I was checking on whether to expect any issues when installing Boot it Bare Metal from Terabyte as this software will create as far as I understand a pre-boot enviroment. When searching through the faq at Raxco I noticed a reference to disabling the instant recovery pre-boot screen when taking an image as otherwise the image may be unbootable. Can someone please clarify this as I did not know that and have never done so in the past. Also, is anyone using ISR and BIBM and can they coexist?
Hi Beethoven I don't know about BIBM but re the warning about disabling preboot it depends on the imaging program. I have no problem not disabling Preboot with ShadowProtect, Macrium Standard, and Image for Windows. However if you use the built in Windows imaging and don't disable preboot when you image the restore will fail. I've also been told same is true with Acronis True Image, but I didn't test it. Pete
Thanks Peter -So far on this pc I have used Shadowprotect with scheduled incremental runs, so disabling each time would not be a possible approach. So I am glad to hear that you don't see the need for this with either SP, Macrium or IfW. As for BIBM may have to ask Brian if he knows as the expert for all things Terabyte.
Checked with Raxco and the response was a bit vague - while they did not know about any issues re BIBM, they did suggest to disable the pre-boot environment prior to imaging as this could affect the success. It was not clear to me if success related to the image process or the restore process. Also no reference was made to any specific imaging program even though I had referenced this thread, they just suggested to test it on my workstation. Well, I will do so and based on Peter's experience I do not expect a problem. Bottomline however is that as much as I like the use of Instant Recovery, if I had to choose between Instant Recovery and Imaging I would go with imaging. I would have preferred if any known issues with specific programs are clearly disclosed.
I've talked with them about the imaging thing, and for obvious reasons they don't want to list specific software(legal issues) As to the problem, there is no problem imaging, the problem is you can't restore a bootable system. If you are using IFW,Macrium or Shadow Protect you shouldn't see an issue. What I would with Bibm installed is image once with Preboot disabled, and then again with it enabled, and first try the restore with enabled. If successful you have your answer. I have to say at this point, they both are invaluable for different reasons. Pete PS. I do have Macrium installed in the Windows Boot manager and it causes no issue with either Macrium or IR
Pete, thanks for that. Part of it is as I expected and I plan to do my testing this weekend - mind you, I don't have your experience, so will restrict what I do to simple imaging and restore first and then if I have time give BIBM a whirl. I am not sure I understand the comment about not being able to list specific software for legal reasons. If there are incompatibility issues, why not list these. Most other software companies do so and obviously don't have legal issues with that. Stating that two programs do not work together, does not mean that the other program is crap, only gives the consumer the information to make a judgement call based on his/her requirements or preferences. On this pc I had no reason to restore before, only did faithfully my images. The fact that they work and I could mount them made me think everything is ok. While your experience reassured me that it should be ok, as a user I would be annoyed to find out that imaging works fine but restore does not work. Seems to be a critical part of it.
Hi Beethoven I think they are just being conservative which is why the just recommend disabling preboot. I have just tested with IFW,Macrium,SP and Windows 7 built in imaging. Had no issues with IFW,Macrium or SP. But the image with Preboot enabled wouldn't restore. The image with Preboot off did. IR has it's con's, requires more disk space, is a tad slower then other snapshot solutions, but it is so darn reliable. I image still but rarely have any need to restore. Once you get into it you find it very flexible. Pete
Hi Pete, did my first restore via SP using a full backup done yesterday without any adjustment of preboot environment. I am happy to report that this went fine without any issues. I agree with you, I still would prefer to do an initial rollback via IR as opposed to a full restore via image, just would feel that it's less final or that I have one final option in reserve. But now I don't understand your comment that the image with preboot enabled did not restore. Does that mean that unless you have another image with preboot off, you are out of luck and all of your prior imaging was pointless or did this comment only refer to Windows 7 built in imaging?
update - I think I now better understand - my restore of an incremental image over the existing OS drive only worked when disabling the pre-boot option in IR - otherwise the recovery disk from SP would not boot So my conclusion is that the images are properly created but if I want to restore and I am not using a blank drive, I need to disable the pre-boot option in IR. Given that a restore over the existing OS drive is planned and would not come as a surprise, that's no big deal. Tomorrow I will try my hand on BIBM
update 2 : Installed BIBM and based on my individual testing it worked with Instant Recovery. Once I had installed BIBM, I was booting via the BIBM environment first giving me the BIBM option (in my case of Win 7, Maintenance and Direct Boot). When choosing Win 7, Instant Recover would still pop up as the next pre-boot environment with the option of snapshots. Of course this was on my pc running Win 7 / 64 bit - as Raxco indicated it may not hold true for every set-up.
Cool. With just the windows boot environment, I see it the other way around. IR preboot first and the windows boot environment. As long as it works....
