Image backup using Drive SnapShot?

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

Just over a minute was ambitious. I timed it. 2:05.

The good news is you can hot plug USB devices after you are in VistaPE and you can put CDs in your second optical drive after you are in VistaPE.

I'm starting to learn which exe files can be run directly from the HD or a USB flash drive. Snapshot, ghost32, IFW. And I've just started.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

No idea yet. Using the A43 app you just browse to snapshot.exe.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

That's fine, appster. But when you do do it, could you boot up BartPE as that's the one which is not displaying DS properly .

Graham

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

I'll get to it in a bit and let you know.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

@Graham - After booting BartPE I don't see any way to determine the color depth being used. I only see display resolution settings and accessibility display settings (now on high contrast #!). Changing display resolution and display contrast had no effect on the DS problem Jo Ann and I are experiencing.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

You using dos these days right to do you backups so only way to see ntfs partitions is to use that ntfs4dos. if having it as fat32 there's no disadvantage if its just reserved for backups so no big deal carry on that way. i was interested if you got any performance read/write speed using ntfsdos. if you can fit it on a dvd thats even better. dvd-rw are cheap enough. i was referring having an automated recovery disk that auto restores in dos would be a cool thing. i was aware you meant defrag to do with EF. The DS differential just writes what sectors are different and doesn't do anything regarding defrag. even a full image doesen't put the data back in order but as how it found it. It still has to be defragged. I do a offline raxco perfect disk defrag and also use RB console defrag. I try to keep snapshots to no more than 4. A well continuous defragged drive is not a possibility using RB its a question of compromise and having the benefit of these features.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

Thanks for the info , Brian. VistaPE is now up and running here . There's quite a good tutorial here with info on adding your own apps. I haven't tried it yet but it looks pretty straight-forward.

@appster
Thanks for trying. I might make a BartPE tomorrow and see how it looks here.

Graham

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

@ Jo Ann

It looks to me it's a graphics corruption issue as your relying on the BartPe prebuilt graphic drivers. You can try first of all trying your BartPe on another pc to see if
same happens.

If it tolerable and only happening in DS and you can get by then live with it unless you prepared to update your BartPe and mess with drivers.

Here is ATI driver plugin
http://fabs.dyndns.org/index2.php?lang=en&section=freewares
Here is Nvidia plugin
http://sourceforge.net/project/downloading.php?groupname=winpe&filename=nvidia-1.0.cab&use_mirror=heanet

I can suggest to all to try this great addon plugin which lets you configure BartPE alot easily and make it act more like a real windows. Its the XPE plugin. It can let you change resolution easily and lots other things. You will also need the Nu2xpe-1.5 plugin to go with it.

Get the plugins from here
http://downloads.sourceforge.net/winpe/nu2xpe-1.5.cab?modtime=1150522568&big_mirror=0
http://downloads.sourceforge.net/winpe/xpe-1.0.7.cab?modtime=1175748476&big_mirror=0

There cab files which you can add easily using Add button in BartPe. You need to disable these plugins for it to work.

PENETCFG: Automatically start PE Network configurator
PENETCFG: PE Network configurator
Nu2shell

When installed goto C:\PE Builder3110a\plugin\xpe-1.0.2\ and edit "ze_pe-custom.inf.sample" and uncomment what you want and comment what you don't.
Rename "ze_pe-custom.inf.sample" to "ze_pe-custom.inf" when done.

Eg.

; TaskBar on Top - Autohide
; 0x3,"Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\StuckRects2","Settings",\
28,00,00,00,ff,ff,ff,ff,03,00,00,00,01,00,00,00,3c,00,00,00,1e,00,00,00,fe,\
ff,ff,ff,fe,ff,ff,ff,02,04,00,00,1c,00,00,00

; TaskBar on Bottom - No Autohide
0x3,"Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\StuckRects2","Settings",\
; 28,00,00,00,ff,ff,ff,ff,02,00,00,00,03,00,00,00,3f,00,00,00,1e,00,00,00,fe,\
; ff,ff,ff,e4,02,00,00,02,04,00,00,02,03,00,00

Tip
This plugin will auto remove the nasty Go start button. To replace the BartPe background you can edit the !custom plugin folder and insert your own wallpaper or to delete it do what i do edit the iso with UltraIso and delete the file BartPe.bmp in the I386 folder and save to a new iso and burn this.

Alternatively if this is all too much then try what Brian K is suggesting a alternative Recovery Cd made from WinBuilder. It is a relatively new package that gives you a choice of many that moving away from BartPe.

