formatting -- don't format the partition) so it can be seen normally and see what's there. You may also be able to access the partition directly using a Live Linux CD. Otherwise, a partitioning program could be used or the partition table could be edited to change the byte.
Without knowing exactly what happened when TI "failed, inexplicably" it's difficult to say what happened.
Thanks MudCrab. I will endeavour now to retrieve whatever is on the SZ partition by one or other of the means you suggested.
Without knowing exactly what happened when TI "failed, inexplicably" it's difficult to say what happened.
What happened was, essentially, what I already wrote:- that when I tried to restore my system from the disk backup that was on the ASZ partition to partition c: of the same disk (where after formatting it I had reinstalled Win XP, at the same time changing from FAT32 to NTFS) TI put up a message saying that there was no backup on the ASZ partition - or anywhere else. That was most certainly "inexplicable" to me, as I'm sure you'll appreciate.
But whatever the explanation I guess it's now academic since, clearly, I'm now never going to be able to do what I was trying to and which I had been led to believe was what Acronis TI was for.
The older versions of TI didn't include the System Report program. It's necessary to download it to use it. Don't expect any fixes, though. Older versions don't get updated or supported.
Noted. Am I the only one who regards the life-span of Acronis products as unacceptably short? They're not what I'd call cheap, although to be fair they almost always seem to be sold at a "temporary" discount from the marked price (which anyway smacks to me of huckstering...). But I'm probably just bitter and twisted...
This thread has some details on getting access to the SZ. Searching will probably show others.
@ MudCrab
Thanks for the link. Looking at the (secondary) link one of the first things I was struck by was that poster "bottom" asserts: "ASZ is just a standard NTFS drive with a special label that makes it invisible for all Windows systems ...
... at in least in TI 8 this was the case !" And further on poster "Kento" works on the same assumption.
In your post above you share the assumption that (running T! 11) my ASZ too would natively be NTFS, because one of the fixes you suggested was first to convert it to FAT32. But when I tried to do this I found that it was not formatted as NTFS but instead was already FAT32.
EDIT And I was unable to gain access to files, neither could I do so through a Linux live CD. Perhaps if I'd known about and been able to follow the guidance in the thread you've pointed me to I'd've had more success. But it's too late now to find out because I removed the previous ASZ out of sheer frustration, and have now set up a new one on my other hard drive.
When most recently I had formatted my C: drive - as part of my previous Win XP install - I chose FAT32 (so as to be compatible with any flavour of Linux I might want to install on that drive - although I understand now that that might not have been necessary).
Could this perhaps be the root cause of the problem I encountered at the beginning? (Although poster "mathematician" says: "the Secure Zone is a FAT32 partition in disguise".)
I've bookmarked the linked archive pages. for future reference.
Sorry for the confusion. It's been a while since I've read that thread. As far as I am aware, the SZ has always been FAT32 and has never been NTFS. Acronis just uses a different identifier for the partition type. The partition may have been a little corrupted. Maybe if you had changed it to standard FAT32 and then run chkdsk /f on it you would have been able to access the files.
I would really recommend using NTFS for Windows as it's a much more stable and robust file system than FAT32 (crashes and power outages can easily corrupt FAT32). Linux is actually pretty good with NTFS now. What I've done in the past was to create a small FAT32 partition to share data with Windows and Linux, but I don't consider it necessary now.
@ MudCrab
I would really recommend using NTFS for Windows
Yes, I've accepted this for some time already. I only formatted my C; drive as FAT32 "just in case" to format it as NTFS might give me problems with installing Linux, without realising that I don't anyway have to format the partitions on my C:drive where I plan to install Linux as NTFS even if the Windows partitions are NTFS-formatted. Which was all the stupider considering that I did in fact from the start format my other partitions on that drive's extended partition as NTFS. Ah well...it's said we live and learn).