System Image Recovery

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  1. bilvihur
    Posts : 32
    Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit SP1
       New #320

    Thanks for the reply, Shawn. So, to be clear, if I had other data on HDD Disk 0 outside of boot partition C, would it have been left alone, or reformatted? Thanks.
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  3. mjf
    Posts : 5,969
    Windows 7x64 Home Premium SP1
       New #321

    In addition to Brink's comments. If you have say a data partition D: on the same HDD as C: and you don't change the partition structure of the HDD then Windows System Image Recovery will have the format box unchecked. If you do not check it D: will remain in tact. If you do check it then partition D: will get formatted and you will lose your data.
    Also, as Brink says if you are force to format use the exclude option to specifically exclude other attached drives.
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  4. bilvihur
    Posts : 32
    Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit SP1
       New #322

    Thanks mjf and Shawn for your replies. To summarize my situation: Win 7 failed to boot due to error reading BCD; Startup Repair couldn't find an OS; and WSIR running without selecting the format and repartition option failed with an 80070570 error. It looks like the only option I had to recover a bootable Win 7 was to format and repartition. I'll be sure not to keep any valuable data on HDD 0. This is getting way over my head, but if the backed-up System Image only contained what was in the C partition on HDD 0, why is it necessary to specifically Exclude the other HDD's during the recovery?
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  5. Brink
    Posts : 72,052
    64-bit Windows 11 Pro for Workstations
    Thread Starter
       New #323

    You would want to exclude them just to be extra safe. Otherwise they are at risk of being formatted by the system image recovery process if anything just happened to be included in the system image without you knowing about it.
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  7. bilvihur
    Posts : 32
    Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit SP1
       New #324

    Wow! This new (to me) info is making me rethink my whole Windows 7 Backup strategy. Currently, I backup a System Image (C partition) to 2 separate HDD's in case one image was to get clobbered. I use Cobian to backup all my User data. However in the last 2 years, I've had the C boot sector corrupted twice (first when SuperAntiSpyware ran amok, recently when I tried to unlock the extra cores on my Phenom 550). I'm thinking I should use WSIR to create a Secondary bootable Win 7 partition on HDD 1. Then if the HDD 0 boot sector was to get corrupted again, I could boot Windows from the secondary partition, copy any other data off of HDD 0, and run WSIR with format and repartition to recreate the Primary Win 7 partition on HDD 0. I know this is kind of verbose, but I'd like to adopt a simple plan that gets me back online in the shortest time. Thanks.
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  8. Brink
    Posts : 72,052
    64-bit Windows 11 Pro for Workstations
    Thread Starter
       New #325

    Good plan. It's always best to have an extra backup plan than be sorry later if one should fail.
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  9. bilvihur
    Posts : 32
    Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit SP1
       New #326

    Well, I ran into a problem with my strategy. After selecting the latest System Image that I wanted to use to make a secondary boot drive, the next frame has the Format and Repartition option greyed out and unselected. How does on go about selecting a new HDD to recover to? Thanks.

    I read in the "Imaging With Free Macrium" tutorial by whs that "...when restoring to another HDD you should disconnect the original. They will both have the same disk signature and this can cause problems." Do you think this is my problem?
    Last edited by bilvihur; 20 Jun 2012 at 11:45. Reason: Update
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  11. Brink
    Posts : 72,052
    64-bit Windows 11 Pro for Workstations
    Thread Starter
       New #327

    Belvihur,

    In that case, I woud recommend to disconnect all HDD's except the one that has the system image backup on it and the one that you want to restore the image to. By default, the partition that has the image saved on it will not be touched.

    Normally, it will restore to the system (Windows 7) drive by default. If no system drive is found and you have more than one drive available to restore to, then you may have an option to select which one to restore to.
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  12. mjf
    Posts : 5,969
    Windows 7x64 Home Premium SP1
       New #328

    ditto Brink's comments. The HDD you restore the image to will have exactly the same MBR as the original including the disk signature. Windows will not allow 2 HDD to have the same disk signature.
    The greyed out unselected format box is typical when your image is on the same HDD but a different partition to the OS. I guess we are assuming your image is on an external HDD?
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  13. bilvihur
    Posts : 32
    Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit SP1
       New #329

    Umm no. The C partition is on HDD 0, the image is stored on HDD 2, and I would like to make a secondary boot drive on HDD 3. The boot partition itself is only 30GB.
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