Acronis TI 1 boot disk "Fatal Eror no boot disk found"

I'm getting a Fatal error no boot disk found when trying to load Acronis TI 11 from a boot CD/DVD. This just started on my new HP laptop suing the new Intel chipset and SATA DVD drive.

I suppose this is a new architecture that cannot be understood by current software? The reason I assume this is because the new laptop would not boot from a bootable CD using Partition Logic either. It works fine in my older rig, even using my SATA DVD.

My Laptop BIOS has no alternative for teh SATA controller.

I'm wondering if I use an external DVD writer using USB if the boot disks will work? I'd have to buy one, but it would be worth it as we wait for the new controller to become standardized. Also, you can use current versions of TI and DD w/o having to download install etc etc. new patches.

Please let me know if an external USB DVD will solve this new problem.

 

Probably the version of Linux used in the DD recovery environment, which is now a couple of years old, does not have the correct SATA driver for your newer hardware. When you made the bootable recovery CD did you include both "full" and "safe" mode versions? Try the safe mode version; it should see any internal disks that are recognized by your PC's BIOS.

 

I don't remember if I did the safe and full or not. I'll create another one with safe mode and try it. But if it needs to boot to give me a choice, that will not work. Does the safe mode automatically try booting if there is a failure with the full mode?

I also tried partition logic bootdisk and it loading it's boot OS but then failed to find the drive also.

 

The process goes like this. When you boot your PC from the CD, the first thing that loads is a menu. From the menu you can choose to boot either full or safe mode. If you have included other Acronis programs on the boot disk, like True Image, then they will also appear in the menu.

I'm betting that the safe mode version will work fine on your newer hardware.

 

Mark,

It never makes it to that GUI screen. It just fails and says No boot disk found. On my older system, and on every other computer I have had no problem, With tehnew HP Laptop, this is the first time I've seen this happen.

Partition Logic also gives errors and will not run at boot either, so I doubt it is only a Acronis problem. I'm begging to think it's a chipset, SATA controller problem. In that case, it's probably trying to boot from the SATA DVD, since I can see the messages it generates on screen, but it cannot find any drives. And that is what it is saying: No boot drives found, the same message you get if you try to boot from a DVD/CD with no drives in you system.

Can you let us know when Acronis has fixed this problem?

One other question: When creating a boot disk, does Acronis copy the current Drivers for the controllers, or does it have it's own generic drivers that it loads for the boot and seek drive functions? What I'm getting at here is that if Acronis uses the current drivers, then perhaps loading it on the machine that it will perform the boot will allow Acronis to copy those "new" SATA drivers on the boot disk. Then the problem would be fixed--just create the boot disk on the machine you want to use the boot disk with, done.

 

Is the HP laptop able to boot ANY bootable CD/DVD? If not, check the BIOS settings for boot order.

The boot disks are not specific to a machine; they can be used on any machine. Machine-specific drivers are not copied to the disk during creation. The full version uses the Linux operating system which contains its own drivers. The safe version uses a DOS-based OS and relies on the machine's BIOS being able to recognize and control devices.

 

Mark, the boot order is fine. I'm sure it will boot a Windows install disk, but it won't boot Partition Logic or the Acronis boot disk with DD10 and TI 11 on it.

I'm assuming there are other things it must know about the SATA drivers/controller in order to access the disk on the level it needs to perform advanced things like partitioning and imaging.

Like I said, it is partially booting because I get the error messages. It's failing after the boot, in that in t cannot get the information from the drives it needs.

I'm wondering now if it will even boot a Windows CD. I can't imagine Intel making a chip set that would not allow windows to boot.

Anyway, I'll try to boot from the Windows Vista CD right now and se if it allows it. I need to figure this out because my new system will be here on Tuesday. After I assemble and load it I need to image the drives, and it has that new Intel chipset (i7 core chipset that only Imtel makes right now.)

