Won't Boot After Install Question RAID 1

I installed a copy of Acronis on my computer after a fresh install of Vista and several applications. When I attempted to reboot, the system would get to the Windows green progress bar, then I would get the Vista Logo Splash Screen then the screen went black. There was a LOT of disk activity, but it never booted. I am an MCSE and a heavy computer user. I could not boot into safemode either. Safemode would stop at the same point every time (I wish I could recall where, but I don't). I found several posts online of other people experiencing the same issue, and they found a registry edit that worked for many of them, but not me. I finally had to give up and start over again, reinstalling Vista and all of the applications.

Sorry for the long intro to my question, but I am very concerned about reinstalling Acronis. I now have ALL of my applications installed, Acronis would be the last one. I would like to clone my C drive so that I won't have to go through all of this again should my system fail.

I am using two hard drives in a Asus motherboard, hardware RAID 1 mirror that are split into two partitions (volumes), a C: drive for the OS and Applications and a D: drive for data.

In defense of Acronis, I don't think the version I installed was the newest, but it was a pretty new version.

So, my question is two fold -
First, Should Acronis work on a system like mine with two hard RAID drives in a RAID 1 Mirror, split into two volumes (C & D) running Vista with ALL of the Microsoft updates?

Second, Are there any known issues with the lastest version of Acronis and Vista causing the symptoms I describe above.

I really Like Acronis, and have used it many times in the past, but the thought of having the reinstall everything all over again is scary and VERY time consuming.

Sorry for the super long post, but I want to backup without trouble.

Thanks for your quick answer.

Paul

 

ANYONE? Re: Won't Boot After Install Question RAID 1

Hasn't anyone tried Acronis in a RAID setup?

 

I hope you mean you want to make a backup image of your boot drive and not to clone it. A clone uses a second drive to make one copy of the original. An image is a compressed copy of the drive, and you can store several backups on the second drive. That's much more useful and a lot easier.

So, you should make an image of the RAID array (both partitions, the whole thing) to an external hard drive large enough to hold several backups.

You can get the latest build of whatever version you have by registering your software on the Acronis web site.

Of course it should. However, you need to find out if it actually does. I'm not being funny, that is what you need to know since you had one bad experience that raises questions about whether the version you tried is compatible with your hardware.

Not in any useful way. There are lots of odd cases, but no pattern that woud be helpful

To say the least.

What you can do without risking anything is to boot your computer from the TI Rescue CD and attempt to make a full image backup from the CD. The first question is whether you can see your RAID array. Be sure that the boot drive has a name (Boot, System, Vista, George, etc.) and also the target drive. As long as you can see the drives, go ahead and make a backup of the entire RAID array (check the box next to the drive not just the C: parttion). Unless you select the entire drive, there is no guarantee that a restore will be bootable without doing a Vista repair.

If you can't see the drive, the version of TI that you have is too old to backup and restore your system. You need to upgrade.

You can install the TI 2009 Trial version and create a TI 2009 Rescue CD. You can do this on any computer.

Test your system with the 2009 Rescue CD to see if all the drives are visible. The Trial Rescue CD will not make a backup (that would be giving the product away), but it can restore a backup made with TI 2009 or earlier version of TI. If everything is good, then buy the new version.

Make a full backup from a TI Rescue CD BEFORE you install any version of True Image on your computer. That way, you can always get back to where you are now by doing the restore from the Rescue CD. With that backup made and validated, you can safely try installing TI again on your system.

With luck, it will turn out that your first experience was just an unfortunate glitch that isn't repeated.

Let us know how the story turns out.