Acronis DDS and Vista Explorer see things differerently

[tiscali]

I have 2 SATA hard disks, Vista Home Edition on one, XP SP2 on the other. I used DDS to partition both disks. Vista partition 1 contains the OS and apps and partition 2 my data; same setup on the XP disk. Acronis DDS sees all the partitions and their contents and so does XP's Explorer. However Vista's Explorer cannot see the 'my data' partitions on either disk - it sees the partitions as unavailable. Any ideas?

[MudCrab]

Can you post a screenshot of the following?


XP's Disk Managment showing the drives and partitions.
Vista's Disk Management showing the drives and partitions.
DD (in Manual Mode) showing the drives and partitions.

What version and build of DD are you using?

[tiscali]

I've attached the views you asked for. I used Acronis DDS 10.0 build 2160

[K0LO]

Is this just a matter of assigning the two data partitions a drive letter using Vista Disk Management? XP has assigned them drive letters (E: and L:) but Vista has not.

Try (in Vista Disk Management) right-clicking on the unlettered partitions and assigning them each a drive letter.

[tiscali]

Mark,
Would that it were that simple! I'd already tried that. I get a message 'The operation failed to complete because the Disk Management console view is not up-to-date. Refresh the view, close and reopen DM or restart the computer' (I paraphrase a bit). Has no effect.

[K0LO]

tiscali:

I had this funny feeling that it wasn't going to be that easy!

Clearly, the problem is with Vista since XP sees the data partitions just fine. For some reason Vista does not. It looks like you don't have any data on the second disk, second partition (with the label "New Volume"). Is that correct?

If so, in Vista Disk Management can you right-click on this partition and format it? If so, after formatting, Vista should recognize it and assign a drive letter.

We'll see what to do about the other data partition later, but first see if the above advice will work.

[tiscali]

Mark,
OK, I right-clicked the empty partition on the XP disc, selected the format option but got the same 'out-of-date console view' message. Then chose the 'delete volume' option - several minutes of behind the scenes activity followed by the same error message.

[K0LO]

tiscali:

In searching Google for the phrase "Disk Management Console View" I find a lot of the same problem listed, but no hint of the cause or the solution. I am wondering how Vista sees your disk controller.

Could you click on "Start" and then type "device" and start the Device Manager? Look in the list of devices to see if there are any with yellow exclamation points. Look especially at "Storage Controllers" and "IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers" to see if there are missing device drivers.

Another place to check is the Virtual Disk Service. If you hit "Start" and then type "Services", click on "Services" and look for "Virtual Disk Service" in the list. Double-click on it and check to see if it is running. You will probably find that it is stopped. Click on "Start" to see if it can start without any error messages being produced. (This is the service used by Disk Management Console when it is run). You can also check Event Viewer under "Windows Logs > System" to check for red Error events. Are any of them related to Virtual Disk Service, Disks, or Volume errors?

Maybe one of these areas will give a clue. At the moment, I'm not sure why Vista isn't recognizing these volumes.

[tiscali]

Mark,
First, thanks for your time on this.
Device Manager: no yellow exclamation points.
Virtual Disk Service: Yes, it was 'stopped'; I clicked 'start' with no error messages.
Red Error Events: A good scattering of these, mostly of 2 kinds. Two system-start drivers fail to load 'drvmcdb.sys' and 'i8042prt' (event ID 7026). Event ID 876 reports that 'drvmcdb.sys' has been blocked from loading.
The details for event 7026 are:
- <Event xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event">
- <System>
<Provider Name="Service Control Manager" Guid="{555908D1-A6D7-4695-8E1E-26931D2012F4}" EventSourceName="Service Control Manager" />
<EventID Qualifiers="49152">7026</EventID>
<Version>0</Version>
<Level>2</Level>
<Task>0</Task>
<Opcode>0</Opcode>
<Keywords>0x80000000000000</Keywords>
<TimeCreated SystemTime="2008-02-22T19:28:15.000Z" />
<EventRecordID>22747</EventRecordID>
<Correlation />
<Execution ProcessID="0" ThreadID="0" />
<Channel>System</Channel>
<Computer>Roger-PC</Computer>
<Security />
</System>
- <EventData>
<Data Name="param1">drvmcdb i8042prt</Data>
</EventData>


Secondly, Event ID6 reports 'IRQARB:ACPI BIOS does not contain an IRQ for the device in PCI slot7, function 0. Contact system vendor...

