Bad start to weekend - image failure

[IcarusII]

Hi guys,

Not been on these forums long but have been reading all your advice and tutorials ahead of a W7 install this weekend.

Intention was to follow barefoot kids advice and create a new partition to the left of my vista os on my c: and then install 7 to it and dual boot till I'm happy with W7 and then remove, erase and reclaim vistas space for 7

Ahead of this I investigated macrium reflect to image c: first as I thought this was a sensible plan. Followed super helpful bid tutorial here and set my c:/ image off and was browsing this forum when I got a cyclic redundancy check error and macrium failed. It suggested I run chkdsk /f /r so I elected my cmd and did so on a restart.

4 bad clusters found and fixed. Free space verification (stage 5 of 5 still running - 47% complete). No other issues found so far.

So. How bad does this sound? Is my hdd about to throw it's toys out the pram or ar 4 bad clusters nothing to worry about?

Eek

Matt

 

[gregrocker]

Download and burn to CD the HD maker's diag/repair CD, boot and run full scan and you will have your answer: Hard Drive Diagnostics Tools and Utilities (Storage) - TACKtech Corp.

Back up your files first as it may need to surface repair sectors where there could be data loss.

 

[IcarusII]

Greg - thanks mate. I'm having a bit of a 'moment'. Once chkdsk finishes I'll run the samsung util. Drive is a 3 yr old 300gb spinpoint f1.

Maybee it's time is up. Still a new 1tb spinpoint f3 arrived today. So long as I can make that image or at least back up my user files.

Out if interest, if I manage to image my vista c: off my 300 gb and toss that image (macrium image, not a clone) onto my new formatted 1tb drive will I be able to boot into vista?

 

[Bare Foot Kid]

Hello Matt.



Here's an idea, let's see what others have to say about it.


After you get a good image of Vista and you're sure it's viable to use to reimage to the new 1TB HDD, use Vista to create and full format 2 partitions on the new HDD.

The first partition on the HDD = 100GB for the Windows 7 install.
The second partition on the HDD = 400GB to reimage Vista to, (enough to make sure the image will have no probs 'fitting' to the partition; after you have Vista reimaged to the new partition and all is booting good.

Disconnect the first (original) HDD and make sure that Vista still boots on its own from the new 1TB HDD.

Mark the 100GB partition on the 1TB as active and install Windows 7 to that; this way W_7 will be the "System, Active" partition and it will be very easy to wipe/remove the VIsta install when you choose to.

I'd like to 'hear' what others think of this plan myself.

 

[gregrocker]

The benefit of Barefoot's approach would be that Win7 will be in the first partition slot and will hold the boot files so you can easily remove Vista later. Be sure to mark the intended Win7 partition Active so that it places the boot-critical files there as first active partition.

I believe you'll have to leave the space to the right of Win7 partition unallocated to image Vista onto it. If you image Vista there first, then there is a good chance Win7 install will autoconfigure the Dual Boot. If not, use EasyBCD 2.0 from Win7 to add Vista later.

Just before you install Win7, unplug the old Vista HD once you make sure your Win7 partition has been set up correctly in Disk Mgmt and is marked Active.

 

[IcarusII]

To me, the plan sound so cunning you could put a tail on it and call it a fox.

However, before i go for it I will wait to see what others think. in the meantime - my usual 50 questions, so Im straight about what Im going to do - oh and an update too.

Update:

chkdsk is now finished. 4 bad clusters found and fixed. no other issues found.

Got straight back inot Vista no problems and sucessfully created a disc image of C:
The image itself is about 75 Gb compressed - but will extract to around 125 Gb as this is the size of the current used space. Macrium apparently only creates images from used sectors and does not include the pagefile or suspend files.

Q1: will the lack of pagefile and suspend files be an issue? Im guessing not.
Q2: In a different thread i queried about separating user data (photos etc) from OS drive. General agreement seemed to be to keep the OS and programmes together and user data seperate. You suggested only 100Gb for Win7 partition. My definition of programmes is anything I install and therefore also includes games - which can be huge. Is 100Gb enough?
Q3: Under your cunning plan of creating the 100Gb active Win7 partition before I install it, will Win7 then create the 100Mb SysRes partition or will that vanish? All in all it sounded like a sensible plan for that partition to end up existing? your thoughts?

Matt

 

[Bare Foot Kid]

Q3: Under your cunning plan of creating the 100Gb active Windows 7 partition before I install it, will Windows 7 then create the 100Mb SysRes partition or will that vanish? All in all it sounded like a sensible plan for that partition to end up existing? your thoughts?



No, you would have to use Vista to create the "System, Reserved" partition as the first partition and that would have to be marked as active before the install instead of the W_7 partition. It would be better if you create it to make it about 300MB instaed of the default 100MB.

