Can't Restore Images

Replaced Norton Ghost with True Image 8, build 826. I have two HDs and my primary has 3 partions. I imaged the 3 partitions and created a CD boot disk about 2 weeks ago. As luck would have it, my windows 2000 registry became corrupted yesterday and the system will not boot to the desk top. Not to worry I say because I have a current image. I boot my computer with the Bootable CD and attempt to restore the image. I get an error "this is not the latest build or image may be corrupted". I had verified the image at the time it was created so pretty sure it is not corrupted. This is the only image I have made with TI so I know it is the latest. Tried several boots and on two occasions, the recovery manager saw my CD, but could not "see" the image file on it. Now I am totally dead in the water with no options but to reinstall my windows operating system and of course lose all programs etc unless someone has an answer to help resolve the problem. Need to get my system back up and running and then immediately switch to Norton Ghost since I have used it for some time and never had a problem creating or restoring images. From reading the posts here and my experience, True Image is still a dream and not a real viable imaging program.

 

Hello Beaglebud,

Thank you for choosing Acronis Disk Backup Software.

Could you please boot with Acronis Bootable CD and verify the image using the "Check Image" tool? What is the result? Could you please describe where you stored the image? Did I get it right that the image is on CDs? If so please make sure you insert the latest CD (with the latest part of the image).

Thank you.
--
Ilya Toytman

 

Images are stored on 11 CDs. I created the images with the retail build that I thinkw as build 795 - 7XX something anyway. I later upgraded to the 826 build. The boot CD was created with the old (original) build. Should I create a boot disk with the new build and attempt that?

Also, do I understand you correctly that you should put the LAST created CD in first when attempting to restore? I do not remember that information anywhere. I put the first CD created in and it would not recognize it and gave me the error messages.

Since my system is totally down and will not boot except to the CD or floppy, I suppose copying the image files to a hard drive partition would not be the correct thing to do? I could copy them to a 2nd hard drive if you thought that might help, but no use going through that process if it is not going to do me any good. Thank you for your reply. Hopefully the issue can be resolved.

 

I forgot to answer your quesiton as to checking the image. I cannot check the image because when I click on it, I get an error that says this is not the latest image or the image is corrupted. Sometimes, I cannot even "see" the image on the CD when in the recovery console. All that I can see is the
CD _ROM drive, but it shows no files in it. Dont understand that when the file is there and can be seen through Windows Explorer. Hope this provides enough information for yo.

 

Which is it? Not the latest build, or not the latest image?

That CD-ROM drive - is it external or internal? ATAPI or SCSI?

Anyway, True Image sometimes have problems with external devices - very annoying - but if the cure is to reboot and try again, and try again, and try again until it works, then do that.

 

There are several options that come to mind. You could use System Restore (if turned on) to restore the computer to before when the registry became corrupted. You could also try 'Last known good configuration' from the Safe mode options.

Reinstalling Windows does not mean that you lose all of your programs if you choose the repair option to repair the existing Windows installation (but you would lose some Windows updates and a few programs may become non functional and these would have to be reinstalled).

Another possibility is to make a Bart CD on another computer and use it boot into a pre Windows environment and then copy the image parts on the 11 CDs to a partition you are not going to restore first and then see if Acronis will restore the 11 split images from the hard drive partition. You could even reinstall Windows if you don't have easy access to a second computer and then make a Bart CD and use it to boot into a pre Windows environment and try copying the split image from the CDs to a different partition to the one you want to restore and then see if Acronis will restore the image from the hard drive.

I would never put an Acronis Image onto 11 CDs as there is too high a chance of something going wrong. I have in the past created an Image split into 4 GB parts and burned it to DVDs (slowly to increase the chance of an accurate burn) by transferring it from the drive it was created on to DVDs and it successfully restored but the image was only in 2 parts and I restored it by copying it back from the DVDs to my second hard drive before I restored it.

 

Hello Beaglebud,

If you are to restore an image from CD, first insert the last CD and then insert them in order starting from the one created first. You can read this information in User's Guide (Chapter 5. Restoring a disk (partition) from an image). Please try to put the latest CD and restore your system.