I too had Googled 'disk management console view' and got the same result as you of course. At the back of my mind is the nagging thought that if you want to run with Vista and XP then it's thought my many that it's vital to load XP first. I'd hoped that by having Vista and XP on separate disks I might get over that problem. Then if your new PC comes with Vista installed and you want to add XP you don't have the option to load XP first.
The only other clue I can add is that I used VistaBoot Pro to give me a boot menu in Vista. This didn't work perfectly until I tweaked the file it produces to tell it that XP was on a different drive from that which VistaBoot Pro set up.
Hope there's something there for you to go on.

[K0LO]

tiscali:

I don't think either of your event log errors have anything to do with the problem, but they may be resolvable.

The i8042 is a chip to handle a standard PS/2 keyboard and mouse. Here is a thread (http://icrontic.com/forum/showthread.php?t=53957) discussing ways to stop the error message. The other error for drvmcdb.sys is from Sonic DLA. You may want to try uninstalling it and seeing if there is a Vista-compatible version available that you can install, or check their forum for Vista installation recommendations.

I have some other thoughts about getting Vista to recognize the disks but have to run at the moment. Your situation is slightly complicated by having the boot files on disk 0 and Vista on Disk 1. I would have recommended removing the XP disk but don't think that your system will boot without it. Is that correct?

I'll check back later.

[K0LO]

tiscali:

Could you post a view of the partition table on the Vista Disk (Disk 2 in the Acronis Disk Director picture)?

To do this:
1. In Vista, start Disk Director
2. Click on Disk 2 to select it
3. Right-click and choose "Advanced" and then "Edit"
4. When the disk editor opens, choose "As Partition Table" from the View menu
5. Post a screen shot of the partition table similar to the attachment

[tiscali]

Mark,
I researched the errors soon after I posted and came to the same conclusion - irrelevant.
The 'drvmcdb.sys' driver seems to be a Vista nightmare. There's many folk out there who have deleted it and then found Vista wouldn't boot. I get a warning when Vista boots that this driver didn't load. I just ignore it.
My system will boot without the XP disk. Boot up is one thing I have under full control. Ordinarily it boots to the Vista disk when I get a boot menu which allows me to select XP if I wish (which I do most of the time). Secondly I can go to the BIOS and change the hard disk boot order so that it goes to the XP disk directly.
Thirdly, and not to be recommended, I can pull the power cord to the XP disk forcing it to boot from the Vista disk. Or, pull the cord to the Vista disk when it boots into XP.
Here's the ADD screen shot you asked for:

[K0LO]

tiscali:

That's very puzzling. Unfortunately, some of the information that would have been helpful is off-screen to the right in your last screen shot. However, it may be irrelevent. In post #3 your DD picture shows the "New Volume" partition on the Vista Disk as an NTFS primary partition, and so does XP Disk Management. In the DD Disk Editor view that you just posted it is shown as a FAT16 partition. So something isn't right.

Here's what I'd do since there currently isn't any data on the partition:

1. Boot from the DD rescue disk and delete the "New Volume" partition, leaving it as uncommitted free space.
2. Boot back into Vista
3. Go to Disk Management Console and try to create a new NTFS partition in the free space, either primary or logical - your choice.

[MudCrab]

-{ Quote: "3. Go to Disk Management Console and try to create a new NTFS partition in the free space, either primary or logical - your choice." }-
If created in Vista's Disk Management, you don't have a choice over Primary or Logical partitions. The first three partitions on a disk are Primary and all the rest are Logical.

[K0LO]

Ah, yes. Forgot that.

Do you see what's wrong here Paul? It seems Vista does not recognize either data volume; the one on the XP disk or the one on the Vista disk. ???

[MudCrab]

Mark,

I think something got messed up or corrupted in the partition's properties (in the partition table or elsewhere). We know Vista looks at partitions differently than XP and DD. It may be as simple as using DD's Disk Editor to change the partition type to NTFS or the partition may need to be removed and recreated (as you suggest).

Since this partition is reported as the wrong type, I would guess the data partition on the other drive is also reported wrong since Vista is having the same problem.

Perhaps tiscali could post a screenshot of Disk 1. It would also be interesting to know exactly how the partitions were created. Were they created from DD in XP or Vista or when booted to the DD CD? If from windows, did they require a reboot? Were they both created at the same time (in the same "group" of processes, all applied at one time) or was one created and then the other?

[K0LO]

That rings a bell. I remember cases where the partition table reported the wrong type (like the example shown here) yet the partition boot record (PBR) reported the correct type. XP was looking at the PBR and was happy, but Vista must check both places and then refuse to make modifications if they aren't in agreement.

