What is "MBR and Track 0" during Restoration?

Discussion in 'Acronis True Image Product Line' started by iSkywalker, Aug 8, 2006.

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  1. iSkywalker

    iSkywalker Registered Member

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    Can anyone please tell me what should I choose during "Recovery Partition":
    1)C: (My backup partition)
    2)MBR and Track 0

    Million thanks to you all.........
     
  2. Tabvla

    Tabvla Registered Member

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    You will usually select "MBR and Track 0" if :

    • The OS won't boot
    • The disk is new and does not have an MBR or Track 0
    • The disk geometry is different to the image that is being restored

    There are probably other times when you may need to restore the MBR and Track 0, but the above are the most common.

    Hopefully other Forum members will add to the list ... :)
     
  3. iSkywalker

    iSkywalker Registered Member

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    Please advise what happen if I choose "MBR and Track 0" for recovery of my C Drive partition?
     
  4. ErikAlbert

    ErikAlbert Registered Member

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    If you are a FirstDefense-ISR-user and you don't restore the "MBR and Track 0", you will lose the Pre-boot screen of FD-ISR or you will get a FALSE Pre-boot screen of FD-ISR, because FD-ISR changes the MBR.

    You can also fix the MBR in FD-ISR by enabling/disabling the Pre-boot Screen at the right moment in case you forgot to restore the "MBR and Track 0", but that's a trick, I don't like to use.
     
  5. Tabvla

    Tabvla Registered Member

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    Following on from EricAlbert's post..... if your boot process is anything other than pure vanilla Windows then you need to specify that in detail.

    If you have any type of Boot Manager, Disk Manager or 3rd-party OS installers then it is almost certain that the standard Windows MBR will have been overwritten.

    The comment belows applies ONLY if you boot using the normal Windows boot process using the Windows boot loader and boot.ini files.

    Firstly, I assume that you are doing all of this to a "test" disk and not your live working environment..? :doubt:

    You can use this as a general rule: - If you are restoring an entire system disk then restore the MBR and Track 0. If you are restoring only the system partition don't restore the MBR and Track 0. This is a simplistic rule, but it is appropriate most of the time for most situations.
     
  6. dld

    dld Registered Member

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    When restoring the C: partition is the MBR and Track 0 being restored at the same time? In other words, is the MBR and Track 0 part of the C: partition or is the MBR and Track 0 in its own sector\sectors without any partition or is the MBR and Track 0 in its own partition? What confuses me is this screen if MBR and Track 0 were in a partition:

    http://img406.imageshack.us/img406/8951/screenshot029copy2ku9.jpg
     
    Last edited: Sep 4, 2006
  7. Tabvla

    Tabvla Registered Member

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    "Track 0" is an unofficial term that has through common usage become to mean the boot sector on the physical disk (not the logical partition) that contains the OS.

    The MBR is not part of the System partition. Any Primary partition on a disk that contains an Operating System can be assigned to be the Active partition.

    The MBR is ALWAYS located at Sector-1, Cylinder-0, Head-0 of the disk. The MBR contains the Master Boot Code, the Disk Signature and the Partition Table. The Master Boot Code scans the disk for the Active partition and loads a copy of the boot sector, from that partition into RAM. The Disk Signature is not associated with a specific physical disk.

    A disk that does not contain an OS and therefore will not be used for booting a system should not have a boot sector, MBR or Active partition.

    If your system won't boot and you suspect (because of the error messages) that the MBR has been corrupted then you could simply restore the MBR and Track 0 and try to boot again.

    If Windows has become corrupted then you don't need to restore the MBR and Track 0.

    You really need to see the MBR and Windows as two different things. Most of the time it is Windows that corrupts and needs to be restored. In practice I have only very occasionally encounted a corrupt MBR. (The experience of others may of course be different).
     
  8. dld

    dld Registered Member

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    So if the MBR and Track 0 are not:
    a) in the System partition (or C: partition)
    b) in a separate partition

    Then can one say that the MBR and Track 0 are on a sector/sectors of their own?
     
  9. Tabvla

    Tabvla Registered Member

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    Yes. The MBR is ALWAYS located at Sector-1, Cylinder-0, Head-0 of the disk.

    The OS can be located in any "Active" partition, anywhere on the disk provided that your BIOS can access past cylinder 1024 at time of boot. If your BIOS cannot access further than cylinder 1024 then the OS must be installed in a partition that resides within the first 1024 cylinders.
     
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