Cannot Restore

When I try to restore, I get the following error message:

"Cannot restore the partition because the image archive file is on the same hard disk that you are going to restore."

The image is in the Acronis secure zone, and I am trying to restore to the normal Windows partition. Let me explain what I am doing. I created an Acronis secure zone on a second hard drive. I backup my primary drive to the secure zone on my second drive. Now that I have about twenty incremental backups, I want to restore the backups to the second drive, so that the Windows partition on the second drive is identical to the primary drive. I'm, sure there is enough free space on the second drive. (I do this so I have a drive that I can switch to if my primary fails, and I also would like to prove to myself that the backup software works.)
It seems like this is exactly what you would want to do if you only had one drive. Why won't it let me restore to the same drive where the image is, if the image is in the secure zone?

 

What version and build of TI? Are you using TI from within Windows or from the bootable CD? Whichever one, try the other. If neither works, maybe you've discovered another wrinkle in TI.

 

Actually I think the easiest way to do this would be to just clone the primary C partition to the (assume currently empty) data partition on the second hdd using the TI clone function.

 

But after cloning, you can't run both drives. Windows doesn't deal gracefully with two identical drives. It will make one unbootable if it sees both. That's why you must always remove the clone or the original drive after cloning before booting into Windows.

 

But, if I understand correctly, after the first boot into Windows with the clone only, set up as master, you can add the original as slave and boot again to format it.

If that's correct, how about two SATA drives. Is the master/slave switching accomplished by changing channels on the motherboard (or switching cables between the drives)?

 

My PCs with the SATA drives seem to have a smarter BIOS and perhaps this is a result of the SATA drives. They give the option to select which drive you want where in the priority list.

I don't think the concept of Master/Slave applies to SATA drives. Each is just on its own SATA port.

 

Yes, but I was wondering if the SATA ports may be carrying an equivalent distinction in themselves, like the connector position on the IDE ribbon cable. That way, changing ports would be enough, without resetting the BIOS.

 

Do you mean if I have a Maxtorabc on SATA connector 1 and WDdef on SATA connector 2 and have the boot device selected as WDdef and then swap the cables, does it still boot from connector 2 or does it search out where WDdef went to?

I just tried it and my boot failed. The boot device is associated with the connector which is not surprising. So you set in BIOS which SATA connector you want it to boot from and the connector is identified by the model of the drive connected to it.

 

I'm running 9.0 (build 2, 302). Yes I could clone the drive everytime, but that takes a long time, and when I clone the drive, I lose all my incremental backups, which may have individual files that I would like to restore. I now run an incremental automatically every week.

Here are the results of my latest attempts:
I tried restoring from Windows, then I also tried to restore from the bootable CD. Both ways I get the same error message. I then tried disconnecting my primary drive so that now I only have one drive in the system. It booted to the original version, which I cloned from my primary about three months ago. When I tried to restore, I got the same error message. (This is exactly what people who only have one drive have to do.)
Next I tried to do a snap restore (even though I hadn't previously saved a disk image.) The screen showd a message that it was loading the image, the disk made noise for about 20 minutes, then it tried to reboot, but couldn't. I put my primary drive back in and tried to read the second drive. Windows said the drive was not formatted.
So I now have cloned my primary drive to the secondary again, which works fine. But I don't have any confidence that I will be able to do a restore from backups that I make weekly.

 

You should try the latest build, 2337. It may or may not fix the problem but Acronis will ask you to do it as a first step in resolving the problem.

You need to un-install 2302 before installing 2337; do not install on top of the old version.

 

Thanks for testing, seekforever. Again.

Went to see how that was done in my HP BIOS.

Well, nothing special, I'm afraid. I can position the "Hard Drive - Integrated SATA" device within the boot order line, but cannot set the priority of individual channels with reported drives. I therefore assume that SATA primary channel would be the one that BIOS will always try to boot from when the turn comes to "Hard Drive - Integrated SATA". That would comply with the result of your test, where the BIOS didn't find the bootable disk connected to the secondary channel.

Therefore if I clone the system disk and reboot once with the clone alone on primary channel (for Windows benefit), I should then be able to add the (still bootable) original on secondary channel and boot again to format the old system disk without causing conflicts.