About the Secure Zone

How can I tell which drive the Secure Zone has allocated? I'm not sure which drive I designated and can't figure it out from observing the various drive capacities in Explorer. This is possibly because Windows doesn't see the Secure Zone and apparently doesn't know how large a drive really is if it contains the SZ.

/imagefurf

 

Administrative Tools, Computer Management, Disk Management.
It will show up as ACRONIS SZ.

 

Right. OK, next question. It's on Disk 1. Which means it's on the boot drive. Can I move it to Disk 2 in case Disk 1 goes down for the count?

 

Open up your True Image software, and go to the Manage Secure Zone option. Delete the current one , which will more than likely demand a reboot, then go back in and create the secure zone again, this time choosing your desired location of Disk 2.


Now if you can transfer over the files that are currently in your secure zone....I really don't know.

 

"Now if you can transfer over the files that are currently in your secure zone....I really don't know."
Nope. And when you delete the current ASZ, all the backup images will go with it.

 

Thanks for all the quick replies. Ok, though I've had TI for many months I only created the SZ last week [and zombie that I am promptly forgot what disk I selected]. When I do periodic imaging and incrementing, I create two images [or increments], one each on a USB external drive and on Disk 2. So when I created the SZ I suppose it created a new set in the Zone on Disk 1.

Because to test it immediately after creating it, I pressed the F11 key and up came my desktop as usual. I couldn't tell whether it was somehow retrieving the just created images and restoring them to Disk 1 and Disk 2... or somehow Acronis knew that it didn't need to.... because there was virtually no delay in the boot-up. I assume that if the SZ Manager had to completely restore two Hard Drives, it would take a bit more time.

So what was happening, anybody?

 

"I pressed the F11 key"
That only works if you also activated the Startup Recovery Manager. Which, but the way, will alter your MBR.
If you have external drives to image to, I would not bother with the ASZ.

 

Thanks Weaz.

Oh? I haven't even looked at the SRM. Are you saying that even though I'm prompted in the boot process to optionally Press F11, it's meaningless?

Yea, I think that's why I never bothered about it until recently. I was on the board here in 2004 and others were saying the same thing. I have a second internal IDE HD and one USB external. Since the BIOS sees the internal I think I'm pretty firm on how Acronis could recover from that. But what about the external? When the Recovery boot CD was created was there a way for it to load a driver for or otherwise see the USB drive? My system was bought in 2000.

 

Okay, to test the image I booted from the CD and it verified the image on Disk 2, the second internal HD.

It doesn't see the USB drive. Have I got it right that from the CD I can only restore from that drive and I need to be in Windows in order to restore from the USB drive?

 

Could be a Linux USB driver problem.
Was the drive plugged in and turned on before you booted?
You could do a search for BartPE. With the TI plug-in, this might solve the problem.

 

imagewurf,

Seems strange to me that F11 prompt appearing without the Startup Recovery Manager having been activated. Maybe you overlooked that the activation of SRM is the default option while creating SZ. But, again, it should work if it was indeed activated.

Anyway, if your external is not visible after booting from Rescue CD, it will most probably be invisible after booting from SRM as well. Some chipsets in the external enclosures are just incompatible with the Linux drivers provided. I had one of those and had to buy another enclosure. It works now.

Don't neglect to assign the space taken by SZ back to the original partition while deleting the old SZ instance, or you will have some unallocated space on your hand.

Edit: In the Linux environment the drives get different letters than in Windows. Have another look - your external may well be there, but carrying perhaps the letter B:

 

From you theWeaz

and from you bVolk

... but notice I said

So Linux is not in the picture for the moment [although I have another system standing by here on which I eventually want to install and learn Linux]. And following your advice theWeaz I just zapped the Secure Zone and thanks bVolk I reassigned the space back.

On the issue of seeing or not seeing a USB drive I can't see how Acronis is going to see it if the BIOS is not showing it. My USB drive happens not to be a true USB drive but an 80Gig Maxtor IDE using a bridge cable to my USB port. [One can save a few bucks: instead of buying a jazzy USB external drive, just bridge an extra IDE drive to one's USB port]. But it would be the same for any USB drive. The system has to be able to see and read the USB port before the OS is loaded in order for the Acronis CD to see it.

I think I might have read somewhere that newer motherboards/BIOS can read USB connections. Dunno if that's a fact. But..... the Acronis CD looks like it might be loading a runtime kernel of Windows [what with the GUI screen and mouse driver??]. If this is true then I imagine it might be possible for Acronis to be able to load the Windows USB host controllers [and/or USB Human Interface Device]. That brings up the question....

Can Acronis 9.0's CD see a USB external HD?

 

The boot CDs are Linux.

