Restore Dell PC DVD Image to New Hard Drive

I haven't been able to find a definitive answer to this question:

I just bought a new Dell XPS200 and a copy of TI 8.0 to image the disk. I bought a larger hard drive to install but do not have another SATA controller to clone the drive. I imaged my original hard drive and want to restore the image to my new, larger HD.

When TI boots from the DVD, I do not get prompts for the image I made on the DVD. How do I restore from the DVD disks to the new HD?

Browsing old posts related to this, I found some issues with restoring Dell's disk image to bigger hard drives. Will I be unable to use the new hard drive's bigger partition with Dell's hidden partitions? (I'd hate to have to delete their utility and restore hidden partitions.)

Do I have to format the new hard drive or does TI do that for me? I found something that said that TI needs to use an image located on the hard drive for images created on DVD. Does TI have the ability to restore from the DVD?

If I have to, how would I copy the image from the DVD to a newly formatted HD? (Would the "copy" command work from the DVD drive if a hard drive has just been formatted? I'm not sure that a newly formatted hard drive would have access the DVD drive. I'd like advice on how to access the DVD drive.)

I read wonderful reviews about TI on Amazon and I hope that the solution is not as difficult as it seems.

 

If you want to migrate from the smaller internal drive to the new larger drive and retain the functionality of your Dell Diagnostic and Dell PC Restore partitions, you only have ONE surefire choice - to CLONE your existing internal drive to the new larger external drive.

When cloning, I choose the Manual resizing option and adjust my new larger C partition to use all available space on the larger drive. I don't upsize the Dell Diagnostic or PC Restore partitions because there is no need to. Don't downsize them, though.

You can use the Proportional/Automatic resizing option and you'll see a rather insignificant increase in the sizes of the Dell partitions, so either is okay.

DO NOT try to restore the existing small drive image to the new larger drive and then resize the new C partition to fill the new drive or else the Dell PC Restore partition will not work at all. The Diagnostic partition may still function, however.

That's why you MUST clone rather than restore and resize your image.

Try this:

1) Install the new SATA drive in your Laptop.
2) Install the original smaller drive in an external USB2 drive case.
3) Boot with the Acronis Rescue CD and clone your small drive to the new larger internal drive. Do NOT choose to delete partitions and info from the original source smaller drive.
4) When cloning is complete, shut everything down and disconnect the original drive in the USB2 case and set it aside.
5) Remove the Acronis Rescue CD and try to boot your laptop normally with the newly cloned internal hard drive. It will probably boot okay but I'm not absolutely positive it will because I've never cloned a SATA drive before.

If it boots properly, you can restart with F12 and boot to the Dell Diagnostics partition and run it as a test.

If that works, shut down, disconnect all external devices and start up and immediately press and HOLD the Control and F11 keys until you see the Dell PC Restore screen. You can either confirm or cancel the restore operation. If it gets that far it should function all the way. You can either run it or else cancel and your laptop will auto reboot.

Once you're satisfied everything functions, you can reconnect the old external USB2 drive and delete all three partitions with the Acronis Add New Disk function and then repartition it within the Windows Disk Management console and use the drive for storage. (Don't do this until you're absolutely sure your Dell PC Restore function runs all the way through.)

Post back here and let us know your results.

PS - You don't have to format the new drive before you clone to it - it's done automatically while cloning.

 

Thanks for the advice! I hadn't considered using an external HD enclosure. I'll give that a try.

Just for my information: I'm curious about the imaging functionality. Do you know the answers to my imaging questions? (DVDs and file locations, etc.)

 

Your questions are about DVD's. Do you mean when you boot with CD's or when you boot with DVD's?

I don't use DVD's so I can't answer if that's the media you have chosen.

Regardless, you can't use your CD/DVD image for restoring to a larger drive because the Dell Restore partition won't work when you upsize the restored C partition. Any time you change the mbr, the Dell PC Restore function is disabled.

 

I created rescue boot CD but imaged the disk to DVDs. I have two DVDs with 5 separate files. When I tried to test out the restore, I wasn't able to see the "tib" file to restore. I've seen some posts that suggest that you can't restore an image from DVD. I'm not sure how it works with CDs.