I think you're correct. If tiscali posts the partition table view of the XP disk (from DD Disk Editor), I'll bet it does not show type 07 (NTFS) for the "Our Data" partition, and probably changing it to type 07 with the Disk Editor will fix it up.

[tiscali]

Hi guys,
I'm in the UK so there's always likely to be a time lag in responding.
|'m pretty sure I used Vista disk management to create the Vista partitions and XP dm to do the same to the XP disk.
I've only used the demo version of Acronis DDS so far and it won't let me edit anything in Disk Editor. Mark's suspicions about the partiton table view of the XP disk (Disk 2) appear to be correct. If he's still confident that making the change to NFTS type 007(?) will sort things out I'm happy to get the real product. However, the data partition on the Vista disk (Disk 1) is genuinely NFTS 07 and Vista can't see it.
Here's the screenshots for the Disk Editor view of both disks:

[K0LO]

tiscali:

OK; I see the problem now. The XP disk (disk 2) simply has the incorrect setting for the file system type in the partition table. It is set to 06 (FAT16) instead of 07 (NTFS). Simply changing this one byte in the partition table should fix this. Here are two ways to do this:

1. Boot into XP and delete the partition using XP Disk Manager. Then create a new partition and format it, again with XP Disk Manager. Assuming that XP does this correctly, then it should end up with Type 07 in the partition table and Vista should see it properly. If you want to play it safe, and if your system is capable of booting into XP when Disk 1 is disconnected, then do that and work with only Disk 2 connected.

2. Purchase Disk Director and boot from the recovery CD. Go back to the Disk Editor on Disk 2 and view the partition table. Simply change the type from 06 to 07 using the drop-down box. Then choose Edit - Save Sector and you're done.

The problem with the Vista Disk is that it is set up with a mixture of the old standard where there is a 63-sector offset and the newer standard with 1024 sector offset. If you look at the "Relative Sectors" displayed in your last screen shot for the first two partitions, both numbers are divisible by 63. This is the older standard that has been in use for years. However, the last partition has a "Relative Sectors" value that is not divisible by 63 but rather by 1024.

I suspect that your system was set up by an OEM with the older offset, and Vista is perfectly happy with it. However, when you then used Vista Disk Management to create a new partition, it does this with the 1024 sector offset. I don't know why that confused Vista into being unable to mount the new partition, but I suspect that if it had the standard offset then it would be visible.

What you do from here depends on the data contained in the partition. If you can copy it off then you could use XP Disk Management to remove and then re-create the partition, then copy your data back.

A second option is to copy the data off the partition and then use the full version of Disk Director to delete the partition, then create a new one. The new partition will be created with 63-sector offset. You can then copy your data back.

Finally, a third option involves using TI. Do you have Acronis True Image? If so, create an image of the troublesome partition, then restore it. When restored, TI will re-align it to the 63-sector offset.

It would be nice to get Paul's (MudCrab) take on this also.

[MudCrab]

Unless I'm miscalculating, going by the Relative Sectors, I think both the data partitions (the second partitions on both drives) were created with Vista.

I think I would first try what Mark suggested in Post #13. Delete the second partition on Disk 2 (since it's empty) using either DD or Vista's Disk Management and then recreate it with Vista's Disk Management.

If that doesn't work, I would delete the partition and recreate it with XP's Disk Management.

[K0LO]

Paul:

You're correct. Both of the data partitions on both Disk 1 (Vista) and Disk 2 (XP) have the 2048-sector offset, so they were both created by Vista Disk Management console. I was in a rush and missed that.

I haven't seen this problem before but I've seen the converse. That one is much worse. If you have a partition structure created by Vista with all partitions having the 2048-sector offset and you then use XP Disk Management to create a partition the disk will be corrupted. Microsoft even has a tersely-worded KB article (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/931854/en-us) to warn about this.

It appears here that if you have a disk conforming to the older 63-sector offset created by XP Disk Management or Disk Director or any other partitioning software, then you shouldn't create new partitions on it with Vista Disk Management or you'll end up with a disk with mixed offsets. From what tiscali is seeing, the created partitions will work correctly in XP but Vista will have trouble recognizing them or modifying them.

I think the fix here is not to have mixed offsets on either disk and to force everything to have a 63-sector offset. Since apparently both operating systems and the recovery partition already have the 63-sector offset, then all that is needed is to force the two data partitions to conform.

