Need guidance creating image

I'm using ATI 9.0.3633 and Acronis Disk Director. I've formatted my C: drive into two partitions, one with my OS (C: partition) the other with Data (F: partition)

http://img165.imageshack.us/img165/7229/screenshot014pq6.jpg

I'm confused now as to how to create a bootable image of my OS without overwriting my Data.

If I tick the box next to C: partition then the image will be of my OS. Is Track 0 containing the MBR then not imaged?

If I tick the box next to Disk 1, then both C: partition and F: partition are automatically ticked off and my Data is overwritten, something I don't want to do.

How best to proceed?

 

"If I tick the box next to Disk 1, then both C: partition and F: partition are automatically ticked off and my Data is overwritten, something I don't want to do."

I'm confused. How can selecting to backup the F: partition write over the data?

 

Sorry for being unclear. What I meant to say was that ticking the box next to Disk 1, resulting in both C: partition and F: partition being automatically ticked off, then on retoration of Disk 1 my Data would be overwritten.

I just created an image with the box next to Disk 1 being ticked off. On restoration this is what I get:

http://img157.imageshack.us/img157/170/screenshot015wa0.jpg

So I guess the way to do it is to tick off only C: partition and restore, and subsequently tick off only MBR and Track 0 and restore. That seems the only way of restoring both the OS and the MBR without overwriting the Data partition. I can't tick of both the C: partition and the MBR & Track 0 simultaneously.

Edit:

This last paragraph is wrong. What I should do is to tick off the C: partition in the restoration process. Further on in the restoration process you are asked if you want to add another partition. That is when I should tick off the MBR & Track 0 partition.

 

I think you are correct. Only restore what you want from the image.
I don't know what it is, but those pics are loading painfully slow. So much so that the second one is still not visible.

 

The reason the screenshots are not showing up properly is that I'm in the process of moving My Documents from my C: partition to my Data partition. I guess ImageShack is having poblems with that. My screenshots were stored in My Documents.

 

since you changed the partition info on your drive you may have to tick the MBR to be able to boot.

the below may help if a failure occurs


Quote:
Please boot up from the Windows Bootable CD, then go to the Recovery Console (the first Repair option you come to).

From the command prompt please type the command in the following sequence:

FIXMBR C:
FIXBOOT C:
COPY CDDrive:\I386\NTLDR C:\
COPY CDDrive:\I386|NTDETECT.COM C:\
BOOTCFG /rebuild

After that, please reboot your computer.

 

Slightly off-topic, but worth mentioning, I think.

The screenshot in post #1 shows partions H: and I: being set as Active too. As far as I know, only the partition holding the OS should be Active.

EDIT: See Menorcaman's post #12.

 

Hi bVolk.. Do you have any idea how to change this?

 

the first screen shot shows you are creating a backup of C: [C: marked as the active partition], BUT there are also 2 other partitiond marked as active, is that what you see in administrative tools > disk managment [other partitions as active] ? or is this what acronis see's !

 

Both partitions H: and I: are flagged as active in Disk Management.

 

was the drives connected when you loaded windows, as i am aware only C: partition can be marked as active, and windows might have loaded files to those partitions on OS loadup.

in acronis my other partitions are not marked as active

 

Hi bVolk,

I believe these are not partitions. H: and I: are shown as Disk 2 and Disk 3 respectively, therefore I assume dld has three physical drives in his computer. In which case, all three can be "Primary" and "Active".

Regards

 

Hello Menorcaman,

Yes, three physical drives. That's what I assumed too. But it was my understanding that the rule applies across multiple physical drives (on a single-boot computer) as well. As it turns out, it's a "per physical drive" restriction only.

Thanks for the correction, one never ends learning (and should not).

 

use disk managment and mark another drive active and reboot, let me know how it turns out, i think windows will crash!

dld if the size of the target image partition has been changed you will be allowed to set the new size on the next screen, also select the mbr with it.

 

I think I'll go by Menorcaman's response and leave well enough alone. I know why that H: drive is flagged as active. That H: drive a few days ago was my cloned C: drive. When I saw that my new slave drive was defective I realized I had to wipe out that cloned C: drive. I used the Acronis Disk Director Rescue Disk to format the cloned C: drive. Of course it kept the active flag. I should have removed the C: cloned partition and repartitioned the drive.
As for the I: drive which is my USB2 external drive I don't know why I partitioned it as active.

