Can't mount Image with XP Home in TI

Re: Can't mount Image with XP Home in TI: FIXED!

I have found a solution to this persistent and plaguing problem! Again, Acronis' programmers have a less-than comprehensive understanding of Windows.

So, you try to mount an image as a drive letter (you may have several partitions, each of which will require you to do this). What happens is this: TrueImage finds an available drive not otherwise used...but, when it tries to assign that drive letter it discovers a lingering registry entry that blocks it.

Say you're trying to mount a single partition in an ATI backup (I've done this with ATI Workstation Build 8206) to F:\.

If there was previously a drive mounted at F: (A prior ATI Mount, a USB drive, a now-removed hard drive), there will be lingering entries in the registry that Acronis isn't smart enough to remove...even though they're "phantom" drives. I found entries (by searching for keys with the complete name "F") at
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\Applications\Explorer.exe\Drives
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\MountedDevices
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\MountPoints2

Removing all instances of F from those registry entries (and rebooting) allows Acronis to mount to those letters.

 

Another trick that I've tried that works (because ATI actually LOADs the Image, assigns a drive letter, then fails!):

While ATI shows the "Assigning drive letters to partitions..." (it takes a few seconds), click on Ctrl-Alt-Esc, select the "Acronis TrueImage..." entry, and click on the [End Task] button, aborting the program before it has a chance to undo all its' good work in Mounting the image!

 

Re: Can't mount Image with XP Home in TI: FIXED!

Interestingly, this almost worked for me. After doing this, when I tried to mount an image, I got a message saying that the allocation of a drive letter was successful but then the machine became unresponsive and I had to power off to recover.

It the closest I've got yet to actually mounting a backup set.

 

I have similar problem with TI 2009 I just bought (build 9709). I tried to follow instruction given by GroverH (see post #17).
Then I found the Microsoft explanation for the Show hidden devices trick. I did as explained (that is from a command window) and the hidden device were displayed in light grey. When entering the 2 environment variables in the system by using
- Right-click My Computer.
- Click Properties.
- Click the Advanced tab.
- Click the Environment Variables tab.
- Set the variables in the System Variables box.
I don't see the hidden devices driver. The PC might need to be rebooted in order to take those new variables into account.... I did not yet try this.
Anyway I removed the greyed devices but still got the error message "cannot assign a drive letter to a partition from the backup archive"...
...after reboot I now see the greyed out devices.

{edit}I tried some more after reading a few other post (in particular this one)
and here is how it goes on my XP SP3 PC:
1) I do a full image backup, requesting validation along the line. The backup completes without error.
2) I select the backup file and click the mount button, then select one of the baked drive to mount as follow:

3) While ATI proceed with mounting the drive, I get the new drive indication and disk manager displays it:

Note that the drive letter is J (and not K as was initialy choosen)
4) ATI continues to display the processing message :

5) After approx 1mn, the drive gets disconnected, it disapear from disk manager and ATI disply the error message:


I tried the same as above using J as the drive letter, but got to the same result. Note that I am trying to mount in read only.
During the short time the drive is shown in disk manager, I am able to browse thru it with a file manager...
It looks like ATI correctly mount the drive but that the NEXT available drive letter is assigned (and not the one initially specified), and thereafter ATI fail to finalize with Windows and dismount the drive .

{edit} Following CAOgdin findings, I searched thru the registry for already reservde drive letter and choose one never previously used (P: in my case). But I got the same problem.
I tried to mount in Read/Write mode -< same problem.
I then tried CAOdgin trick of killing ATI as soon as the drive is created and visible in disk manager, but the drive last for the same 1mn or so and then is dismounted by what ever internal timeout...
So NO SOLUTION so far and it is frustrating since ATI does mount correctly but then is unable to dialog with the MS OS to change the drive letter and insure it stays mounted.

I filed a service request with Acronis, hope they will reply soon.

{edit} just to compare, I tried on a 64-bit laptop with Vista Business SP1 and here everything works fine, I was able to mount the drive for the same backup I tried on the XP SP3 machine. Without doing any trick on the drive name in the registry (this laptop has seen connection of various USB drive and has already used quite a ot of drive letter, in particular the I letter which I used to mount the drive. Still it worked fine.
So maybe all this has to do with XP SP3 or my PC particular config ?
Can't be the antivirus, both PC and laptop have the same (ESET)...

 

Hello ergonom,

Thank you for using Acronis True Image 11 Home

Use the following KB article to identify the issue.

If none of the solutions helps, please collect diagnostic information using AcronisInfo Utility and contact Acronis Customer Central with reference to this thread.

Best regards,
--
Dmitry Nikolaev

 

Hello Dmitry,

I received info from Jatin by direct email I followed up his instruction to completely remove ATI using the CleanUp utility. I had some problem after cleanup to restart my PC and had to do a cold reboot.
I then re-installed ATI version 9709 (note I already had that version before). However, the issue is still there. So Jaton asked me to run the AcrinisInfo utility as you suggested. I have sent the results to him for analysis.

By the way I checked the list in the KB entry you pointed to and I had already tried all of those suggestions without success.

 

I am having this same problem. Did this get resolved?

 

Nope, I received info from Acronis to install latest version (9796), I did and still have the proiblem. Acronis helpdesk said : "I am writing to let you know that your case has been escalated to a tier 2 support professional. This was made to expedite the resolution of the current issue. The initial analysis of the information we currently have may take up to several days but in any case we will get back to you as soon as we either get a solution for you or gather enough information on some further steps required to be made."

This was on Jun 28, 2009, that is 10 days ago. I hope they will come with a solution soon....

 

If you have BitDefender Internet Security running on your computer you probably will have exactly the problem described above.

BD has done this to my computer with a DVD burning program and with the "Mount" function of True Image.

Yesterday I finally replaced BD with Norton Internet Security and suddenly I was able to use the TI "Mount" function for the very first time. Amazing.

Fungus

 

Hello,

I would also like to add that I have the exact same problem with mounting a back-up archive using ATI Home 2009 running on Vista Home Premium SP1.
I have tried using several different drive letters to no avail. The Archive was created by ATI Home 2009, Trial version build 9796. I am able to explore the drive using windows explorer, so the achive appears to be complete. I have been using Acronis 2008 for a while on my XP machines with no problems of the sort, but thought I would give the newest version a try since ATI 2008 will not run on Vista. This seems to be a very fundamental function that you think would have been debuged before this software was released.
So far I am not that impressed with the Home 2009 version, but I have not had any problems with 2008 and was very happy with that product. It saved my bacon on a few occasions!!

 

This problem is still open with Acronis. Upon their request, I sent them a bunch of log information which they are currently reviewing. I hope they find a solution quickly.