 

Just to clarify a few points.
When you boot from the Acronis rescue CD you are in a Linux environment. Linux drivers are provided to see and work with a variety of USB devices including, most importantly, external USB HDs. As you are using a different USB hook up to your external HD my guess is that the CD does not contain the necessary driver for you ext.HD.
Possible solutions. Get a suitable driver down load from Support. Build a Bart PE CD with Acronis plugin, this will use Windows drivers when booted from the CD. Purchase an enclosure for your HD which is recognised by the Linux drivers provided on the recovery CD.
BTW even if you start within Windows to do a restore of your system drive you will actually have to re-boot into the Acronis/Linux environment.

pilot

 

Thanks Xpilot. That's why I was imaging twice, once to the internal HD and once to the external. I notice that the second image, if done immediately after the first, takes much less time to build.

Now what's

 

Oops, cancel that BART PE CD inquiry, Xpilot, I just found the explanation on the website. /ifurf

 

Hello imagefurf,

Thank you for choosing Acronis Disk Backup Software.

Please make sure that you use the latest build (3633) of Acronis True Image 9.0 Home which is available at: http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/support/updates/

Yes, Acronis True Image bootable rescue media supports USB external hard drives in rescue mode.

Please find the detailed information about Acronis True Image 9.0 Home in the respective User's Guide.

Please create the bootable rescue media with the latest build and see whether your USB drive is visible in rescue mode or not.

If the problem persists, please boot your computer from the Acronis True Image rescue disc and press F11 key when the selection screen appears. After you get the "Linux kernel command line" prompt, please modify it in the following way:

quiet acpi=off noapic, click on the OK button and choose "Full Version".

If that does not help, please create Acronis Report and Linux system information (sysinfo.txt) as it is described in Acronis Help Post.

Please create an account, then log in and submit a request for technical support. Attach all the collected files and information to your request along with the step-by-step description of the actions taken before the problem appears and the link to this thread. We will investigate the problem and try to provide you with the solution.

Thank you.
--
Tatyana Tsyngaeva

 

Tatyana:

What a bummer! I downloaded TI Home 9.0 and installed the complete package in Win98SE. It installed without a problem, but now Acronis doesn't load when I click the desktop icon or use the Programs folder; it shows in the Close Program dialog but that's all. If I click the icon or program five times, there will be five copies in the Close Program. Hello?

And why is there no UNinstaller?

Nor is there a click to register it [it says to register it but isn't it auto-registered as a downloaded upgrade??]

I see there are two identical copies of the Acronis archive explorer in the device manager. Is there supposed to be two?

I've rebooted twice and still it doesn't load [well the kernel must load as it's in the Close Program window].

To make me doubly sorry I upgraded, three days ago my boot HD failed and 8.0 bailed me out handsomely, restoring the image to a new HD. But now I can't even get 9.0 to do anything. What next? /imagefurf

 

Hello imagefurf,

Thank you for choosing Acronis Disk Backup Software.

Please accept our apologies for the delay with the response.

Please note that the issue with Acronis True Image (builds 3625 and higher) not launching under Windows 98/ME is already known and will be fixed in the next build of a particular product. Please accept our apologies for the current inconvenience.

As you have already contacted Acronis Support and if you want to temporarily obtain an older build of Acronis True Image 9.0 which works fine under Windows 98/ME then please feel free to reply to the e-mail you received from Acronis Support. Provide a brief description of the issue in your request along with the information about your purchase of Acronis software (order number, e-mail, where did you purchase our product, copy of invoice, scan copy of receipt, your order confirmation letter, etc.) and the link to this thread.

In order to completely uninstall Acronis True Image 9.0, please follow the instructions in the previous post.

Please note also that we recommend you to uninstall any previously installed build/version by following Start -> Settings -> Control Panel -> Add or Remove Programs -> Acronis True Image, prior to installing Acronis True Image 9.0 Home.

I'm afraid that your copy of Acronis True Image 9.0 Upgrade is not registered at our web-site.

Please register it at https://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/my/products/registration/
After product registration you will be able to download build 3567 of Acronis True Image 9.0 at http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/support/updates/ which works with Windows 98 without any problems by yourself.

Thank you.
--
Tatyana Tsyngaeva

 

Ok Tatyana:

I registered my 9.0 version but I doubt I'm going to use 9.0 anytime soon. I removed it entirely and reinstalled 8.0 and at least I have two new images made of my new Maxtor 80Gig MAster boot drive.

I'm on dialup and I'm worn out downloading 9.0. It takes 3 hours and I've done it twice for a total of over six hours. How about shipping a CD? The stats say that most online users are still like me: still on dialup.

Anyway, SUPPORT then emails me the following:

So I spend 3 hours downloading Build 3602. It installs routinely, and guess what, it doesn't load either [although like the first build, it appears in the Close Program window]. Now what! Soooo....

SUPPORT sends me another link as follows:

Etc.

So I click to the zip file and I get the following:

You can try the link as I've provided it here. I used the Acronis site search utility to check for xcsc.zip and even checksum but nothing came up on the site.

