Recovery fails when booting from cd

I installed Windows XP Pro and other software on my Toshiba notebook, removed the drive and connected it via a USB cable to my desktop and created in Acronis TI ver. 9 a full backup spanning multiple files of size 650 MB each (total of 9 files). Then, I copied these to 2 DVDs. I moved the drive back to my notebook, booted from the bootable Acronis cd and started the restore procedure by inserting DVD #2, which contains the last backup file. The restore failed after inserting DVD #1 with a message suggesting that the media might be corrupt. I tried again but chose to verify the image before restoring, and the same error was displayed. Then, on my desktop, I ran the verify image from the DVDs in TI ver. 9 running from within Windows XP, and the result was good. I recovered my notebook drive's system from the DVDs by connecting the drive to my desktop and running TI from Windows XP, and that worked fine. Then, I installed TrueImage on my notebook for testing purposes, ran the verify image from the DVDs from within Windows XP and they tested fine. This meant that there is nothing wrong with the notebook's DVD drive or with the media. I re-ran the system recovery from the DVDs by booting my notebook from the Acronis TI bootable disk. It failed again. I recreated a bootable CD on my desktop and re-ran the system recovery. Again, it failed. Any suggestions?

Thanks.

 

Do you have the latest build for ver 9? ... build 2323? Since the backup image fits on only two DVDs, re-create the image but let TI decide on the split size. It will split into two files - one that will just fill one dvd and the rest on the second dvd. If the restore still does not work, you may have to go for a hard drive in an external usb enclosure to hold the images. That's what works for me. You can still burn the images to DVD for additional insurance.

 

Thanks Chutsman for the reply.

I have a slightly older build of version 9. I will upgrade to the latest version soon. Afterwards, I will create a new bootable CD and try the recovery procedure from the 2 DVDs that I already have. If it fails then I will redo the backup by specifying a maximum file size to fit on a DVD (4.xx GB) as I choose to save these to a hard-drive. Then, I will copy these to DVDs and use the DVDs to restore the drive by booting from the new bootable CD. If this also fails, then I will assume that there is something buggy with the software as it runs from the bootable CD, unless the bootable CD only works as expected on the machine where it was created (). I know that the recovery works when I run the program from within Windows XP, but it would be a disappointment if it still fails when booting from a CD and running the recovery from DVDs. I will keep this thread up-to-date. Please feel free to make any suggestions or share your experience.

 

Hopefully you have your notebook and desktop networked (preferrably by cat5). Try your imaging and restores over a network folder.
I make all my images 650mb with no problems.
Linux in general (boot cd), is picky about dvd drives, because the notebook worked well in windows doesn't mean it will with the boot cd.

I have cd burners, dvd burners in laptops and desktops and preferr to always do the network method. Flawless for me.

Sorry, just saw you used usb to connect the two boxes. Suggest getting a router for many reasons in addition to imaging. You can get a wireless Linksys for as little as 20 bucks on sale.

 

noonie:

Thanks. I did not connect the 2 boxes via USB. I removed the drive from the notebook and used a 2.5"-to-USB kit to connect the drive to the desktop, and then I did the backup. I understand from your reply that booting Acronis TI from the bootable CD actulally boots into Linux. I thought it boots into the Windows PE (Preinstallation Environment). Anyway, I am more concened with performing a recovey in the case where I cannot boot into Windows, and therefore no network can be established.

 

With the boot cd you DO have total network access for Ti to image and restore. Windows is not required.

 

noonie:

Thanks again for the tip. Now I know of more than one alternative method to perform the recovery.

I will try to get the recovery to work by booting from the bootable CD and running the recovery from DVDs after I install the latest build of the software. Let me know when and how you are able to get it to work that way.

 

Hi jumpy01,

Set TI's manual split size to 4.3GB if subsequently burning the .tib files as DVD-ROM (UDF) compilations. If burning DVD-ROM (ISO) compilations then set the split size to 1492MB and burn up to 3 .tib files per DVD for max utilisation of the available space. Whether you choose to burn UDF or ISO compilations, I strongly recommend that you reduce the burn speed to around half the maximum rated speed of your recorder or chosen DVD media, whichever is the lesser. This greatly reduces the likelyhood of a corrupt recording, which can often be the case with today's high-speed burners. It's no big deal when recording large multimedia files (what's a few dropped pixels or the odd "pop" between friends) but a single bad byte in your .tib files will render the whole image useless.

Regards

 

Hi menorcaman:

Thanks for the tips. I will try these, as well. I have a question for you, though: why is it that the check archive test works fine when done from within Windows XP and fails when running it after booting from the Acronis bootable CD? What can this be related to? Drivers? ASPI? Memory management? etc.

I hope you can shed some light on this irregularity.

 

The strange thing is that for many people it's the other way around i.e. the image only verifies o.k. when checked after booting from the rescue CD .

It appears to me that True Image is capable of stressing our systems in a way very few other applications do. It also seems somewhat sensitive to system timing variations.

It would do no harm to download and run <Memtest86+> for a few hours. There should be zero errors reported. If you do receive any errors, make sure your motherboard BIOS is set to the Optimized default memory timings before you think about replacing a faulty memory module.

It's also worth making sure the CPU isn't overclocked and, if all else fails, try reducing the speed of the front-side bus (e.g. 200MHz down to 133MHz or 133MHz down to 100MHz).

Regards