what if scenario: disk crash & move to new drive or computer..

hi,

What if I have been making image backups with either incrementals or differentials onto separate USB hard drive media. Now if the main hard drive crashes and I have an "Acronis recover" CD and I decide to trash the old hard drive and get a new different, much larger drive, can I use these imaged files to upload and make the new drive bootable. Or am I having a problem because I can no longer "clone" the old drive?

And similarly, after the crash I decided to get a new computer and want to reload these imaged files, is that possible without a "clone".

thanks,

 

Hello Etrsi 645,

Yes, you will be able to replace the present drive with a new (larger) one and restore the image to it, making it bootable too. If the present drive has more than one partition but you regularily image only C:, it will be good to have at least one (old) image of the whole disk that will enable you to restore to a blank new drive (no prior partitioning will be required). Then you would restore a fresh image of C: on top of it.

As for restoring the image to a different computer, that would work only if the new computer were of identical hardware as the old one (doesn't happen in normal life). If not, the drivers and hardware-related Windows settings, as restored from the image, would not match the new hardware. A repair installation of Windows would help, but the results would not be satisfactory.

 

so, in your second paragraph where there is a new computer and things restore in a non-desirable way, is that where one would need to use a "clone" of the old drive to make things work desirably? And, if so, to achieve that I would have to get a new drive for the old computer and restore the image, then, secondly, clone that image to the new computer?

thanks,

 

No, the new computer issue has nothing to do with TI and how it restores information to the new computers disk. It has to do with the fact that your Windows installation is actually customized during install to load the drivers required for the PC's hardware configuration along with perhaps other dlls etc. When you restore your old PC's image to the new PC, it starts to boot up but finds that it has either incorrect or missing drivers or dlls and that is where the problem lies. An XP repair may or may not fix the problem.

Microsoft's Sysprep tool will attempt to handle PNP devices and TI makes a product called Universal Restore that you can use with TI Workstation, not Home. The TI stuff costs you more money and if you are only doing it once in blue-moon then it isn't worth the $ IMO.

When I get a new machine, I look upon it as a way of cleaning out the old apps and garbage I don't want and also a refresher exercise on setting up XP and my applications. In other words, I start fresh and reload XP and the apps. Sure it takes a bit of time and in my case that is not an issue and it sure is a great (re-)learning exercise. You also have the advantage of knowing when something behaves unexpectedly that it is not because you made an attempt to jam an old configuration onto the new machine. By having the old machine available, you can also go to it and when necessary to check something out or see how it was setup.

When I do this, the first thing I do is setup the network on the new machine so I can access any needed data files on the old machine.

 

ok, so you are saying that a new drive on the crashed computer or a new second drive on the old computer (not crashed) is a no brainer...

But, with TI Home there is no way to get a confident restoration onto a new computer, but the "universal restore" product (for more money) can do it.

So, if I don't have the universal restore product, can the Windows XP files and setting transfer wizard bring all that I want to the new computer confidently?

thanks,

 

IF you got a New computer, ...why would you want to put an Image on it from an entirely different computer?? You're talking about an Image that would contain software, and drivers for a different Motherboard, BIOS, Chipset, Video Card, Sound Card, Ethernet Card, Optical drives, USB port drivers, and much much more.

You're way better off Re-installing Windows XP anyday... than using "Universal Restore".

 

You can copy over by whatever means, CDs, network, floppies, etc any files you want. You can also make a Files and Folders backup of the old computer disk and restore the files in a suitable place and probably several other options as well. You can use whatever Microsoft tools you want to transfer your settings.

My rough procedure is on a mom and pop computer store machine for which I have specified the components (in other words, not a Dell, Compaq, HP, or brand-name boxes with a lot of pre-installed crappola):

Boot up the XP installation disk and partition and format the HD as desired. Sometimes I just do C and then use the Windows disk mgt tool to do the remainder later.

Do the XP install from CD.

Install TI and make my first base image. Store it on another partition on the HD and if you have a second HD store it there for additional safety. At this stage, I would ensure I can validate the image and also do a restore so I know it works on the new machine. Until you've restored you've only done half the check-out of your backup process.

Start configuring XP and get the network going. The network is very important to me because I keep all the install files for apps purchased on-line, app updates, serial number data for the apps, etc on another machine. I can map the required area as a drive and install from there.

Make images as desired along the way just in case. I keep all the images so I can go back if necessary. When I'm done I'll decide which ones to delete.

Just keep installing and tailoring your system making appropriate backups until done. If you can't remember how you had an app setup, you still have your old machine available unless it blew up.

Copy your data files, pictures, spreadsheets, mpegs, documents, etc onto your new machine if you keep them there.

Imaging programs like TI deal with the partition as the smallest unit of data. Do yourself a favor and setup a partition for your OS and apps, and another for the data files you create yourself. These are the files that you cannot buy, beg or borrow if you lose them. By keeping them out of C you can blow away C for any reason without worrying about losing these data files.

While I install my apps on C (since they write stuff to the registry and possibly folders on C anyway), I do install large games like Flight Simulator etc to another partition. These files rarely if ever change, and I can therefore back them up only when I make a change. This also means I can backup and restore C much more quickly if necessary. I will make a backup of C when I am testing software and then restore it back to exactly it was before the test by using the TI image.