Off to a bad start with ShadowProtect - PLEASE HELP

Well, I tried to do my first restore of my OS with ShadowProtect and I have a problem. During the reboot phase I get a message as follows

Windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt:

<windows root>system 32\hal.dll.

Please re-install a copy of the above file

Any help with this problem will be most appreciated.

 

I am pleased (and relieved) to report that I tried restoring again and this time it worked.

The first time I tried I had selected to not enable(?) networking and I selected to use the images MBR. The 2nd time I allowed networking to be enabled(?) and I selected to load Windows MBR.

I guess I did the wrong thing the first time around----or should the first selections not have made a difference?

 

Thats odd since I restored the same image, or are you saying a 2nd attempt, not a 2nd snapshot?

Oh, by the way, I am also on XP.

 

bgoodman4,

Were you restoring to the same or a new HD? Do you have several partitions on that HD? Is your WinXP the first primary partition in your partition table?

The error messages usually refers to "an error when boot.ini on the active partition is pointing to a non bootable partition."

 

bgoodman4-

Are you also running Rollback RX on this same computer? (I think you've posted in the past about RB.)

According to other posts here, RB and SP don't work well together - I was considering such an arrangement and others advised against it.

 

I have my PC set up with 3 drives (thats 3 drives, not 3 partitions and no drives are partitioned), the OS (C drive, a Data drive and a Back-up drive. I was restoring the C: drive to the C: drive. Basically just reverting the drive to an earlier state. The purpose was to make sure I could do so as I am new to SP and it was suggested elsewhere on the forum that I test the recovery media. --- scared the begeebers out of me when the system would not boot the first time.

PS: I am grateful to whoever it was that recommended I name the drives as the drive letters during the recovery operation were messed up. Could have been unpleasant if I had tried to restore to the wrong drive becausee of this.

 

Understood, thanks

 

No, I have Rx on my Tablet PC and SP on my desktop. For portable PCs I figurered there was no point to SP as it would have to save images to the same drive. I would love it if the 2 programs would work nicely together. I did a rollback today (tested some software) which I have done numerous times but having just done the revert on the desktop the time differences were very much in my mind. SP was faster than any imaging program I have used (8 min to do the 2nd restore - about 18 min total if you count both attempts) and Rx was simply a normal Rx boot.

It has been suggested that if you are willing to do only sector by sector images you can use both programs together but I do not want to do S by S images and figured better safe than sorry any way.

 

I do not have a lot of experience with SP, but I know for a fact that what you are doing above is not possible. You can restore from one drive to another or from one partition to another but you cant do restore from the same drive to the same drive or from the same partition to the same partition. Perhaps that is what caused the error in your case.

Or did you mistype? Perhaps you meant to say from your backup drive to your C: drive?

 

Hi bgoodman,

I've seen error messages before with image restores, especialy using ATI, but not that particular one! Usually they regard bootup errors with the MBR, missing bootmgr or similar. I'm wondering if, alternatively, it could have been fixed by booting off your XP disk and choosing the "Repair" option? I'm just curious what others, maybe Peter, think? The important thing, after all, is you had a happy ending

 

It was a boot.ini error but I don't know why it happened. Easy to fix if it happens again.

http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/kb/article.php?id=130

It can happen occasionally when installing WinXP due to a bug in the install routine.

 

Sorry, the image was from the C: drive and back to the same drive. Not a new or different drive. So yes, from the backup drive to the C: drive.

 

Easy for you maybe,,,,,thanks for the link though I hope I never have to do this,,,,its a couple of steps above my knowledge and comfort level,,,,,,big steps.

 

There are numerous ways to edit boot.ini of a non booting WinXP but I think the easiest is...

http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/kb/article.php?id=234

Out of interest have a look at your boot.ini by right clicking My Computer, Properties, Advanced tab, Startup and Recovery Settings, click Edit and there it is.

