Image backup using Drive SnapShot?

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

Yeah, thats all duly understood of course w/SP.

I also get back everything 100% intact & complete when restoring Paragon Drive BackUp Pro images. LoL

I just haven't seen any reports mentioning yea or nay yet regarding any similar results with DS, so i imaged with DS and am very pleased to report that by employing the services of XYPlorer in order to explore DriveSnapshot's virtual mounted image with FD-ISR snapshots, that THEY ARE INDEED! very there and ready for complete restore.

So, looks like DS is quite up to the task as well as the big league players in a lot of respects.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

That's good news, Easter . I don't have a FDISR installation so was unable to confirm or deny.

Did you use DS' Maintenance Mode in the end or did it work ok in standard mode?

Graham

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

No Maintenance Mode, just simple Standard.

ALL snapshots (and programs/files) are there when viewing them via XYPloyer app. I dunno how it gets around it but XY obviously is very capable of bypassing the permissions and so affords you a way to view FD-ISR's numbered snapshots that ordinarily you couldn't in just windows or other file viewers.

This is very pleasing to learn. Next step is to actually restore the image to conclude this program is 100% to satisfactory results.

I think i have finally found a reliable and extraordinarily light secondary imaging program to safeguard against a surprise adverse issue. Two programs are better than one. Theres definitely freedom in numbers.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

Okay,today I made a test restore in BartPe from a DS image made in Bart and placed on my USB drive...
The image consisted of sys partition ~17GB reduced to ~8.7Gb in splitted sna files, took around 30 mins.In this image I had 7 Eazfix Pro v8 snapshots...
Before restoring I updated EF:s baseline (so all snapshots were gone at the restore)
In BartPE the DS restore was made in 16,56 minutes.Rebooted with anxiety and (!) no subconsole and then startup got stucked at win login screen(!)...Did a shutdown by the button and tried again...The same..

But here´s the interesting part: Before all this I also made a MBR backup in Bart with MBRwhiskey plugin (a win gui of MBRwizard)...Restored the MBR in BartPE and rebooted for 3d time...And the subconsole was there and in win all 7 snapshots intact...Rebooted again to another snapshot to be sure and indeed all is perfect...Success after DS and Mbrwhiskey in combo...Indeed a venture!

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

osip, silly question but, did you restore the mbr with DS before doing the restore? The mbr is saved automatically by DS but it is not restored by default. To do that you need to right-click on the first panel of the DS 'graphic' showing the drive and select 'Restore mbr' from the menu. This always works for me and restores the sub-console.

Graham

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

Exactly... With the caveat that I'm still using RB v7.2.1, since building my UBCD4Win as you suggested (thank you!), I bootup with UBCD4Win to backup (in maint. mode) as well as to restore my system partition (which has Rollback Rx installed). After the DS restore (wherein I instruct DS to restore the MBR), my system boots up with the RB subconsole and all RB snapshots in place.

My only complaint now is UBCD4Win's very long bootup time, but I guess that's a small price to pay for imaging success.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

Not a silly question...I thought it was included by default,...missed that! Ok,thx for pointing it out...Nevertheless I was surprised that MBRwhiskey worked, as a fact it did...That rises the question: is this applicable also with ifw raw images with Phyllock made in win ? If so you can backup with all sectors to DVD with aut IFD restore, then go in to Bart and restore MBR with the help of MBRwhiskey...will test this further on when I have time. For the time beeing I´m very happy with the DS restore with all EF snapshots intact...This is the ultimate...
--------------
added: link to MBRwhiskey http://red.boot-land.net/mbrwhisky.html

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

Osip well done getting a BartPe working. Nice find with the mbr plugin its a frontend for mbrwiz. It uses mbrwizard beta 2.0. A nice clear view of the drives to do the necessary. Personally i like to backup and restore the mbr automatically as my first drive is always 0 and i not change my hardware often so it always 0.

I always managed to backup and restore all snapshots with DS without backing up the mbr but just use it in BartPE as it can access c unrestricted.
DS replaces it itself. If you read old posts on here people had success doing that. In fact nexstar summed it all up in this post here. https://www.wilderssecurity.com/showpost.php?p=1072235&postcount=1 I only need to backup the mbr when i use IFW in XP in BartPe straight after i make an image unless had a recentish backup of it.