Make the (now second) Windows 7 partition how-ever big you need though W_7 has issues installing to VERY large partitions so keep that in mind.

 

[IcarusII]

Greg: just to clarify regarding the new 1TB drive....

Im going to use PWBD to:

1) Partition the drive into 3 partitions? 1x100Gb, 1x400Gb, 1xthe rest approx 500Gb?
2) Leave all 3 partitions unallocated
3) Re-Image Vista from my D: to the 2nd 400GB partition

I presume the act of re-imaging that to the 2nd partition will set it to Primary and Active or do I need to do that with PWBD before I unplug my old C: and try to boot to Vista from the 1TB drive?

Once I can boot into Vista ok from the 1TB drive - I go back into PWBD, set partition one to a primary partition and then set it to active. (does this de-activate the vista partition?)

And then install W7 to partition 1?

Just a mental checklist. Please correct my errors before I do this - as this is quite techy for me

thanks to both of you too for help and advice. Ive been using those lil scales Least i can do!

Matt

 

[gregrocker]

Unallocated space is what partitions are created from.

Create the first two partitions as Primary NTFS, label them System Reserved and Windows 7, format then rightclick on 100mb to Modify>mark Active.

Next reimage Vista to the unallocated space to the right of your two partitions. If you're using Macrium it may want a partition, but most want unallocated space - it will prompt you.

You can restart after imaging to see if Vista starts, but if it doesn't I would go ahead and install Win7 as it may autoconfigure the Dual Boot placing Vista's boot-critical files onto the Active SysReserved partition. If it doesn't, use EasyBCD 2.0 to Add Vista to Win7, giving the 100mb a drive letter if necessary so it autocompletes.

Or you can follow the repairs I posted to start Vista first but before installing Win7 make sure from PW CD that 100mb is still marked Active, then rightclick Vista to Modify>Set Inactive so it will be certain to place all boot files on 100mb.

Since you're using PW boot CD unplug your old Vista HD and place your image on external.

 

[IcarusII]

Greg and Barefoot Kid - thanks loads for the continued help and support.

Greg: Its amost 1am for me now and I cant face physically installying the 3rd HDD and doing all the tech partitioning stuff tonight. Ill just make mistakes and regret it.
Im going to ask a couple more questions, hit sack and do this 1st thing in the am.

Create the first two partitions as Primary NTFS, label them System Reserved and Windows 7, format then rightclick on 100mb to Modify>mark Active.

Next reimage Vista to the unallocated space to the right of your two partitions. If you're using Macrium it may want a partition, but most want unallocated space - it will prompt you.

Im fine with all that...

You can restart after imaging to see if Vista starts, but if it doesn't I would go ahead and install Win7 as it may autoconfigure the Dual Boot placing Vista's boot-critical files onto the Active SysReserved partition. If it doesn't, use EasyBCD 2.0 to Add Vista to Win7, giving the 100mb a drive letter if necessary so it autocompletes.

This however lost me. If ive set the 100MB partition to active in your 1st quote, and then re-imaged vista to the unallocated space - how will it boot? I thought my computer will boot from the partition set to active...which is the 100MB partition with nothing in it. Im so sorry im being slow here - but this is new to me and i do want to understand things rather than blindly follow instructions as i wont learn anything otherwise.

If vista dosnt boot - im fine installing Win7...i understand that during the install it may autoconfigure the dual boot and should also copy vistas boot files to the sysres drive. Im just not sure how the paragraph above is likely to work.

Ideally i would like to try to get Vista booting from my 1Tb drive before I go on to install W7. So if thats my goal - am i setting the imaged partition of vista to active or the 100mb sys res (which in my slow on the uptake mind is still empty) partition to active before trying to boot vista?

Sorry for so many questions
Matt

 

[Bare Foot Kid]

Get Vista imaged and booting before you mark the created SysResv as active.


The image of Vista will be "System, Active" and boot on its own; then mark the created SysResv active and install W_7 to the second created partition.

Then you may need to add a boot entry for Vista using EasyBCD to get back into Vista but that's the least of your concerns right now.

 

[gregrocker]

If you reimage Vista to the HD then it will still be marked System Active and if it starts up will likely override any other 100mb Active flag.

Barefoot's solution to wait til last thing before installing Win7 to mark 100mb partition active should do it.

I think the only wild card here is the 100mb System Reserved partition. Barefootkid has conducted tests lately that show it can be constructed during partitioning and will install correctly including the Repair console it writes to F8 Advanced Boot Tools. Before it was thought it can only be issued by the installer during partitioning of blank HD.

One concern is that 100mb needs to NOT have a drive letter to keep from writing anything to it, yet sometimes it requires one to add an OS manually using EasyBCD 2.0. Another concern is whether constructing that partition from scratch will cause the installer to configure Dual boot there since normally when Win7 configures a dual boot as it does when installed last there is no SysReserved partition.

