System Image Not Found on External USB HDD with Image as Root Folder

SIW2, You say Win 8 doesn't even claim to have the imaging now? Guess that's one way to fix it!

Saltgrass, Its been miserable hot everywhere through the midwest and south I think. Record temps here for awhile now. But your right, I'll take the south in January and that's about it.

I'm a bit lost with what you did though.
What do you mean by re-imaged?
To fix it you copied out of its original location and into a new folder where disk manager could see it?

SIW2 said:

No further developments or updates I am afraid.

MS have included it in Win8 - really just for those who need to access win7 backups they already made.

It is well hidden and they have abandoned it.

MS do have something different in win8 - slightly better than a clean reinstall - but not as good as Time Machine.

You would be better looking at a 3rd party imaging app. There are some good free ones out there.

whs said:

The lesson is simple and I am preaching it since a long time: Do not rely on or use any Windows backup facility. That goes for imaging, system restore from restore points, data backup, etc.. And that not only since Win7, it was just as dismal in the earlier systems.

But fortunately there are very good OEM products. And for data backup I always recommend to do a simple copy job. Then at least you know what you have done.

Going forward, I will! Had I had any prior knowledge of how unreliable WIB system was I surely would have treated it like a useless appendage.

The fact that I had used it once previously when I installed a new HDD on this machine gave me a false confidence about its integrity.

The funny thing is my Seagate External came bundled with a free back-up utility called Memeo. It did an excellent job of backing up files and folders automatically but what it lacked was full system imaging - the ability to back-up and then reinstall custom settings, drivers, hardrive partition and mapping, etc. so I rarely used it.

Turns out Memeo, even with its slight limitations, would have been the far better choice to trust my data to.

You live - you learn.

kado897 said:

I second what whs and others have said. Don't trust Windows Backup as your only solution. Use a third part tool. I use Macrium for images and FreeFileSync for F&F backups. Both have served me well.

Sadly, most casual users, as I am, do not learn of this fault in the software until it is too late.

Worse, I am sure Windows knows of it. Of all the seemingly constant patches and updates I'm alerted to install on a bi-monthly basis, why a fix for this or even an alert NOT to use it going forward I find lacking of honesty and integrity on MSFT's part.

In my opinion its akin to sending a paratrooper off to war with a parachute that the manufacturer knows may or many not open.

Slightly off topic, but while some knowledgeable people are here, this episode made me realize that someone could clone my entire machine should they have access to to my external drive and were able to access the VHS file.

What encryption software, if any, are any of you using for your secure folders.

Saltgrass

Just re-imaged using the folder that was deleted in the VHD and it worked fine. I even went you one better and had deleted the folder to the Recycle Bin and restored it.....

But even after rebooting, the VHD would not reattach to the file and still showed it as unallocated.. I could attach to another backup folder, just not the one marked as deleted....

Yes, Salty that is why it is worth seeing if PG will mount the thing.

http://www.partitionguru.com/freeedition.php

Worth a try.

If PG manages to mount it - then you can use PG inbuilt imaging to make an image - or , if you prefer, you can just copy out some files.

SIW2, I am going to look further now, but have installed PG and it sees everything, cool.
What option am I looking for to mount the .vhd file?
Disk>Create New Virtual Disk>which type?

Hang on - I will have a look - I haven't got any vhd's atm.