Yes, it's exciting seeing all your snapshots back working first few times.

When you mastered that dl the evaluation of IFW and Phylock and backup in windows with RAW,Validate ticked and then jump into BartPe backup the MBR and then totally destroy your c drive and wipe out the head(0-63) of the MBR. Look at the first sector of the drive it should read all zeros and so you to prove to yourself you restored the MBR with MBRWIZ 100% you see it saved back. Most times a drive can go corrupt and the MBR is still intact. So this is a strong test. Then restore your image. Best to restore the mbr after obviously and check all your snapshots are working hehe. Thats a buzz.

Heres another free good editor/backup but not found a plugin. It run without a plugin or easy to make one. I have a play with all.



http://students.cs.byu.edu/~codyb/

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

Markymoo:
Yes, all this is fine...By my mistake I got proof that the MBRwhiskey indeed backsup the whole needed MBR which I think is a great bonus...Did I get you right: once you have the MBR backed up with EF/RB installed there is no need to backup MBR every single time...it´s good enough to use with different image-EF/RB restores if the partition structure is the same...

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

Pete,

Interesting problem. How did you fix it in BootitNG?

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

The question is if you restoring the image back onto the same drive. How do you all know it restoring the mbr and extended mbr as well if theres one there already. The image will work anyway even if it didnt restore it because it was there already. So that isn't a good test. Better to wipe the entire first 63 sectors first. I don't know how you tested it. If you just restored the image back after taking it then unless you wipe it you dont know if it put it all back. MbrWhiskey as we just discovered restores only sector 0 which is enough as DS will do the rest.

You could have the remains of a boot manager in your extended mbr and not know it. Take Paragon for example. You could delete the partition, format it and select new mbr but there still be the remains of a boot manager hiding like BootIt in the extended mbr which can prevent your drive from working right.

Yes thats right you don't have to backup the entire MBR each time.

I found a way to backup the entire 63 sectors with mbrwiz 2.0 with this command through trial and error. Its not in the manual. The head command was used with the wipe but also works for sector. So that means mbr whiskey doesnt have it in it gui. But mbrwiz gui is good for other commands too. Beeblebrox doesn't have the feature also. It good for backing up restore of your partition tables though.

mbrwiz /disk=0 /Sector=HEAD /Save=filename

and wipe
mbrwiz /disk=0 /Wipe=HEAD

@Peter

It could be a bug with the routine and certain factors all come into play at once like certain geometry disk sizes and data streams writing and that could trigger it but its rare right.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

It sounds like you corrupted partition table and more. Like i was was saying before wiping the entire 63 sectors will sort it. When disk software tries to read it it can't work out what it is and sometimes crashes. Thats why a mbr util is handy.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

will try that in Bart for use with ifw...

Many thanks Markymoo for your extraordinary help,tests,effort and general useful comments!

osip

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

@osip
Neat, you finding mbrwhiskey made me look at mbrwiz again as i couldn't backup the entire 63 first time using it. The command was not listed. I was resorting to secinspect util for that. In v.2 it lists backup sector or (sectors) but doesen't give the format, using the command 'Head' works. So thanks too, it means i can use mbrwiz for everything now.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

@markymoo,

Would you mind briefly summarizng now your routine procedure for backing up your snapshots so I can file this for my learning? Thank you for all your research along with all in the thread.

Gary

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

Just pm:d you...where do you put in "Head" ? Or do you mean this "mbrwiz /disk=0 /Sector=HEAD /Save=filename"...

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

Thanks guys for all the very useful hints & tips and especially for bringing up MBRwhiskey. I gave it a spin myself, even Beetlebrox, very crafty utilities, nice ones.

I have to go on record again with yet another plug in favor of DriveSnapshot. It's been a few weeks so after reading the latest posts here i went and applied DS recovery images across partitions of one of my machines (single drive x2).

DS absolutely blows my PARAGON right out the water in speed!! This time and now i thoroughly convinced DS is not only a great secondary choice for me but may even take center stage as my "first" choice if this keeps up. What an amazing tiny image app this DS really is!