You can use either Disk Director or XP Disk Management to delete and then re-create the two data partitions. You can format the XP data partition with XP and you can format the Vista data partition with Vista; just don't create either partition with Vista.

I would be very interested in hearing how this turns out.

[tiscali]

Thanks for that discussion, guys. I do have True Image so will copy the data off before reformatting. It may take 24 hrs before I come back but come back I will.
I'd posted this problem to the UK's leading computer mag, PC Pro, and it's covered in the April issue (no 162, p 189) but their expert didn't really address the problem; he went into details about setting up a dual Vista/XP boot mechanism.

[K0LO]

If you have True Image then the fix for Vista is a snap. Just image the Vista data partition and then restore the image. TI will put the partition image back with a 63-sector offset; no reformatting required. You could also do the same with the XP data partition even though it is empty.

[McTavish]

Did you install any Norton products in XP that might have installed GoBack? What make of computer is it? Some manufacturers’ recovery systems use non default partition tables that you can’t just repartition in the normal way.

[tiscali]

Interim feedback:
Problem 50% solved! On the XP disk I used XP disk management to reformat the empty partition; it worked and is now seen as a 07 NTFS partition which can be seen by Vista disk management and Explorer. I've copied all my personal data from the Vista disk into it and Vista can see it.

I can't do the same thing in Vista as it causes an error message - see the opening post in this thread.
The version of True Image I have is 8.0 which won't load under Vista. Therefore I've bought the full version of Disk Director which loaded under XP but won't load under Vista!!! I get an error message towards the end of the installation 'The installer was interrupted before ADDS could be removed - restart installer...'. I've sent an email to product support to hopefully sort that one out. I'd disabled firewalls and uninstalled the demo version beforehand.
Until I can get DDS running in Vista I'm stuck. The PC, by the way, is a UK brand called Mesh, very reputable, and was a state of the art machine 6 months ago!

[K0LO]

tiscali:

Well, half the battle is won - that's good news.

For installing DD in Vista, did you right-click on the installer program and choose "Run as administrator"? Acronis has not gotten their installer program written correctly yet to ask for privilege escalation in Vista, so you have to force the issue.

Since things are working in XP you should be able to either:

1. Run DD in XP to delete the Vista data partition, then re-create a new partition. Switch to Vista to format the partition and copy your data back.

or,

2. Run TI in XP and create an image of the Vista data partition. It won't matter that you're using TI8 - it should be able to backup and restore an NTFS data partition. Save the image file anywhere but in your target destination partition. Restore the image (while running in XP still) to the same partition and it should realign to a 63-sector offset. Boot into Vista to check the results.

[tiscali]

Success at last!
Turns out that if you buy DDS 10 online you don't get the lastest version. I went back to the Acronis website and found an update, tagged as Vista compatible. I downloaded this and it installed successfully on the Vista disk.
I then used Disk Director to format the troublesome E: drive labelled 'My Data'. The partition emerged empty and unlabelled but after labelling it all partitions on both disks appeared correctly defined. Vista disk management and Vista Explorer also now see everything as it should be. I've attached screenshots of the two Acronis DD views and of Vista disk management for the record.

My thanks to Mark and Paul for their perseverence in getting to the bottom of the problem. The fix in the end was quite simple. The root of the problem I think lies in the middle paragraphs of post #19 in that an OEM version of Vista Home Edition is likely to screw up if you use its disk management to partition a disk.

Perhaps either Mark or Paul would like to conclude this thread by posting a recommendation to others finding themselves in trouble following a Vista disk partitioning.

Best regards to both and other viewers of this thread from here in the UK.

[K0LO]

tiscali:

Excellent - those are beautiful pictures with things looking exactly as they should. All of your partitions have 63-sector offset and your drive letters were assigned exactly as expected.

Until the makers of partitioning software catch up I still prefer having a 63-sector offset layout on my PCs. Some day the tools will be able to deal with either layout without issue, but that's not the case today. The 1024-sector offset was created to deal with future large-sector hard disks but as far as I know they don't yet exist, so there is no penalty for sticking with the older layout standard.

Glad this worked out for you. Always glad to help our friends in the UK.

[jpr]

Greetings! I'm new here, just googled here over a different problem, I'll probably fix it myself, but if not I'll post it.

What I'd like to say here is:
1) Thank You for saving me from a potentially huge problem, because I was about to use VISTA to repartition a few things (I have a similar setup; Vista Home Premium with split partitions on the original disk, XP Pro with split partitions on the second disk). Of course, I do have backups, but...