At this point I'm not as frazzled since I have 8.0 back up and running and have done two full images of my new hard drive, one internal and one external. But do you blame me for not wanting to spend another 3 hours downloading another build of 9.0? And I haven't yet heard back from SUPPORT on the File Not Found.

And to think everything was fine under 8.0. /imagefurf

 

Hello imagefurf,

We are very sorry for the delay with the response.

Could you please let us know your Acronis request # (e.g. [Acronis #123456]) which can be found in the subjects of the letters that you received from Acronis Support Team? We will look through the correspondence and see how the investigation of your issue is going.

If you cannot provide us with your Acronis request # for some reason (e.g. you have deleted Acronis Support e-mails) then please send us a Private Message containing your e-mail address.

As for the non-working link you have been provided with, I believe it was done by mistake. At the moment, please feel free to use eXpress CheckSum Calculator to calculate the MD5 checksum of the downloaded installation file. Please accept our sincere apologies for the delay with the response.

Thank you.
--
Alexey Popov

 

Alexey:

The message no. is Acronis #611705

Today Acronis sent me a link to build 3666 but I'm just not going to risk another 3 hours downloading it via dialup. So I requested a CD. I think you guys could do me that favor after the six hours I have spent downloading it twice and neither download worked. ifurf

 

Hello imagefurf,

Thank you for choosing Acronis Disk Backup Software.

Please accept our sincere apologies for the delay with the response.

Actually, there is absolutely no need for you to order the CD containing build 3666 installation file. I've sent you the 100% working download link for the latest build (3666) of Acronis True Image 9.0 Home. This build was tested on Windows 98 and Windows ME and runs correctly from within both these operating systems. If you encounter a problem running the latest build (3666) of Acronis True Image 9.0 Home from within Windows 98 then please inform Artem about this fact. He will investigate the problem and try to provide you with the solution as soon as possible. If you want to order the CD anyway, please follow the instructions Artem has provided you with.

Thank you.
--
Alexey Popov

 

Alexey:
You probably got my email saying how your last emailed link [I took the 3 hr. plunge and downloaded it] did the trick. I was actually surprised to see the Rescue CD find my bridged IDE/USB drive. There's a goshawful speed difference in how the Rescue CD finds and verifies the images on the internal drive [5 minutes or less] and on the USB drive [1 hr 50 min]. Now 9.0 3666 does not have this speed problem with the IDE/USB drive if it running under Windows. I'm trying to figure out why the difference and am inclined to conclude that 9.0 is using the Windows driver and maybe the Boot CD only has some sort of USB generic driver maybe?

Is there a way to add specific HD drivers to the Boot CD? /ifurf.

 

Hello imagefurf,

Thank you for choosing Acronis Disk Backup Software.

Please accept our apologies for the delay with the response.

As you are already in touch with Artem from Acronis Support Team, I would like to answer only your last question:

Acronis True Image doesn't allow to add hard drive drivers to the Full version of Acronis True Image bootable rescue media. However, you can use BartPE plug-in for it.

BartPE (Bart’s Preinstalled Environment) is software that allows you to boot into Windows-like environment from a CD. The main advantage is that it uses Windows drivers and has Windows-like graphical user interface. It is possible to add any storage drivers at startup in the same manner as when installing Windows on the hard drive (by pressing F6 and inserting diskette with drivers).

In addition, applications and can be installed into the BartPE environment at boot-up using a BartPE plug-in. For additional detailed information on BartPE please refer to http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/

Acronis True Image plug-in for BartPE is available in every edition of Acronis True Image 9. To get the plug-in you need to use the Custom type of the installation and then choose the plug-in for BartPE to be installed.

To create BartPE CD with the Acronis True Image plug-in please follow the instructions below:

- Download the PE builder and install it;
- Go to the Acronis True Image installation folder (the default folder is C:\Program Files\Acronis) and rename the BartPE folder to Acronis. Copy this folder into the Plugin folder in the Bart PE builder installation directory (the default directory is C:\pebuilder3110a or a similar one);
- Run the PE builder, put in the necessary paths (the online help is available at http://nu2.nu/pebuilder/help/, and click the Plugins button;

Make sure you have the Acronis True Image plug-in enabled on the Plugins screen.

- Close the Plugins window and click the Build button to start the building process. If you want the image to be burned to CD, please check the Burn to CD option and choose the appropriate burner in the Device menu;
- After the image is created, burn it to CD or DVD (this is of course, if you did not check the Burn to CD option at the previous step).

Adding drivers

BartPE supports adding two types of drivers: storage drivers and network drivers. For instructions on how to add drivers please refer to http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/help/english/drivers.htm

There is also an option to add storage drivers (for RAID or SCSI devices) during BartPE boot-up (by pressing F6 and pointing to the diskette with the drivers).
Some common storage drivers are available here: http://nu2.nu/pebuilder/drivers/.

Thank you.
--
Tatyana Tsyngaeva