I plan on cloning the hard drive as you suggested but was interested in how TI handles backups and restores. I'd like to use the product to its fullest.

 

In order for the DVD segments to be recognizable and restorable, they'd have to be located all in one place, as far as I know. So, you'd need to locate them all on an external hard drive during the restore.

For CD's, you would be prompted to insert the individual CD's. I have done the CD restores several times - very slow and tedious but effective.

 

Hello Bob,

Thank you for choosing Acronis Disk Backup Software.

Please be aware that bobdat is not completely correct, since in order to restore an image archive spanned over a several CDs\DVDs you should insert the last created CD\DVD first (disc that contains the last volume of the image archive) and then follow the wizard's instructions. Please also take a look at this previous post of mine.

Please also note that the most probable reason for the problem you encounter is that you have followed the so-called "two-step" method for writing your images to DVD and have not "finalized" the discs during the recording. You can find more information on how to write your images to DVD in this FAQ article.

If that's not the case then please provide us with the following information:

- Describe the way you have written your images to DVDs in more detail;

- Boot your PC Bootable Rescue CD created using the latest build (937) of Acronis True Image 8.0 and create Linux system information (sysinfo.txt) as it is described in Acronis Help Post;

Note that since you use an older version of Acronis True Image, you should press F11 button when the "Starting Acronis Loader..." message appears and not when the selection screen appears;

- Download and install the free trial version of Acronis True Image 9.0, create new Bootable Rescue CD, boot your computer from this CD and see if the problem still persists. Inform us about the results;

- Describe actions taken before the problem appears step-by-step.

Please submit a request for technical support. Attach all the collected files and information to your request along with the information about your purchase of Acronis software (order number, e-mail, where did you purchase our product, etc.) and the link to this thread. We will investigate the problem and try to provide you with the solution.

Thank you.
--
Alexey Popov

 

Cnacubo! (I know a few words of Russian!)
A few questions before I do this:

When I imaged the disk, the images were written directly to the DVDs and each DVD was ejected when it was done. I didn't see a message about finalizing the image. I am also able to verify the partition information through TI.

I just bought TI 8.0 from Amazon and got it in the mail a few weeks ago. Does TI 8.0 have DVD functionality? Could my problem be fixed with the latest build? Should I test it before I download 9.0?

If I uninstall 8.0 and download 9.0 as a free trial version, will I be able to upgrade free-of-charge? (I'd hate to have wasted my money on 8.0!)

 

Hello Bob,

Please be aware that both Acronis True Image 8.0 and Acronis True Image 9.0 do not write to DVD directly, instead they utilize third party UDF packet DVD writing software as it is described in the above mentioned FAQ article.

Please also note that both of them has a capability of restoring the images from DVDs.

Please take a look at this previous thread. It should answer your questions concerning our upgrading policy.

Could you please send us the information requested above?

Please also provide us with the following details:

- What exact UDF packet DVD writing software did you use to format the DVDs?

- What type of media did you use?

- Download and install the free trial version of Acronis True Image 9.0, create new Bootable Rescue CD, boot your PC from this CD and see if the problem still persists. Let us know the result;

- Describe the way you have written the image to DVDs in more detail.

Thank you.
--
Alexey Popov

 

I downloaded the latest build. (937) I uninstalled the version that I bought, installed the latest build, and created a new boot CD.

The formatting tool is Sonic DLA that comes with the Dell.

From the boot CD, I get the Restore Image Wizard which proceeds to the Image Archive Selection screen. I only see My Computer and the prompt for the file name on Local Disk c:\ instead of the DVD drive where the file should be. (I don't get a prompt for the last disk in the set.)

I tried to follow the directions to write the sysinfo.txt but I don't get the loader screen. It boots directly to the Splash screen.

Should I abandon TI 8.0 and download the trial version of 9.0? (I have the confirmation email from Amazon for my purchase of 8.0 dated Jan 27.)

I'm stuck.

 

Downloading the trial version of TI 9.0 worked! I made the rescue disk and found the cd/dvd drive in the directory tree where I had written the files to DVD. I sent a request to upgrade to 9.0 from 8.0 for no charge. (I had just bought 8.0 from Amazon on January 27.)