Restore of Windows 8 Image on another HDD fails
Hello,
On 1/12/2013 I have installed a fresh downloaded test version of TI2013 on my new Windows 8 PC. I wanted to check if
a) A backup and restore on a different hard disk works (in case of a HDD crash)
b) A backup and restore on the same hard disk works (in case of a system recovery)
If all would work successfully I would buy a three pack of TI2013 because there are another PCs waiting to get an Windows 8 upgrade. But … case a) doesn't work and I don't dare to try case b), because I don't want to end up with no working PC at all. But step by step …
The original system:
Asus P8B75-MLX, Core i5-3470, 16GB, Windows 8-64, AHCI on, 128 GB Vortex 4 SSD as operating system disc, 1TB Hitachi HDD as data disc, Acronis Trueimage 2013. On the SDD has been Windows 7-64 before, I installed Windows 8 as upgrade over it (because of the 29,99€ promotion until 1/31/2013). Because of this the SDD has been partitioned by the OS like this:
Part 1: "System-reserviert": 100 MB (und not 350B as it would be on a fresh Win8 install - that's because of the former Win7 installation)
Part 2: "Windows": 119.14 GB
Test a)
Copy the system from SSD to a target HDD. The HDD is a 700GB and is not blank but has the same Windows 7-64 installation on it as the SSD before the Windows 8 installation. I just want to override Windows 7 by Windows 8. The HDD is partitioned same as the SSD, leaving some 500 GB unused.
I created a backup of both partitions with TI2013 in Windows 8 on the local HDD. Then I turned the system off, disconnected the SSD, connected the target HDD, booted the system from USB stick with TI2013 on it, selected "Recovery", selected the just stored image on the data disc and wrote first the first partition "System-reserviert" including MBR on the target HDD. Next I wrote the second partition "Windows" on the target. The I rebooted the system, result: a blue screen showing a message like "necessary device not connected … error 0xc000000e...", see attached picture (sorry, it's in German). All attempts to fix this by using Windows 8 Repair were failing. I haven't tried to do a complete blank repair because I didn't want to loose my personal settings and apps. At all, I don't see why I should use repair tools to get a restore working.
Additionally I tried to use the "Hard Disc Clone" capability, but unfortunately the test version of TI2013 doesn't support that …
Test b)
I skipped it, you can imagine why.
Summary: backups of Windows 8 images are working great, but when the emergency case occurs, and one need to restore to another hard disc, because the original HDD is broken, you're stuck.
I need your help. I think my procedure is not so exotic, on the contrary, it is one the main procedures a backup/restore solution is used for.
Make sure that you mark the system reserved partition when you restore it.
Oh - I always marked BOTH the checkmark for the MBR AND the 100MB volume with the boot images. Now I tried to mark ONLY the MBR checkbox and ... it works! So simple. Thank you for the hint! A recommendation for Acronis: a little more detailed help or a more intuitive GUI would prevent such misunderstandings.