WARNING! Windows Vista "System Restore" stops working when using ATI 11

Discussion in 'Acronis True Image Product Line' started by d.chatten, Feb 6, 2008.

Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.
  1. Karma

    Karma Registered Member

    Joined:
    May 13, 2005
    Posts:
    19
    Hi, I've tried to read this entire thread, but there's just a lot of info. And of course, I'm greatly dismayed to hear of yet another problem with TI 11. This is not good... :eek:

    I need clarification on a few things so that I can decide what to do going forward:

    Q1 - If I need to recover my system, should I always try System Restore first and Acronis TI 11 second? I'm thinking yes.

    Q2 - If this is the case, and SR fails to work, then I should probably approach an ATI restore as though it were pretty much my last recovery attempt before rebuilding my system, right? I'm also thinking yes.

    Q3 - If my answers to Q1 and Q2 are correct assumptions, then upon restoring from a TI backup, my Windows "System Restore" points would be unavailable. Assuming that restoring from a TI 11 backup gets my system working again (sans RP's), then is it possible to "mind wipe" Windows Vista of its old Restore Points, and begin fresh by taking a new RP for "going forward?" If so, how should I go about doing that?

    Thanks in advance!
     
  2. seekforever

    seekforever Registered Member

    Joined:
    Oct 31, 2005
    Posts:
    4,751
    Sure, if you wish, its easy to do and if it doesn't work then you have TI. However, if you restore an image you know everything is put back - the risk is that you may lose data files that weren't present when the image was taken. I don't even know if I have SR enabled on my system, I just restore with TI if I wish to for any reason.


    Unless you have some other kind of a backup that is your only option. If you have done your homework and done at least one successful test restore with TI to a spare HD then you have confirmed TI works on your system and you should be able to recover without any problem.
    Don't know about Vista but in XP you just go into the Restore Point task in the Help and Support Center and there is a link to take you to setup.
     
  3. Karma

    Karma Registered Member

    Joined:
    May 13, 2005
    Posts:
    19
    Thanks!
     
  4. rseiler

    rseiler Registered Member

    Joined:
    Dec 22, 2003
    Posts:
    90
    I found the above issues too, but by virtue of using the latest DD, not TI. No one above specifically mentioned DD, but is anyone also looking into updating it to workaround the issue? It hasn't been updated in almost two years.

    In Vista x86 SP1, I used DD to resize a data partition, with these reaults:
    1) System restore points/previous versions are deleted for the partition. There should be a warning about that.
    2) System Restore config then has a "generic volume" checked instead of the data drive. There should be a notice to correct this, since few will ever notice it. I wish the whole "generic volume" creation/detection never happened in the first place, since it also causes you to make an extra reboot after the resizing.

    Note: In System Restore config, I checked the correct drive, unchecked the generic volume, and verified later that the generic volume had gone and the proper driver letter was checked, but volume shadow monitoring for that volume still didn't kick in at the point that I could see (new previous versions weren't created), so you may need to reboot. Instead, I started the Volume Shadow Copy service manually (the service normally turns itself on and off as needed) and manually created a restore point, which got it going again.
     
  5. Acronis Support

    Acronis Support Acronis Support Staff

    Joined:
    Apr 28, 2004
    Posts:
    25,885
    Hello rseiler,

    Thank you for your interesting in Acronis True Image

    We are expecting release of new build of Acronis Disk Director Suite 10.0 in near future, you can receive Acronis' releases and special promotions information if you sign up at our web site

    Best regards,
    --
    Dmitry Nikolaev
     
  6. dormix

    dormix Registered Member

    Joined:
    Aug 5, 2007
    Posts:
    40
    Location:
    Center of Italy
    Hi all! I'm trying ATI 2009 BUILD 12.0.0.9709 and I found the same problem of #1 post. Vista system restore doesn't work even if I uninstall ATI 2009 and make a registry clean as advised somewhere on this forum. Is there a way to repair it or I must use only True Image, to make restores, until I will make a new format?:mad:

    PS: There are many points of windows system restore but not any works.

    Regards!
     
  7. shieber

    shieber Registered Member

    Joined:
    Oct 27, 2004
    Posts:
    3,710
    I think this has more to do with how Sys restore operates in Vista than anything else -- something that might be tweaked in the minor upgrade being called W7.
     