This link explains the partition numbering. Your W should be 1

http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/kb/article.php?id=159

 

Thanks for that info... I didn't realize that it is suggested NOT to use both Rollback RX and ShadowProtect ont he same machine.

I had planned to do just that. But I haven't purchased ShadowProtect yet.

I'll have to search the forum to see exactly why not and may ( or may not) happen.

 

bgoodman4,

It is confusing, for everyone I'm afraid. Drive letters exist in the mind of the booted OS. There is no C: drive when the computer is turned off. Boot from a DOS CD and the CD will be C: drive. Boot from a WinPE CD and sometime a data drive will be the C: drive. Boot from a Linux CD and there is no C: drive.

It is better to use a term like HD(0), partition 1 as this isn't ambiguous.

You have

HD(0), P1
HD(1), P1
HD(2), P1

 

The reason is that imaging programs other than RollBacks companion imager do not understand Rx and so when you do a restore with an image that includes Rx the MBR will get messed up (at least thats what I understand is the situation). This can be repaired using an install disk for the OS or using a program like MBRwizard. Personally I prefer to stay away from anything that might complicate things so I am firmly in the camp of those who say no to using Rx and 3rd party imageing programs.

That said what I have been doing on my Tablet PC is as follows - For day to day I am using Rx. Once a week I image using Rxs companion imaging program. Once a month I uninstall Rx, defrag the PC and do whatever other maintenance I feel nec, and then image with Acronis TI 10 (I have a copy that I was using before I bought Rx or SP so I figured I may as well use it). This way if there is a problem I can simply rollback using Rx. If its a serious problem that I cannot fix with a simple rollback (fried drive for example) I have the Rx companion images which I can use to reinstall everything onto a new drive once its installed in the PC. In the event that the image fails for some reason I have my TI image which I can use to at least get most of my stuff back to state. I also back up critical files to a remote site on the net (iDrive) as they are created. With this regime I feel pretty secure.

SP seems to be the gold standard, very fast images and restores (apx 8 min to restore my 25 gig OS drive), and an excellent set of features. Its just overkill for a portable PC where you would of necessity have to backup to a partition on the same drive. Not something I would feel safe doing as a lost PC or fried drive means goodbye to the data etc.

On my desktop its a whole different matter. There it makes sense to go with SP. I have 3 drives (the OS is on C:, Data on D:, and backups on E. Incremental are very small (you can do them as frequently as every 15 min and a typical incremental is under a meg) and very fast. Backups (both incremental and full can occur while you are working and if it were not for the notification that one had just been done I would not be aware of anything happening. Etc etc.

Both real nice programs, it would be nice if they were more compatible but.....

You are also aware of the do not do with Rx installed (I hope), as well as the routine you need to follow to keep the PC running smoothly when you have Rx installed. Nothing too onerous but if you don't follow the guidelines problems are much more likely to crop up.

 

Yes, thanks for clarifying for me, you are 100% correct.

guess I was just lucky,,,,first time restoring and bang,,,it really did get my attention though,,,,woke me right up I can tell you.

 

Yes, I am glad I named my drives, C: is called OS, D: is called Data, and E: is called Backup. Easy to keep track this way. My only previous experience with imaging software that I actually had to use was Acronis TI and I never had to do anything but tell the program which image I wanted to restore. Beyond that I had little to no involvement in the process.

 

Thanks for this, I will take a look and hopefully learn some more about the inner workings of PCs. I have learned so much from this forum and the folks on it. Mind you the more I learn the more I realize I don't know.

EDIT: took a look at your links and must admit my blood ran cold. Am absolutely clueless about this stuff. Its like trying to read a book on quantum physics if you are a lay person, none of the terms mean anything to me and the text does not explain what they are. The following might as well have come from a QP text book as far as I am concerned

Actually this was the point at which I got lost

I havn't got a clue. As I said above, I hope I never need to get into this stuff. I really would be at a loss.

 

That reminds me of the Ancient Mariner...

However I don't think Coleridge was referring to the boot.ini.