2) If I understand this post correctly, the problem arose when the OEM used the 'XP method' of partition offsetting, and repartitioning with Vista will muck it up. However, Microsoft's kb article does not address that; in fact stating the converse - they give the scenario where re-partitioning with XP mucks things up (presumably because they are assuming the original Vista disk was partitioned with 1MB boundaries) as stated in the kb article.

Do I have that right? (Incidentally, 1MB granularity would be 2048 sectors, not 1024, wouldn't it?) So, either XP or Vista could 'cause' the problem, depending on how the disc was initially partitioned. Actually, if you ever restore with TI, since it apparently uses 63-sector offsets, Vista would have a problem with that too. Hmm.

Anyway, thanks much, it's great to read a thread where people are reading the actual problem and trying to solve it, as opposed to just jumping in with a 'common solution' that doesn't really address the problem at hand!

-John


-{ Quote: "tiscali:

OK; I see the problem now. The XP disk (disk 2) simply has the incorrect setting for the file system type in the partition table. It is set to 06 (FAT16) instead of 07 (NTFS). Simply changing this one byte in the partition table should fix this. Here are two ways to do this:

1. Boot into XP and delete the partition using XP Disk Manager. Then create a new partition and format it, again with XP Disk Manager. Assuming that XP does this correctly, then it should end up with Type 07 in the partition table and Vista should see it properly. If you want to play it safe, and if your system is capable of booting into XP when Disk 1 is disconnected, then do that and work with only Disk 2 connected.

2. Purchase Disk Director and boot from the recovery CD. Go back to the Disk Editor on Disk 2 and view the partition table. Simply change the type from 06 to 07 using the drop-down box. Then choose Edit - Save Sector and you're done.

The problem with the Vista Disk is that it is set up with a mixture of the old standard where there is a 63-sector offset and the newer standard with 1024 sector offset. If you look at the "Relative Sectors" displayed in your last screen shot for the first two partitions, both numbers are divisible by 63. This is the older standard that has been in use for years. However, the last partition has a "Relative Sectors" value that is not divisible by 63 but rather by 1024.

I suspect that your system was set up by an OEM with the older offset, and Vista is perfectly happy with it. However, when you then used Vista Disk Management to create a new partition, it does this with the 1024 sector offset. I don't know why that confused Vista into being unable to mount the new partition, but I suspect that if it had the standard offset then it would be visible.

What you do from here depends on the data contained in the partition. If you can copy it off then you could use XP Disk Management to remove and then re-create the partition, then copy your data back.

A second option is to copy the data off the partition and then use the full version of Disk Director to delete the partition, then create a new one. The new partition will be created with 63-sector offset. You can then copy your data back.

Finally, a third option involves using TI. Do you have Acronis True Image? If so, create an image of the troublesome partition, then restore it. When restored, TI will re-align it to the 63-sector offset.

It would be nice to get Paul's (MudCrab) take on this also." }-

[K0LO]

-{ Quote: "If I understand this post correctly, the problem arose when the OEM used the 'XP method' of partition offsetting, and repartitioning with Vista will muck it up. However, Microsoft's kb article does not address that; in fact stating the converse - they give the scenario where re-partitioning with XP mucks things up (presumably because they are assuming the original Vista disk was partitioned with 1MB boundaries) as stated in the kb article. Do I have that right?" }-That's right. From what I've seen on here (and on the TI forum), you can get in trouble if your disk has a mixture of partition types. Vista Disk Management will want to create new partitions with the 2048-sector offset and XP Disk Management will want to create partitions with 63-sector offset. If you have all 63-sector offsets then you should probably use XP Disk Management Console or a third-party partitioning tool to make modifications. Likewise, if you have all 2048-sector offsets then you should use Vista Disk Management console when making partition changes. Third-party partition managers like Acronis Disk Director can work with a mix of offsets without problems, but when viewed by Windows Disk Management the results may look odd.

-{ Quote: "(Incidentally, 1MB granularity would be 2048 sectors, not 1024, wouldn't it?)" }-That is correct; I don't know how I messed that up and, unfortunately, the forum software will no longer let me edit the posts with this error. Drat.
-{ Quote: "So, either XP or Vista could 'cause' the problem, depending on how the disc was initially partitioned." }-That would appear to be the case.

-{ Quote: "Actually, if you ever restore with TI, since it apparently uses 63-sector offsets, Vista would have a problem with that too. Hmm." }-Vista works fine with 63-sector offset but when using Vista Disk Management to create new partitions on the disk then you may end up creating a disk with mixed offsets and leading to the issues described here.