I used it to recovery an image to a newly formed partition that it wasn't even imaged from that drive! The restore was over in a few minutes, booted perfectly, and the only issue i'm experiencing is with System Restore crashing which i'm reviewing since THIS IMAGE was with SP1. I'll get that sorted out soon. I also have to backtrack and determine if both drives are the same manufacturer or not, because this was something of a revelation for me to see since this was only an experiment. Didn't matter if it worked or not, but it did, and is running great.

My next test is to draw on some of the advice here and delete then wipe a partition and then restore again to it to see if it will indeed restore MBR 100% partition table and all with using this MBRWhiskey app, it should make for reliable results either way. I also need to get on the test table again with FD-ISR and ensure everything (snapshots/archives) restores with it too!

Mind you, i'm doing all this IN WINDOWS across partitions ATM, i'll get around soon i hope to practicing the command lines to DOS restores and such, but this is a fantastic Topic & thread with a lot of very good information, so thanks to all for sharing your experiences and results so far.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

I agree,outstanding topic...Have in mind that markymoos tutorial clearly proofs that MBRwhiskey backsup sector 0, if you want to backup the whole sector 0-63 you have to use mbrwiz.exe in BartPE/ DOS with the command: "mbrwiz /disk=0 /Sector=HEAD /Save=filename"...

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

For those who prefer to avoid DOS commands, there is MBRWork from TeraByte Unlimited. It's the one I use.

Backup First track
Restore First Track
Reset the MBR to zero
Reset EMBR to zero
Install Std MBR
Set active partition
Recover partitions

MBRSaver from Dan Goodell can backup and restore LBA-0. And selectively restore the 3 components of LBA-0.

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

You guys M-m, brian, nextar, osip, Peter et al: these -unfortunately- concurrent threads which I have to hop b'tween have been GREAT GREATreading
Really educational

It's good to see RBack problems with imaging being explored and solved and the mysteries/intricacies of the MBR back-up being aired so thoroughly

In lieu of coughing up for SP IT edition _ which I have thought about ( would be a business expense and so be part paid for by the taxman)

Seeing DS and Terabyte running at the head of the pack is great for these really powerful and perhaps less well publicised utilities run by smaller operations.
Get BartPe involved : great
see these other utilities exposed: great

I'm with BrianK here: the Terabyte apps still rule for me: there is 'nothing' they cant seem to address and the partition management options add extra dimensions. LOL: just wish I could follow some of the issues and replies at the newsgroup better

Keep pushing Brian
Heh:

Thanks to all who have run this/these thread(s).

 

Re: Image backup using Drive SnapShop?

@huntnyc

for now

backup with ifw+phylock with raw and validate in xp
bartpe save 0-63 sectors with mbrwiz
or
backup in bartpe with ifw
bartpe save 0-63 sectors with mbrwiz

restore image in bartpe
restore 0-63 sectors with mbrwiz

note for ifw2.0: now saves and and restores all 0-63 sectors. if backing up and restoring just using bartpe then it does away with mbrwiz. if backing up in windows there's still need to save and restore the 0-63 sectors using mbrwiz in bartpe.

i'm in process of backup and detecting if image has differential or not and restoring it all automated.

@osip
sorted
do that test if you get chance with DS

@Easter
There's Paragon 2008 now.
I'm wondering if users are only successful with DS because the extended mbr is still there and not blank. Try this.
1. go into BartPE like you normally do and take an image with maintenance mode turned on.
2. run this command from dos in BartPE to check you going to wipe the right drive. it usually 0 but can be 1. if you know already you dont need to run this command. good idea is to label your drives so you can see at a glance which is the right size drive to wipe. good if 2 drives are similar size - mbrwiz /list
3. run this command. it wipes the entire mbr. 0 being the drive you want to wipe and restore the image to. you noted from 2. - mbrwiz /Disk=0 /Wipe=HEAD
4. restore your image as normal with DS.
5. boot up and checkout if you have snapshots all ok and each snapshot is the correct one.

Tip.
Open up the right dos folder easily and to mbrwiz with 'Drop to Dos'
Get Drop to Dos http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/downloads/DOSDROP.ZIP - Install
Right click the mbrwiz folder and select Drop to Dos.