What to do when you lost the MBR

I am new with True Image, and had a problem testing restore untill I was told to disable GoBack. Now everything works. I got to thinking, what if my 'C' drive goes bad, head crash, etc., where the system cannot read the MBR. I have my backup on a second disk drive. Will I be able to restore if the should happen. Thanks.

 

Hi
If you have a TI backup then you have everything that is on the disk, including the MBR.
HTH
John

 

That is true as long as the image backup was made with B3567. On previous builds the MBR was included only if the whole disk was imaged. This is a good reason for moving to B3567 if you haven't.

For MBRs that are plain XP MBRs, that is another piece of software didn't modify it (GoBack may be in that category but I don't know), you can restore the MBR with the XP installation disk recovery console FIXMBR command or even a W95/98 recovery disk's FDISK /MBR command.

 

I just happen to have been looking at a system that has GoBack on it last week. The system wouldn't boot. In looking at some forums on GoBack, it seems that about 1 out of 100 people are happy with it. . The owner of the laptop is still waiting for a file from the GB people that will uninstall it.

If you got your system running, take my advice - I'm not going to use it anyway, LOL, - do not put GB back on it. Even True Image is better than GB.

 

Surely every build will include the MBR if a whole drive is imaged? I don't think we are talking about just file & folder back up here.
John

 

Files and Folders backup being out of question, every whole disk image will indeed include the MBR. But build 3567 went one step further: now the MBR is included in a single partition image as well, and restored on user's request.

 

I am using B3567. I know that GoBack does something with the MBR, but I think I can restore the MBR with the CD that I downloaded from the Acronis site. I made a bootable CD that will fix the MBR, at least thats the information that was given to me. Am I correct to assume this?

 

If it's MBAUTOWRITE then AFAIK it only restores a normal XP MBR which would not contain GOBACK modifications.

 

I am one of those "1 out of 100" It has saved me many times. GoBack and TI serve different purposes. Neither is a substitute for the other.

 

I believe I use TI to my satisfaction as a substitute for GoBack. It just requires making a backup at the appropriate times. Granted, GoBack is faster if the intention is just to put the system back to where it was earlier.

GoBack however is not a substitute for an imaging program.

 

And that is why I use both.

 

I'm afraid the discussion has drifted away from your question.

So, yes, if you ever have to replace the system drive, you will be able to restore the image stored on the second drive to the new system drive replacement.

To make the new drive bootable, the image should contain the MBR too. To achieve that, with previous builds you had to image the entire system disk, i.e. you had to tick the Disk1 box while creating the image and again while restoring it.

With the new build 3567, the MBR is included in the image even if you backup a single partition from the system drive. Upon restoration, the MBR appears as an additional option that can be selected either on it's own or within the Disk1 selection.