In either case, EasyBCD 2.0 should do the job to add Vista if required.

 

[IcarusII]

Cheers. All clear now. Will do all this when I wake up now - typing from my iPhone in bed lol.

Must sleep. Will report back with outcomes in morning (approx 9 hrs from now as I really need a lie-in)

Thanks,
Matt

 

[Bare Foot Kid]

That's correct, if the SysResv is active for the Windows 7 install behind Vista it is necessary to use EasyBCD to add an entry for Vista and it not having a drive letter does not bother (or hasn't) in my experience.

 

[Bare Foot Kid]

Cheers. All clear now. Will do all this when I wake up now - typing from my iPhone in bed lol.

Must sleep. Will report back with outcomes in morning (approx 9 hrs from now as I really need a lie-in)

Thanks,
Matt

I bet you aren't/wasn't able to sleep very good with all this Windows knowledge bouncing around inside your head; you had better watch out, it may consume you as it has some of us.

:roflmao:
​

 

[IcarusII]

Morning barefoot kid and Greg. Not sure if either of you are awake yet. 2pm here.

Your right barefoot kid - I didn't sleep too good - lots going through my mind. Anyhow here's an update from my iPhone:

Dismantled my pc and installed the new 1Tb drive. Of course no self building computer enthusiast can open ulna pc and see dust inside and then close it. It breaks all known laws so I had to Hoover the inside down so it was spotless again. No dust has gotta be worth another few GHz right? Anyway I digress.

Booted into PWBD and created a 300mb primary ntfs labeled system reserved and a 400gb primary ntfs labeled windows 7. I left the rest unallocated

Tested all was ok and booted to vista from my old drive and vista now seeing all 3 physical drives and all partitions

Re booted from my macrium rescue disk and then started it copying the vista c: image to the unallocated space to the right of the win 7 partition. It just finished as I'm typing this. I'll post this and see if it will boot from the vista image. Need to unplug the old c: to make sure!

Matt

 

[Bare Foot Kid]

Well done, we'll be here.

 

[IcarusII]

Im in mild shock at the moment.

Typing this from Vista, which is the re-imaged vista on the new 1TB drive. My old C: is currently unplugged.

The only thing Vista did when it first booted was to install the device driver for the new Samsung drive and ask for a re-boot. Aside from that its as if nothing has happened.

in Vista disk manager my new drive is showing the following:

So that all seems rather good then yes?
Now I guess i can re-boot from PWBD again and do the following:
Set Vista system partition to not active
Set the 300 Mb System Reserved partition to active
Stick in the Win7 install disk and install it to the 400 Gb Win 7 partition.

Few quick questions:
should i format the 300Mb partition and the 400 Gb win7 partitions through PWBD before installing windows? or should i let windows install take care of all of that side of things?
I should leave my old C: drive with Vista on it unplugged throughout?
Im guessing i should avoid registering Win7 for now?

A HUGE thankyou to you and greg for helping me through all this. Im sure though Im now approaching the bit you are most curious about which is how W7 is going to handle my constructed 300Mb System Reserved partition.

I dont really understand that bit. Why would it put any files in there? Wont it just totally ignore it and put all the boot files etc in the partition its installing into? or is it the fact that the flag on the sysres drive is set to active that triggers all this? in which case wont it error on me and say it cant fit W7 into a 300Mb space?

I guess what im getting at here is fine the active flag is on the SysRes drive, but why, from the partitions available to it:
400Gb primary labeled W7
280Gb primary system Vista
220 Gb unallocated

would it choose to install W7 to the place I want it too?

Im so curious about all this, as so far i fully understand what ive done and why which is awesome! just want to be sure im understanding the rest

Matt

 

[Bare Foot Kid]

So many questions.



Now I guess i can re-boot from PWBD again and do the following:
Set Vista system partition to not active
Set the 300 Mb System Reserved partition to active
Stick in the Windows 7 install disk and install it to the 400 Gb Win 7 partition.

Yes

should i format the 300Mb partition and the 400 Gb Windows 7 partitions through PWBD before installing windows? or should i let windows install take care of all of that side of things?

Use Windows Vista disk management to do the formats, I thought they were formated when created; the W_7 installer will format the partition for the install.

Im sure though Im now approaching the bit you are most curious about which is how Windows 7 is going to handle my constructed 300Mb System Reserved partition.

I'm not at all concerned about this, mark the SysResv as active before you start the install and install W_7 to the partition you created for it not the SysResv partition; Windows will add the boot files to the SysResv partition during the install;



More later, I'm cooking food now and have to go.

 

[Bare Foot Kid]

Do not put a check in this box during the Windows 7 install, leave it un-checked.

click to enlarge

​