 

hope you got it to work dld,

 

Hi dld,

You should have absolutely no problem leaving your three drives as they are. As you can see from the screenshot below, my two internal drives and an external USB drive are all reported as Primary/Active and have never, ever affected the functionality of my system.

Regards

 

Please also note that Menorcaman has named his drives sensibly so that regardless of which system or backup is looking at his drives it matters not what drive letters are assigned. They can still be identified by their names.

 

Hello Menorcaman,

Talking about learning ... please do help me clear another doctrine that may have become obsolete nowadays (it's being done in medicine every day ).

I've heard several times that the computer runs faster if the page-file is placed on a non-system internal disk, if available. So, I created it on my second internal drive, while you have it on Disk 1. An unnecessary solicitude from my side?

 

Ever since I got "out of memory" messages when using Photoshop I set up a Photoshop scratch partition on an internal slave drive. While doing this I also set up the Windows page file on another partition on the slave drive.
Since then I have not had any out of memory complaints and I like to think that things run more quickly than before though I have no benchmarks to prove it.
One benefit is that when I run a defrag on my main drive there is no longer any unmoveable space and it defrags to a nice sea of blue. I also think that the need to defrag has receded but I have no evidence to back this up.

 

I believe that only if the drives are on different controllers (not a Slave/Master setup) will you see any improvement.

 

Hi there bVolk,

True in days gone by when the poor bandwidth (i.e. data transfer rate) of hard drive controllers needed to be taken into consideration. Now, with the advent of UltraDMA 133 and SATA, as far as I'm concerned it's no longer a significant factor (the disk rotational speed, access time and seek time have a far greater affect). So why did I move the Pagefile to a separate partition anyway? Because it reduces the amount of Pagefile fragmentation (Windows changes the size dynamically) and, as indicated by Xpilot, has the added benefit of reducing the time taken to defrag my main system partition.

Regards

 

Hi Xpilot, The Weaz and Manorcaman,

Thank you for your comments and experience shared.

Regarding page-file fragmentation: I'm avoiding that by having set the page-file to fixed (1.5*RAM) size. That, in theory, should speed things up too (by eliminating the need for Windows to permanently optimize the page-file size), but, again, it may not yield any appreciable advantage with modern fast processors.

I hope this discussion (though not strictly on-topic) has been of interest to some other members too and that dld has received the answers he was seeking when he started this thread.

 

I believe dld answered his original question via his own Edit in Post #3 but we then drifted off onto the subjects of Primary/Active partitions and Pagefile location . A little off topic as far as True Image support is concerned I agree, but interesting stuff nevertheless. Therefore, at the risk of upsetting our Moderators even further, here is some additional light (!!) reading to add some meat to the debate .

<Planning Your Partitions>
<Virtual Memory in Windows XP>

Regards

 

XPilot, and Menorcaman,

I turned off "Page file" on my C:/Drive, and then assigned it to my Internal F:/Drive. It worked out ok. I checked the Defrag, and noticed the Green had been moved to the F:/. As XPilot indicates, you have a continuous sea of Blue on the C:/.

I left it like this for awhile, but then decided to switch it back over. The transaction worked. "Page File" was put back on the C:/ Drive the way it was originally-- in the middle of the Drive.

Moments later, I decided to give my F:/ drive a name by naming it "Storage". But of course, it's best to actually Reformat the drive, and give it a Volume name in the process. When I tried to Format the F:/ drive, I got a message saying that "your drive is being used by another program". I couldn't Reformat it at all. After Rebooting several times, it still wouldn't allow me access to Reformat it. I even tried turning the F:/ drive OFF in the BIOS on boot up, and then turning it back ON during another Reboot, ...but it didn't work.
I finally had to use the Western Digital Diagnostics to "Write Zeros" back to the F:/ drive, and then Reformat it.

After this experience, I'm not so sure it's a good idea to assign the "Page File" to another HD guys. Here's why. When you assign the "Page File" to another Internal HD, you actually tie that Drive up with "Page File" writing.
I see a lot of problems developing IF you decide to Reinstall Windows XP. By default...Windows is going to assign the Page File back to the C:/ drive during Installation. That will leave an existing Page File on the F:/ that was used earlier.
How would you get around this? Do you Re-Assign the New "Page File" to the F:/ drive, and let it over write the existing one? (which I don't think is a good idea)
Or, would you delete the old Page File first, and then Re-Assign it?

I'm confused now, .....LOL!