Archive Corrupted

[MHat]

I've been using Acronis 11 to backup my C drive once a week for a year. Today my Vista went berserk and I'm told it's corrupted and I have to reinstall it. I laughed at them. It's okay, I said, with a smug smile. I've got an Acronis backup of my "C" drive. That is, I thought I had.

Background. Newer comptuer. My Vista OS is there but many of the functions are not working (eg. can't access "personalize" or Internet, etc.. Definitely corrupted.

I opened my Acronis from the desktop and clicked on restore. I selected one of the incremental .tib backups and everything went along fine until i went into the final restore. The Acronis started analyzing my "C" drive then stopped and gave me the error message "The Archive is Corrupted. I tried again manyl times. using different .tib dates, but the result was always the same.

I did a forum search for information about corrupted archives, but I couldn't find anything to help me out. In fact, I couldn't understand most of it (Snr. Citizen, not very computer literate)

I've submitted a request for help, but have not heard back.
I'd sure like to know what's going on.

My Acronis is right up to date and I expected it to work. To say I'm disappointed is a very faint reflection of what I'm feeling right now.

I work on my computer and it's all set up for what I do. I'd hate to have to reload the OS and all the programs. Any suggestions to get me out of this mess?

[seekforever]

To check an archive TI reads the archive and recreates the checksum for each 256K bytes of data - this amounts to 4000 checksums per gigabyte. When the archive was written the checksums were placed in the archive file. The validation process compares the recreated ones with ones in archive file; if they don't all match perfectly the archive is declared corrupt. It only takes 1 bad bit in the billions of bits in a multi-gigabyte archive to have it declared corrupt.

Common causes are a bad sector on the device holding the archive, a problem transferring data from the device, bad cable, low power supply voltages, - just about anything including overclocking and too aggressive memory timings.

The other cause is bad RAM. If the memory is bad then the checksums will be incorrectly calculated in memory. Since you are experiencing strange things with your OS, this would be the first thing I would check. You can download Memtest86+, free, from www.memtest.org . Let it run for at least several passes, preferably overnight for a thorough testing. You must have zero errors. A new system is no guarantee the memory didn't fail, I've had new premium memory fail very early in its life.

[MHat]

Thanks for the explanation, Seek. The thing is, all of my .tibs are corrupt (all dates). Thus the backup I relied on is not there when I need it.

[seekforever]

Originally Posted by MHat

Thanks for the explanation, Seek. The thing is, all of my .tibs are corrupt (all dates). Thus the backup I relied on is not there when I need it.

If the cause is bad RAM and possibly other problems as well, they all will show up as being bad even if there is nothing wrong with the actual archive file(s). If the RAM was bad when the archives were made it could indeed corrupt the archives depending on where the bad cell or cells were located.

Did you validate the archive when you created it?

[Jeremy Fothergill]

Unfortunately, I am in the same situation. I cannot either restore, browse or mount the backup and yet on the day I created it I tested it by restoring the backup and the backup validation confirms the backup is OK. If the backup validation is confirming everything is OK then I assume it is using the same checksum validation.

This is frustrating as TrueImage is meant to be one of the best but when I first need it it lets me down!

Jeremy

[seekforever]

Originally Posted by Jeremy Fothergill

Unfortunately, I am in the same situation. I cannot either restore, browse or mount the backup and yet on the day I created it I tested it by restoring the backup and the backup validation confirms the backup is OK. If the backup validation is confirming everything is OK then I assume it is using the same checksum validation.

This is frustrating as TrueImage is meant to be one of the best but when I first need it it lets me down!

Jeremy

What TI version and build are you using?

Is this an image or a data (files and folders) backup?

What media is it stored on (internal HD, external HD, DVD)?

What happens when you boot up the TI rescue CD and validate using it rather than Windows?

When you did the test restore that worked was it a restore of your active partition, usually the C drive?

[MHat]

I validated it a couple of times, although I don't remember if this was when it was first created. I stored it on an external HD.

[seekforever]

Originally Posted by MHat

I validated it a couple of times, although I don't remember if this was when it was first created. I stored it on an external HD.

My recommendation is to verify that your RAM is OK first. If it isn't there can be all sorts of red-herrings when examining other solutions since virtually everything uses memory. The fact your OS has strange problems is another reason. Regular PCs do not check memory other than a simple test on bootup which is more for determining the amount installed, it is always assumed the values stored or read are correct.

[MHat]

Thanks for trying to help me out Seek. I really appreciate it.

The problem is that my OS is so corrupted I can't open anything on my new HP computer--not device manger, personalize, etc. and, as well, my keyboard (seen working here) has stopped working on my HP. It would appear that the only thing I can do is reinstall Vista. Thankfully, I didn't rely wholly on Acronis, and I have my documents and emails backed up on another hard disk. Thanks again.
Don Lemna.

[MrMorse]

@MHat
To test the RAM with memtest86 do not need any OS on your PC.

Download the newst ISO from the link in post#2.

Burn the ISO on CD and start with the cd.
Let the test run a night...

If there are no errors your RAM is obviously ok.

Did you try restore under Windows?
if Yes, try to start with the Ti-rescue-cd and restore from there.

[MHat]

Thank you Mr. Morse. I've now been advised by HP specialists that my computer OS is hopelessly corrupted and I have to do a recover. (My CD drive on that computer is also out.

Most programs won't open, I can't acess the internet and my keyboard won't work any llonger. So I'm in the midst of preparing for the reinstall of the OS. I'll report back to this thread on the outcome.

I believe there was a corruption in my new HP computer from the beginning. When I brought it home a year ago, it wouldn't wake up from "sleep" and (after a long session with MS experts) I had to bypass that and go directly to shutdowns. Most recently the computer would put itself to sleep and never wake up, even though all the power settings (including sleep) were on "never". I went through many attempted fixes with HP support. The total failure occured when I (finally) tried a restore and iit failed. After that (last night) everything went rotten. Then my Acronis backup failed.

Well, so be it. I'm going for a fresh installation of the OS and from now on I'll use my acronis 11 in a different way.

By the way, the early aconis backup was verified and I have the screenshot to prove it.

Cheers, Don.

[seekforever]

MHat,
Glad to be of some assistance. Hope you get it going without excessive anguish and congratulations on having your personal data files backed up with a different method. I have often said those are the ones deserving of the most attention.

At the first sign, or sooner, of your new install going bad or if you have trouble doing the install run Memtest86+ from www.memtest.org . I am always suspicious of things just getting more and more corrupted - in my mind it points to a possible HW issue.