Thank you.
--
Irina Shirokova

 

Why am I surprised that "latest" means last - LOL. Would never have thought of starting with CD # 11 first and to me "latest" was referring to date. Anyway, I did that and things looked good at first. The image was recognized and it began to restore my C: partition only to abort in a few seconds with an error message that the image was corrupted. Ran the check image utility on it and it says the image is good. I have two internal CD R/RW drives and tried both of them to be sure there wasnt a problem there. Tried many attempts with a boot disk from original build and the current 826 build with the same results. The program just wont read the image for some reason. Also attempted the "quiet ACIP = off no acip" command and still had no luck. All I managed to do was completely wipe my C: partition out so now there is no access to the windows 2000 operating system. I find it odd someone woudl suggest not to burn image on 11 CDs. Nice to know the information for the odd way Acronis works is on the users guide on the CD which I cannot read without a computer that wont run because I cannot restore the image. Love the new user guide distribution system companys use. Anyway, tha tis another issue.

Used Norton Ghost for many years and never had a problem burning or restoring images across 11-20 CDs depending on which disk I am attempting to back up. VERY RELIABLE and easy to use. The only reason I switched was that Acronis had more functionality and options that seemed attractive. What a mistake as it seems obvious that Acronis is not ready for the big leagues yet. Still have my image disks, but not much hope of recovery at this point unless someone has an answer as to why the program keeps telling me that the image is corrupted and wont read it. Hate to even try it again as it immediately wipes out the partition and then have to start all over again. Does anyone have a sure fire way of restoring the image? Probably not.

If anyone has an answer will be glad to consider it, but at this time, I am not sure that Acronis will do the trick for me and not sure what will happen if I do get the image loaded only to find system wont boot, programs wont run etc. May be more trouble than it is worth.

Will be interested to see other comments on these issues.

 

Hello beaglebud,

Could you please boot the computer with Acronis Bootable CD and then verify the image on CDs. Please insert the latest CD first to verify the image. If the image verifies ok then there should be no problems that the image is corrupted. Could you please let me know the exact message you got when you tried to restore the image?

Thank you.
--
Ilya Toytman

 

As my post said, I ran the image check on the image files and program verified the image was good. When attempting to restore it, I get to the screen where it asks for "latest" image. I put in disk number 11. The image is recongized and then several screens of which partions to restore, resizing, etc. After finishing with those, the program asks for Volume #4. I insert it and after a few seconds, the program asks for Volume #1. I insert volume #1 and the program runs for a few seconds, shows the time left (about an 1 hour and 34 minutes) and then a box with a big Red X pops up with the message "this image is corrupted". The program stops and when you close the message box, you are taken back to the Acronis opening screen. Of course by this time, the C: partition was wiped out and all data lost so now I have a rather large fishing anchor or paper weight - LOL. Tried to restore it with different builds (original install build and build 826), attempted to use the quiet off mode line suggested, tried it on different CD-R/RWs to see if that would make a difference, and nothing worked. All with the same results. It just will not restore. Each time I attempt to use Acronis, I do further damage to my system so obviously not very pleased with the progress to date.

 

Hello Beaglebud,

Did you verify the image under Windows or in Acronis stand-alone mode after booting from Acronis Bootable CD? You may also choose "Yes, I want to verify image" option during the restoration process. In this case the image will be verified before the restoration starts and there will be no actions performed before the verification is completed.

Thank you.
--
Ilya Toytman

 

Hello Beaglebud - I find the requests for discs #11, #4, and #1 very confusing and disturbing

I have never tried to restore from multiple CD's, so perhaps this is how True Image is supposed to behave?

The only scenario where the sequence #11, #4 and #1 makes sense (to me at least), is if you have asked to restore 1 or 2 partitions instead of a complete disk.

Restoring 1 or 2 partitions could very well require True Image to first ask for disc #11 in order to read in some kind of Table of Contents (TOC) with details about what is on the 11 discs. Once the TOC is read to memory, True Image could ask for disc #4 (if that is where the sub-image for the 1st partition is stored), and then for disc #1 for the 2nd partition.

Do you have access to a second computer with lots of free disk space? If so, I suggest you load all the 11 discs on the 2nd computer and create a network share with the sub-images. Next use the Rescue CD, locate the network share, and restore over the network.