Using Winbuilder the best for fastest boot times is to use LiveXP. It's fastest because it uses microsoft 2003 server sp2. You can alternatively use XP but won't be as fast This is also good if you having having trouble if you xp isn't 100% compatible. You can download Windows server 2003 here http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/R2/trial/installinstruct.mspx The Winbuilder is a good way as support for latest devices is supported. If you build a Recovery with the Geoshell it will also be very fast. Its a total replacement of explorer. http://www.geoshell.org/

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

i don't think i go as far as that as the DS verify the images and uses its own built in accurate hash routine check and if a byte changes in the files the image is usually corrupt anyways but thats really professional what you do.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

I made a LiveXP and I was surprised that it took 3:25 to boot.

It doesn't matter if you choose Complete, Minimal or Recommended for the VistaPE CD, the boot time is the same.

Of all the boot CDs, ReatogoXPE is my favourite by a long shot.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

no you not going mad its me that sleep deprived it seems after your result i tested again and its a screwup at my end. sorry. the DS was not keeping mm as default and it was not turned on every time when i did several tests before, i done that much testing. what happens is when it scans excluded folders it comes up with a amount of how much is saved so if it doesn't report a figure then it saved nothing. yes mm is overriding excluded. its amazing what a night of sleep can do. sorry for the inconvenience. mm turns off excluded basically even though it goes through the motions. i was wondering why it didnt do and other times it did i thought the file format was wrong with the backslash.

eg. 05:04:48 2889 MB saved by skipping 10271 files

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

Hello markymoo, thanks for considering my BartPE-DS issue. It will take me some time to digest and understand your BartPE plugin suggestions, but I will dive into it when I get a larger slice of free-time.

I will try the Bart\ CD on my husband's PC tomorrow to see if the DS check-box problem shows up and I'll report back sometime tomorrow. I find it interesting that appster also has difficulty seeing the DS check-boxes when using his Bart CD!

Jo Ann

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

I'll be the first to admit that if theres no front end for DOS apps then i quickly lose interest. It's one of those quirks for me that require a lot of EXTRA thought and effort to go into striking just the right chord needed to automate different chores with DS being no exception of course.

Thats why i get a charge out of the exchanges in this topic, it's inspired me to build my first ever bartPE even though i can pretty much accomplish any such tasks with my ERD Commander.

DriveSnapshot still continues to amaze me. It's not failed a single time in several images and restores practicing the lazy method of imaging/restoring across partitions and drives IN WINDOWS.

In DOS i'm not quite where i need to be yet but i'm nearing closing this gap thanks to all the members contributing to this post.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

EASTER,

A friend uses ERD Commander. Is it possible to use Drive Snapshot from ERD Commander? That would be a plus.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

Yes it can, all it takes is a reliable ISO program to custom add programs and when complete burn it back to ISO then CD again.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

EASTER,

I just had a look at my mate's computer. That's a great CD.

Good news. You don't need Snapshot on the CD. From the My Computer icon on the ERD Commander desktop, browse to snapshot.exe on your HD or USB flash drive. Double click snapshot.exe and the program runs. You don't need DOS or a BartPE CD. You can restore your OS partition from a stock standard ERD Commander CD.

Interesting. A lot of single exe apps can be run from these PE CDs.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

I don't believe ERD Commander is freeware - is it?

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

No, it's not freeware.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

With the help of Google, I found out that what was once Winternal's ERD Commander is now Microsoft's Diagnostics and Recovery Toolset and a 30-day evaluation is available here. It's worth a look I guess.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

I just booted my husband's PC with my Bart CE (which was built on my laptop) and it doesn't even see either of his two hard drives!

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

I figured as much, but there are only so many hours in the day and I don't know what good that will do re my DS graphics issue. My point being that DS' check boxes are messed up on my BartPE, so I guess markymoo's advice about adding a plugin for my ATI graphics card should be my next endeavor.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

Hi Jo Ann,

As you may have read by now, I have the very same Bart-DS check-box problem you reported and guess what, I also have an ATI video card (bingo)!

If you don't mind its very long bootup time, download UBCD4Win. Once UBCD finally loads, DS works great (at least in my case)! Just be sure to copy your snapshot.exe over the trial version that's in the iso.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

appster,

My video card (nVidia) fan runs on fast speed until drivers are loaded during the boot process. I use ReatogoXPE rather than plain BartPE because it's so easy to add drivers to ReatogoXPE. It picks up your drivers during the build process.

Jo Ann,

Despite not seeing your husband's HDs with BartPE, did Drive Snapshot look OK?

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

Quite right Brian K

With ERD Commander CD you enter right into your system even if it won't boot and can run any program, i was thinking along the lines of what i experienced recently while researching the file infector Parite Virus, but even then you could in reality re-overwrite every single executable from the ERD interface. It almost reminds me of my Paragon Emergency CD except with ERD you can reach places a Linux CD can't, if there is one. LoL