Bare Metal Restore - Something really went wrong
Good Morning dear Acronis Forum,
my name is Marco Stefan and I'm an IT in a medium/big company.
For our improved backup plan we need a fast/easy restore option if a production PC crashed we need to replace it fast so we have chosen Acronis 2013 True Image with Plus Pack for Bare Metal Restore. (back-up computer have all dissimilar hardware)
After creating the image and copying it on the empty HDD of the back up pc, something went totally wrong.
(complete Disk recovery was started from the Acronis Boot CD (we have bought the physical Acronis Disk)
I'll try to describe step for step how I created the backup on our current production pc and how I tried to recover it on the back-up pc.
(It really get frustraded( I try this bare metalrestore since 2 weeks ,every day 4-5hours and but it seems that I miss something...and it doesnt work... Bare Metal restore is describes as fast and easy on your product... I really think I am missing something really important...
So I'll describe first how I did the back up on the production pc(Windows XP Professional 32bit - it's an Acer PC).
Originally it was Windows 7 but we installed Win XP on it because the production software just runs with XP)
1. Installed Acronis True Image 2013 incl. Acronis Plus Pack
2. Created a full disk recovery(my partitions are: C-Windows, D-empty partition, System reserved partition (100 MB) and a "PQService" Partition ( this is the acer backup partition).
3. I have chosed the following partitions for back up: "C and System reserved because D Partition is an empty one and "PQService" is just the Acer Backup Partition.
4. Changed backup scheme to "full backup"
5. Backup destination folder is a network "NAS" Storage.
6. After 2 hours, the production PC was fully backuped (40 GB)
Now I'll describe how I tried to recover this backup on a dissimilar hardware PC (also an Acer - with originally Windows 7 on it)
1. Booted the PC up - changed in Bios Boot option to "Boot from Disk"
2. Inserted the Acronis Boot CD and restared the PC
3. Clicked on Recover " My Disks"
4. Selected the backup from the NAS.
5.Made a tick by the "Universal restore" option
6. I selected some drivers from the Acer Homepage for my current back-up PC: its an Acer Veriton M4610G
I selected the following Windows XP 32bit drivers from the page:
-Chipset driver
-Sata AHCI driver
-Intel iAMT driver
-Realtek Audio driver
-Intel LAN driver
7.For the recovery partition I've chosen "My C/Windows Partition and MBR and Track0"
8. MY C/Windows Partition is on Primary and active.
9.I made a tick on the "Recover Disk Signature" box
10. Stared the operation and waited 2-3 hours for the recovery process.
11. Error screen, doesnt find drivers?!
This are the driver that arent "selected" - I have it in german but I'll try to explain them in english.
- 1. driver that is misssed: VEN_8086_DEV1c3c( have searched but havent find anything)
-2. driver : ACPIAPIC_MP for Windows XP Prof.
- 3. driver: *PNP0A08 for Win. XP Prof.
- 4. driver: *PNP0C08 for Win. XP Prof.
- 5. driver: ACPRI/GenuineIntel driver for Win. XP Prof.
- 6. driver: x86_family_6_model10 for Win. XP Prof.
- 7. driver: primary_ide_channel for Win XP. Prof.
- 8. driver: secondary_ide_channel for Win XP Prof.
After that the PC booted BUT imediatly after Windows XP loading screen he restared.
I tried this 5-6 times, everytime he just restared...
I searched for a in depth guide for Bare Metal Restore with Acronis 2013 but havent found anything really detailed, I backed up and recovered after this tutorial:
http://kb.acronis.com/content/5410
Regards,
Marco Stefan
I really hope you can help me... my finishing date with this project is this Friday and I cant complete it without your help... !
Help me, I beg you!
EDIT: If you need some hardware konfiguration data etc. Ill try to get it for you, Ill stay online and look every 5-10 Minutes for a reply to answer it as fast as possible.
- Accedi per poter commentare
Thank you for the tips. I'll look into it but still have some questions that need to be cleared first:
So the first step I'll do is to ensure that the important drivers are on an USB Stick.
After I have this 8 driI vers below I can be sure to succeed the Bare Metal Restore or do I need some other drivers too?
Ireally have problems with the drivers I listed above.... they don't really tell me anything.
- 1. driver that is misssed: VEN_8086_DEV1c3c( have searched but havent find anything)
-2. driver : ACPIAPIC_MP for Windows XP Prof.
- 3. driver: *PNP0A08 for Win. XP Prof.
- 4. driver: *PNP0C08 for Win. XP Prof.
- 5. driver: ACPRI/GenuineIntel driver for Win. XP Prof.
- 6. driver: x86_family_6_model10 for Win. XP Prof.
- 7. driver: primary_ide_channel for Win XP. Prof.
