F11 no longer starts Recovery Manager

Acronis TrueImage v11.0 build 8101
Windows XP Pro SP-3

I used to be able to reboot the host and hit F11 to run the Recovery Manager to perform a restore of the OS partition. That doesn't work anymore. When I reboot and hit F11 when prompted, I get a menu choice to boot normally or load the Recovery Manager. I choose the Recover Manager. The screen blanks and displays "Loading Acronis Recovery Manager ...". In a few seconds, the screen refreshes with the Acronis logo in the upper left corner of the screen and with a "Loading" text string under it. And there it hangs. The Recovery Manager never loads.

This used to work before. It also was working long after I applied Service Pack 3 to Windows XP Pro. I tried reinstalling the Recover Manager but that didn't help. I uninstalled TI and then downloaded the latest version and installed it. I used it to install the Recovery Manager, uninstall it, and then reinstall it again. That was in case an install was only partial because of seeing the Recovery Manager already installed. I wanted to force a new install of the Recovery Manager. When I rebooted, hit F11, selected Recovery Manager, it hung at the Acronis logo screen again. I cannot get TI v11 to now load its boot-time Recovery Manager which worked before.

My hardware setup is one 160GB IDE drive on an IDE port on the motherboard and a 120GB SATA drive on a SATA port on the motherboard. The OS partition is on the SATA drive so I have the BIOS configured to boot from the SATA drive. The IDE drive is all for the Secure Zone so it has just one partition and only used by TI. The SATA (boot) disk has 2 partitions: the 1st partition is for OS, apps, and data and the 2nd partition is for data files not to be included in backups, like OS images for virtual machines, .iso files of CDs, and immediately accessible backups of a few programs so I don't need to use TI, and also a Download folder where I save downloads for programs that I install on my host. So I have:

IDE disk: 1 partition (primary, entire disk, Acronis Secure Zone)
SATA disk: 2 partitions - primary (boot) for OS, apps, & data; logical for non-backed up data files.

Since this all is outside the OS, nothing in the OS would be affecting Recovery Manager from not loading. The BIOS boots using the SATA drive. The Recovery Manager would have to be installed in the MBR bootstrap area of the SATA drive for it to become the bootstrap loader.

I might be able to boot using the install CD but, one, I hear there are sometimes problems doing it that way and, two, I'd rather not have to go hunting for the install CD and would prefer to use the Recovery Manager that usurps the bootstrap loader in the boot disk's MBR.

 

I think your Recovery Manager has goten wonky.

I'd try removing the Recovery Manager using ATI. Then reboot and run the ATI install; it should offer to do a repair, let it do the repair, jsut to make sure none of ATI's files are crrupted.

Then either:

skip using the Recovery Manager and do restores for CD, which many folks have found more reliable that the Recovery Manager or

try creating the Recovery Manager fresh

 

I did replace the Recovery Manager bootstrap program. I uninstalled it and then reinstalled it. That didn't work.

I'm wondering if the Recovery Manager occupies both the 446-byte bootstrap area of the MBR along with perhaps a portion of it inside the hidden partition for the Secure Zone. If the Secure Zone has gotten corrupted then it might explain why the Recovery Manager starts but then hangs. However, I can still save backups to the Secure Zone and obviously it has all my old backups there. So I don't want to blow away the entire partition and recreate the Secure Zone which would lose all my old backups.