Solved Drive not available in list of drives at backup.

[Jandek]

Problem:
I was trying to make a (standard Windows 7) backup, but the backup drive Y: was not shown in the list of drives available for backup.
Note:
The drive Y: was shown in Explorer!

Analysis:
I think the cause of the problem should be found in the fact that drive Y has the attribute System (and a system drive may not be used for storage of backup files)!
The configuration (2 drives) is as shown in the attachment.
Note:
[FONT=&quot]Partition C has as attributes: Opstarten, Wisselbestand, Actief, Crashdump, Prim. Partitie.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]When drive Y is disconnected, drive C gets attribute System too!
[/FONT]

Further:
The idea was to use drive Y only for backup purposes. I made a first backup and everything seemed OK. After disconnecting drive Y the PC continued to function.
I want to make a backup now, so I reconnected this drive Y but now it may not be used by the backup!

Question:
How to solve this problem now (I think the attribute System in drive Y has to be removed, but the question is how) and
How to prevent occurring this problem in the future?

 

[Brink]

Hello Jan,

Since Y: is considered to be a system and active drive, that would be why you are unable to use is to back up to.

Does your Windows 7 still boot properly if you remove Y: ? If so, then you could format Y: at boot, and should be able to use it to back up to afterwards.

Translation: Partition C has as attributes: Startup, Paging, Active, Crash Dump, Prim. partition

Your screenshot:

Was there a reason why you have unallocated space on Disk 1 like that?

 

[Jandek]

Hello Brink,

After removing drive Y the system is still running normally.

The solution you gave (Format Y) has as disadvantage that the backups stored on the drive will be lost.
Perhaps there is a solution wich does not result in loosing data?

 

[Brink]

Did you move anything to your Y: drive?

For example: user folders, page file, etc....

 

[Jandek]

Your question "Did you move anything to your Y: drive?" is to be answered with Yes: I stored some installation files (files used rarely) on drive Y, but no pagefile or user data.

Jan

 

[Brink]

In that case, I'm not sure what would be causing Y: to be seen as a "System" drive.

The only thing I can suggest is to temporarily copy the contents of Y: to another location (if able), format Y: at boot, then copy the contents back.

 

[Jandek]

I just found the cause of the System attribute for drive Y:
In the boot/repair screen (System properties, Advanced) the option "List of OS" appeared to be checked.
After unchecking this option the attribute System disappeared.
After this I could backup again!!!!!!!

 

[Brink]

Perfect.