No, I even put the hard disk boot sequence under the floppy USB option and changed the boot drivers to boot unsigned drivers:

Acronis Loader fatal error: Boot drive (partition) not found. Press <enter> to try to boot your OS. . . . This same disk works on my older system fine. It also works on every computer I've tried it on, until the HP laptop.

Tried the XP disk once again, BSOD after loading drivers.

It did boot Vista though to the first information screen.

At least this is a good way to get people to use Vista and not XP--you can't load XP--lol.

So there you have it.

If you do a search for "Acronis Loader fatal error: Boot drive (partition) not found " You can read the problems IT people and others are having with Acronis, even 2009. As a last resort, Acronis have been creating special ISOs for people depending on their system specifics. I thikn they are saying tehre are specifics to these new Intel chipsets that are not working with SATA drives, which is a driver/controller issue.

Bad news because no boot level utility will now work with these new chipsets.

I tried Windows XP botdisk and after XP loaded all of its drivers, it BSO'ed.

I found this:
http://www.omgili.com/newsgroups/al...ronis loader fatal error boot drive not found

It's the ICH9 Intel chipset coupled with an SATA DVD. Not compatible. The guy said he did what I was thinking about doing, which is to install a ATA DVD and boot with that. The problem is, I can't do that with the HP Laptop. About the only thing I can do is create a USB boot stick and use that. Some MB BIOS's allow you to change the SATA controller to legacy mode, in which the Boot Loader will then boot, if the chipset allows it.

You can see below that the CH9 does not support PATA--can you believe that? Just NOT THERE. I'm sure my HP main board has this chipset.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I/O_Controller_Hub

CH9

The ICH9 came in May 2007 in the chipset P35 on the market. It does not offer any PATA support. In practice, most baseboard manufacturers would like to keep providing PATA and to do so use an additional chip. Only the ICH9R, ICH9DH, ICH9DO chip have AHCI support[2]

This has the following variations:

* 82801IB ICH9 Base (ICH9) neither AHCI nor RAID support
* 82801IR ICH9 RAID (ICH9R) with AHCI and RAID Support
* 82801IH ICH9 Digital Home (ICH9DH) with AHCI and no RAID Support
* 82801IO ICH9 Digital Office (ICH9DO) with AHCI and RAID Support

[edit] ICH10

Intel launched the ICH10 southbridge in June 2008 with the Intel P45 (Eaglelake) chipset. Datasheet [3] and errata [4] information is now available.

ICH10 implements the 10Gb/s bidirectional DMI interface to the "northbridge" device. It supports various interfaces to "low-speed" peripherals, and it supports a suite of housekeeping functions.

[edit] Peripheral support

* Six PCIe version 2 ports, four of which can be configured as either 4x1 or 1x4.
* PCI bus
* Six SATA 3Gb/s ports in either legacy IDE or AHCI mode. can support external eSATA
* Intel high definition audio
* Integrated gigabit LAN.
* Six USB 2.0 controllers

ICH10 does not offer direct PATA or LPT support. Notably there is support of 'hot-swap' functionality. ICH10 also offers reduced load on CPU and decreased power consumption.

ICH10R is a RAID variant which also supports a new technology called “Turbo Memory”. This allows the use of flash memory on a motherboard for fast caching.

I suppose using an SATA USB external DVD/VD would work? What do you think?

This is also good reading on the subject. It seems that the newer chipset CH10 allows ATA emulation without BSOding:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Host_Controller_Interface

I think Intel REALLY screwed up.

OK I made a boot drive using my USB flash drive. Acronis will not run in DD FUll mode. It will run in DD 10 Safe Mode. I at least get teh GUI now and the error for full mode DD 10 is the same: Acronis DD has not found any hard disk drives.

True image will run in full mode from the boot USB pen drive. That's strange.

Anyway, it looks like I can run DD 10 in safe mode.

 

WellWell:

Glad that you got to the bottom of this issue. A USB boot device is apparently the way to go with your chipset, so an external USB CD or DVD drive should also work but a flash drive is faster and more convenient.

