Clone of a bootable RAID1, results in "NTLDR missing" error

I have 2 hard drives in a RAID1 (redundancy)

I Cloned that RAID to a single hard drive (that is the same exact brand and model as the drives in the RAID array)

I unplugged the RAID drives, and installed the Cloned drive.

When I try to boot, POST runs fine, but Windows doesn't load. Instead it gives a "NTLDR is missing" error message


I am trying to create a bootable Clone of my boot RAID1 array. So that if my RAID array is corrupted, I can plug in the Clone and recreate the RAID array.


Does anybody know how to resolve the NTLDR error, or a better way to make a bootable copy of a RAID1 array?

THANKS

 

go into the bios and set your new drive as the boot drive, make sure that boot from other is NO, once windows reboots and everything is ok you need to format the old drives to avoid conflicts.

 

thank you so much Mac

that works!!!!

 

Hello jonjan,

Thank you for choosing Acronis Disk Backup Software.

Please accept our apologies for the delay with the response.

I would also like to mention that there are two approaches available:

Clone Disk - copies\moves the entire contents of one disk drive to another;

Backup - creates a special archive file having '.tib' extension for backup and disaster recovery purposes;

Please take a look at this FAQ article explaining the difference between Clone Disk and Backup approaches in more details.

The Clone Disk approach is usually used to upgrade the hard drive (e.g. install a larger disk), while the Backup approach is basically dedicated for the complete data backup and disaster recovery purposes.

As you are interested in backing up your hard drive (RAID array) for the disaster recovery purposes, we recommend that you follow the Backup approach.

In case of the system crash the restoration scenario would be as follows:

- Turn off the computer and repair RAID array, e.g. Replace the faulty hard drive;

- Boot the computer from Acronis True Image Bootable Rescue CD and restore the image saved to any type of the supported media such as CD, DVD, internal, external or networked drive, etc.

Moreover, there are several advantages of creating a disk\partition image over the disk cloning procedure such as that you can create an image without rebooting your computer, image creation can be scheduled for the particular point in time, Acronis True Image allows you to create incremental and differential images, image archive contains only the actual data and so it has a smaller size, images are ordinary files and can be stored on any type of the supported media (e.g. any internal, external or networked drives, CD, DVD, ZIP, etc.), etc. However, the final choice is always up to your needs.

You can find more information on how to use Acronis True Image 9.0 Home in the respective User's Guide.

You may also find Acronis True Image 9.0 Home FAQ page mentioned above helpful.

If you have any further questions concerning Acronis software, please feel free to submit a request for technical support or post any of them on this forum. We will certainly try to help you in resolving any issues.

Thank you.
--
Alexey Popov

 

Alexey,

thank you very much for your helpful post.

I can see some benefits of the BAck-up option, such as not needing to reboot.

One helpful aspect of the Clone feature, is that it allows me to test the 'backup' data. I can plug in the Clone and boot, and check if it is working fine or not.
If I used the Backup feature, is there any way to test it and make sure it processed correctly?

Are there any stability or other disadvantages to use=ing the Clone option for my purposes?


Thank You,
I am using the software to help me in my volunteer work to support efforts to help people :-] and animals who need help. Acronis is a great help in this
Jon

 

Hello jonjan,

Please accept our apologies for the delay with the response.

There are no disadvantages of using the Clone Disk approach for your purposes if it does what you need. As I have already mentioned above, the final choice is always up to you. The only thing I should mention is that after the disk cloning is finished it is recommended that you completely unplug one of the hard drives prior to booting into Windows for the first time. The point is that keeping two identical hard drives, i.e. hard drives having identical "digital signatures" is unpleasant for Windows and may cause a number of boot or\and drive letter assignment problems. As soon as you successfully booted into Windows from one of the hard drives, feel free to turn off the computer and connect another disk.

What concerns checking backup archives, we recommend validating backups by means of the embedded Validate Backup Archive tool both when Acronis True Image is running from within Windows and when it is operating in Linux-based Acronis Rescue Environment, i.e. when your computer is booted from Bootable Rescue CD or Acronis Startup Recovery Manager is used. If backup validates successfully both from within Windows and in Acronis Rescue Environment, there should not be any problems restoring it in the future. You may also find instructions posted by Menorcaman helpful.

Thank you.
--
Alexey Popov

 

Alexey,

thank you so much for such helpful help.

I thought of another option...

Am I able to save a backup image,
and then later install it to a different hard drive. ?

I would like to be able to save my entire drive contents as a single file... and be able to 're-install' the contents on a different drive. This would allow being able to email the image file, or save it on an internet storage site, etc

To somehow install ATR to the destination drive... then re-install from the image... Is this possible?

Thank you very much,
Appreciatively,
Jon

p.s. ATR has been working very well for me so far, and I do recommend it to others

 

What version of TI are you using? I used to see this error mentioned fairly often with version 8.

Locate the NTLDR file on the Raid drive's root direcory and copy it to the clone. That usually fixes the problem. Why it wasn't copied has never been explained satisfactorily.