- 8. driver: secondary_ide_channel for Win XP Prof.
The driver is the Chipset driver, but the rest...?
1. For this driver it just tells the VEN/DEV ID, for 1c3c I couldnt find anything.
2. Driver seems to be something with the HAL for Multicore Processors... but what type of driver do I need...?
3. and 4. and 5. driver ... never heard about it.
6. 7. and 8. seems to be the chipset driver?
I'll search now parallel for this drivers... however... I would really appreciate your support until my back-up pc is "successfull restored"
Now to ther other problem you mentioned. my recovery partition:
First to my backup:
I select "full disk backup" and there I can chose my C: Partition(Windows + program data), D: Partition(empty), Windows reserved( Partition created only by Windows 7 ( this PC originally run with Win 7) and PQSERVICES: Partition(Acer Backup partition).
So I have this 4 partitions, do I need now to backup all 4 of them for the bare metal restore? Or is it enough to backup just my C: Partition( everything important is on C) and then restore just C?
I hope you can understand what I mean.
Regards,
Marco
EDIT: I looked now at the NAS Recovery environment for the drivers and my Chipset and Sata/ AHCI driver already we're extracted there.
I cant understand why he doesn't recognize them? This are the drivers from the acer Homepage for my Product( Acer Veriton M4610G - Win XP Prof. 32 bit)...I am clueless...how I said im my first post, I already tried a lot... but can't see the mistake...
I did a previous test yesterday before trying the recovery again, the test was:
I installed Win XP Prof. 32 bit - SP3 on the backup pc.
Before patching the drivers I looked in the device manager: 5 drivers were missing.
I installed them with the drivers from the manufacturer homepage and all of this 5 drivers was cleared out.
So now I cant understand why he doesnt recognize this drivers in the recovery process?
- Accedi per poter commentare
Marco,
If you have imaged the complete disk, this is what you should restore, at the very least you should restore the System and 'C' partition. It is possible that Acer might use the PQ partition during a normal boot, but unlikely. I would suggest restoring a complete disk along with the new drivers the first time around just to make sure it works. Once that is done, you could try restoring without the PQ partition.
Alternatively make the complete disk excluding the PQ partition in the first place, as you are always going to restore to different hardware, the PQ partition may not have the correct utilities anyway, but the System and 'C' plus MBR should always be recovered. Only recover the 'C' partition by itself if it is to the same machine.
I'm a little unsure what you mean by "5 drivers was cleared out", when you downloaded the drivers and installed them once in Windows XP, did they install or not.
Were these drivers in inf or exe format?
You mention that you are using a shop purchased Acronis CD, this might be out of date, make sure you register your serial numbers under your Acronis account and download the latest builds of 2013 and the Plus Pack. Of ocurse you will need to either make a new recovery CD or you can download the ISO (plus pack) version from your account and just burn it to disk.
- Accedi per poter commentare
Hello Colin,
and thank you for you informationn input and response.
I meant by 5 drivers were cleared out, that the 5 missing drivers(marked as question marks) were gone and the drivers all were installed properly.
To the driver format:
Original format how I downloaded was a typically .rar format.
After extracting, I had a System folder, this contained an .exe and some subfolders which contained
as far as I can see .dll, .inf, and .cat.
For the recovery driver directory I have chosen the fully extracted system folder.
Now the steps I'll do:
1. Create a complete backup.
2. Create a new Acronis Boot CD
3. Try it again.
Thanks,
I'll post my answer as quick as possible.
Regards,
Marco
- Accedi per poter commentare
Alright,
so I did everyting what you told me:
1. Created new Acronis Boot CD
2. Created new drive backup
3. Made sure, all the drivers are on their right place
Now, before completing the recovery process, he told me that he couldn't find the drivers (listed in my first post)
I clicked "Ignore all" and afterwars it said "Recovery successfull"
The computer restarted and first error that I got is "Couldn't find the biosinfo.inf"
- Accedi per poter commentare
Is the new CD from build 6514?
Have you installed the Plus Pack for 6514?
BIOSINFO.inf is definitely on your USB stick and is definitely in INF format?
I'm not sure where it is going wrong for you. If you click 'ignore all' of course universal restore will ignore all your driver files, so we need to work out why it isn't seeing your USB/CD that contains the drivers.
Are you using a USB stick or a CD to store the drivers on?
- Accedi per poter commentare
Things to consider:
1. I read in an Acronis Knowledge Base article pertaining to TI Home 2012 that Universal Restore was supported on Windows XP SP3. Is your XP system on Service Pack 3? I'm not sure what the system requirements are for Universal Restore in TI Home 2013.
2. I question your 100 MB System Reserved partition. It was probably left over from the earlier Windows 7 install. Do you know if XP is using that partition to boot in boot.ini?
- Accedi per poter commentare