TI 11 full mode works because it uses a newer Linux kernel and has more updated driver support than the version of Linux used with DD 10.

Since you seem technically inclined there is an even better alternative open to you. You should try building a VistaPE bootable flash drive with TI 11 and DD 10 integrated into the build. VistaPE uses the kernel of Windows Vista and has a lot better driver support than Linux or Windows XP. I've switched to using VistaPE as the recovery environment for both TI and DD almost exclusively; I've even installed the build (which occupies less than 250 MB) to my hard disk for convenience. If you haven't already done so check out forum member MudCrab's guide to VistaPE.

 

Mark, thanks. PE sounds interesting.

Hopefully, we'll not encounter that type of non PATA supportive MB for a few more years. Total screw up on Intel's part. But yes, PE with TI and DD would boot up regardless, and that seems to be the way to go. Can yuo load PE on a pen drive?

I just ordered a serious pen drive, since the one I have is really slow and I use it just for personal things I need with me, like writing, Firefox settings, bookmarks, passwords, etc., that I may need with me.

So I decided wince FF and other apps, like Infrarecorder are going portable, plus I can load TI and DD on it too as a boot, I should get a serious pen drive.

I got the Corsair 8GB Survivor, which has sustained writes and access times about as fast as my external USB hard drives. Now with PE and it's possibilities, that new high performance pen drive was a great buy for me. I mean there are other better performing pen drives, but this one, as you know, comes in that aircraft aluminum with O ring seals, water proof to 200 feet. Very rugged. I also got it for like 40 bucks. Anyway, thanks for the help.

I do have a question about TI 11 and RAID arrays. Let's say I create a RAID 0 array and then image that array with TI 11. Now let's say I want to change the array to RAID 10. After creating the RAID 10 array, can I use the RAID 0 array image to reimage the RAID 10 array, given that the disks and the system remain the same--the only change will be a RAID array change.

 

WellWell:

Yes - VistaPE will work from a flash drive. You're on the right track with the Corsair Voyager 8 GB flash drive. I have a tiny (physically) 8 GB flash drive that is small enough to carry on a keychain. It is set up to multiboot several operating systems including VistaPE. Currently it contains:

• VistaPE
• The Acronis ISO w/DD 10 and TI 10
• Kubuntu Linux with persistent partition
• Knoppix Linux
• PartedMagic
• Portable Firefox, PuTTY, WinScp, VNC
• A collection of Windows utilities
• 5 GB of free space

Multibooting is managed by Grub4DOS. It is extremely handy for solving PC problems. I am sure that you will enjoy setting up your new Corsair Voyager and will find it to be a fun project.

Yes, TI should enable you to back up the contents of a RAID array and then restore it to a different type of array. You have to be sure to first set up the new array in the BIOS and then verify that TI recovery environment sees it as a single disk before proceeding. Also, the proper RAID driver needs to be in the image that you will restore. This is almost automatic if you have a RAID controller that is working and you only want to switch from RAID 1, for example, to RAID 0 with the same controller.

 

Ahhh Mark,

So what you are saying is that, yes, I can use TI on an array and restore it to a different array, but the controllers need to be the same. So every thing remains teh same, like the system need to be the same, since there are HAL concerns, the hard disk can be different of course, and then with RAID, the CONTROLLER has to be the same, which makes sense. Either that or the controller methods, for lack of better wording, must understand each other, which pretty much means the same controller card, or at least the same manufacturer's card programmed the same way. Is that correct?

 

WellWell:

I think the issue is that the image you are restoring MUST contain the proper RAID driver, or else Windows will generate a stop error when booting. So if you are simply going to change RAID modes with the same controller, then you're probably OK. If you are going to switch, for example, from a single disk to a RAID array then you could run into problems if you don't plan ahead and install the RAID driver in Windows before you create the image. The same thing applies if you are going to switch from one RAID controller to another - you have to get Windows to install the right driver for the new controller before you make the image that you are going to transfer to the new array so that the image contains the right RAID driver.