Boot looping

Well, I followed Menorcaman' advice in this thread https://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?p=365582

and discovered that I can't maintain a stable boot from CD or floppy! Here's what happens:

1. It loads initially and I get the splash screen.

2. Then the black screen with 'loading please wait . . . '

3. The the graphical image appears

4. But after a few seconds the boot starts over if I don't move my mouse and immediately if I do.

I tried:

1. the quiet apci=off noapic with both the CD and floppy and it didn't make any difference.

2. Then I remembered that I had disabled the startup items but reenabling them made no difference.

3. I seem to be able to recover from within Windows but if I have to do it from boot I'm screwed.

System is Win ME 20GB (single partition) with an USB2 30 GB external (2 partitions) all basic IDE drives.

Using TI8 build 786. Please don't suggest I download the latest build because on 28k dialup that's not going to happen anytime soon.

FWIW, I am able to boot into Knoppix without a problem.

Any suggestions?

 

I don't want to seem too impatient but anyone?

 

Hello earther,

Thank you for choosing Acronis True Image (http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/products/trueimage/).

Please accept our apologies for your inconvenience.

Since each new build of Acronis software includes new fixes we cannot support older builds and the only thing that can be recommended is to download the latest one and try using it. If the problem remains and "acpi=off noapic" workaround still doesn't help please create the sysinfo.txt file and send to support@acronis.com (please see https://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?t=55317 for details).

Thank you.
--
Ilya Toytman

 

Good news to report. I was finally able to maintain a stable boot.

First off, I bit the bullet and downloaded the latest build. OMG, it took TWO HOURS on 28k.

Then I realized that when I made the previous problem rescue disks (with build 786), I did not have my external hard drive turned on. Hmmm, I thought . .. maybe the rescue disk needed that info to write the boot disk correctly. Could that have been the problem in and of itself? If this is obvious please keep in mind that hardware is not my forte.

Anyway, I can now boot into graphical interface and all my drives and images are where they should be. I went through the process up until 'verify image' and backed off . . . I didn't want to have it start a restore and I wasn't sure whether the process could be canceled at that point.

Could someone please tell me if I can complete an image verification at boot and still exit without rewriting data?

Thanks for all your help and encouraging me to be more courageous in dealing with hardware and boot/BIOS environments. It's been quite a learning experience but I think I've got a handle on it now.

earther

 

Boot using the rescue cd..When menu comes up, in the left pane is the option
to check your image(s)..I create my images using the rescue cd and then verify the images immediately afterwards..My backup media is a USB external
60gb hard drive..

 

Ah, your comment just turned on another light! Next back up and verification I will do from the rescue CD. To date I have been doing it from within windows. I'm planning to do that later tonight and will report back. Thanks!

 

Another success story. I created the image to external USB via the rescue CD and then did an immediate verification. No errors! After all I've read on this forum about corrupted images, I am very thankful. I feel confident now that if need arises, I will be able to get things up and running again.

 

Hello earther,

Glad to hear Acronis True Image is working fne for you now.

Please note that Acronis Bootable CD is not hardware-specific. It means that averyone who has got Acronis Bootable CD created with 796 build has got absolutely the same CD.

As for the how far you can go in the experimenting with Acronis software without any risk to rewrite data. Please note that nothing actually happens until you press the "Proceed" button. This is the rule and is never violated by our software.

Thank you.
--
Ilya Toytman