Note: Somewhere on Acronis' site there a free mini-application that can verify images. Load that onto the 2nd computer and verify the sub-images once you have loaded them onto the harddisk.

 

Thanks for the inputs. I sort of figured along your line of thought. Last disk to read some table, checksum etc. I was in fact only going to restore the C:\ partition so also figured it would tell me to go to CD #1 to get started since that is where it began to create the image. Not sure why it asked for disk #4 unless it was seeking the end of the image and calculating disk space, time etc. Since my computer, the one broken, is down with no operating system, it is pretty hard to set up a network share. I do have another computer in the house sharing the network with me and had a network share set up, but not able to access it now. I suppose I could load windows and acronis again then copy the image to my 2nd hard drive and attempt a backup from there. I am just not sure what kind of integrity it will be even if I can do it. So far all I have be able to do is wipe out the C:\partition with Acronis and no luck with restoring image. Fortunately, I learned many years ago that there isnt too much backup and save so I have all my data saved off on another hard drive and the important stuff saved to CD_RWs so not much lost except a heck of alot of time and effort to reinstall and reconfigure everything. Will not have it happen again for sure.

Thanks again for the inputs.

 

Well, here's one more thing that I didn't see specified when I scanned this thread.

1. What version of TrueImage did your use to create the image to the 11 CDs?

2. Did you make the TrueImage Recovery (bootable) CD with that same version?

Newer versions of the Recovery CD can read older images, but older Recovery CDs won't work reliably with images made with a newer version.

If you can copy the 11 CDs to a second hard drive, it may be easier to restore from there and may even allow a restore that isn't working from the CDs.

 

If you decide to do a re-install, you can always (I hope!) copy the 11 sub-image files to your disk and mount the imaged partitions as virtual partitions. Once there, you should be able to drag'n'drop files from the virtual partitions onto your real partition(s).

 

Created the images with the retail version. It was build 7?? (cant remember the nuymber) Created a boto disk from it. Shortly afterwards, I upgraded to build 826 (current build) and created a boot disk from that version. Tried both with same results. I have now reloaded my system, reloaded many programs, drivers, upgrades and you know how that goes. I don't want to mess with Acronis now or ever again as the minute you click on restore and begin the processm, it wipes your partions out so if it aborts at that point (as it has done all along) you are really in a heap of trouble. I am going back to Norton ghost which admittedly doesnt seem to have the nice features that Acronis does, but it is reliable and secure. Never had a problem with it after using it many times.

Acronis is not ready for retail, and judging from this and several other message boards with almost total negativity, not a good or a dependable imaging program. Until it is refined, tested, and reliable, anyone would be crazy to use it as a "safety net". Thanks to everyone for their comments and hopefully my experience and the others posted here will encoursage others to find and use a reliable imaging program.

 

All I can say is that TI 6.0 works fine for me. Last afternoon I restored my IBM Thinkpad using the TI 6.0 Rescue CD and an DVD-R with a complete image of the laptop's harddisk.

The image was created using the Rescue CD to a network share on my desktop PC, burned with Roxio Easy CD Creator 5.3.5.10v to an DVD-R.

The restore was necessary, because I had use the laptop as a testbed for a case raised here in forum where the poster claimed it was an TI 8.0 problem. After a lengthy discussion here, the poster agreed that TI was not to blame.

 

May be a wonderful program and works for everyone, but me; however, I cant take the chance that it will work the next time I need it. I cannot rely on a product I have no confidence in. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I have used Norton Ghost successfully for many years and it never has failed me, but is not as feature rich as Acronis advertises. My new strategy will be to image my system with Norton Ghost; however, use Acronis as sort of a backup program to capture incremental changes to files etc. and if drives ever need restoring, I can attempt to use it, but if it fails again, I know I can restore using Norton Ghost even though it may not be the most current image.

If TI is working ok for you, that is great, however, you did say you were using TI 6 and I was using TI 8 with two different builds. May be that this release is a bit buggy and TI 6 was a better program. I did find another web site with an Acronis discussion board with the very same issues posted. Just too many people with too many problems to solve to trust Aconis as the primary program to do the job. Anyway, to each their own and what they are comfortable with. Hope it always works for you as I know Norton Ghost will always work for my needs - At least to date it has never failed me!!