  8. jura0001

    jura0001 Registered Member

    Joined:
    Jun 27, 2007
    Posts:
    47
    A few remarks:

    Someone in this thread suggested a sector by sector restore in order to preserve system restore points.
    As I expected, this does not work (the vista system restore points are gone!).
    You would need to do a sector by sector _backup_ first, and then a sector by sector restore, and it might work - didn't test it myself.


    It is not only with True Image that Vista loses its system restore points, but also with some other (all?) imaging products.
    I did some tests with "drive snapshot" (excellent and light-weight! no installation needed, and comes with perfect imaging mounting capability), and the restore points were gone, too.
    I also tested "ghost 11.5" (which is said to be vista compatible) -> restore points gone, too.

    By the way, I used true image 9.1 and even one of the earlier versions (which are not yet claimed to be vista compatible) and (apart from the system restore points issue) the vista backup worked perfectly, just like restoring the image!
     
  9. Vlad V

    Vlad V Registered Member

    Joined:
    Dec 17, 2008
    Posts:
    61
    Hello,
    Those who have ATIH 2009 (build 9646 or later) can try selecting "MBR and track 0" + "Restore disk signature" boxes during restore. Updated UG says that by doing so you will be able to restore "System Restore" points as well.

    Vlad
     
  10. K0LO

    K0LO Registered Member

    Joined:
    Mar 9, 2006
    Posts:
    2,591
    Location:
    State College, Pennsylvania
    Vlad:

    I don't think that alone will do it. With the current and older versions of TI, if you restore a Vista partition back to the same disk the Disk Signature does not change, yet the restore points are lost. If the Disk Signature has not changed, then restoring it on top of itself isn't going to do anything.

    The suggestion in post #33 is the only one that works as far as I know. You have to back up in sector-by-sector mode and restore in sector-by-sector mode in order to preserve the restore points because restore point information is tied to absolute sector location.
     
  11. Faust

    Faust Registered Member

    Joined:
    Aug 25, 2008
    Posts:
    258
    This may be a rather simplistic approach - I got fed up with the amount of room Vista takes up with restore points and as I use ATI I concluded why bother with system restore. I back up with ATI 2009 every few days in any event so if anything goes wrong I just do an ATI restore.
     
  12. K0LO

    K0LO Registered Member

    Joined:
    Mar 9, 2006
    Posts:
    2,591
    Location:
    State College, Pennsylvania
    Faust

    Good point, although in Vista if you turn off System Restore then you also lose Previous Versions of Files, my most-favorite Vista feature. Windows 7 is better in this respect - you can choose to disable system restore and keep Previous Versions.
     
  13. Vlad V

    Vlad V Registered Member

    Joined:
    Dec 17, 2008
    Posts:
    61
    Kolo:

    User's Guide says that if you do not check the "Restore disk signature" box, ATI will generate a new disk signature. So the signature will be changed even if you restore Vista to the same disk.

    Vlad
     
  14. MudCrab

    MudCrab Imaging Specialist

    Joined:
    Nov 3, 2006
    Posts:
    6,483
    Location:
    California
    I think that option only applies when you restore the MBR/Track 0. If you restore just a partition (or partitions), the disk signature shouldn't be changed. (I haven't tested it yet, though.)
     
  15. pbmcmlxxi

    pbmcmlxxi Registered Member

    Joined:
    Oct 28, 2006
    Posts:
    131
    Location:
    Hants, UK
    I have also found the same issue as post 1, regarding System Restore Points. System Restore Points I previously created do not work, after an image restore, using Acronis 2009 and Windows 7.
     
  16. K0LO

    K0LO Registered Member

    Joined:
    Mar 9, 2006
    Posts:
    2,591
    Location:
    State College, Pennsylvania
    I think that this only applies when restoring to a new, blank disk without an existing signature - TI will generate a new one when it creates its generic MBR. The option to restore the old signature is present so that you can preserve information in the image that uses disk signatures (drive letter assignments in the registry, ATI scheduled tasks that rely on partition ID information, etc.)


    That's correct. If you only restore a partition to a disk that has an existing disk signature, the disk signature does not change. I've confirmed this on TI 10. I don't have access to TI 2009 but I can't imagine that it would do this differently - it wouldn't make sense to arbitrarily change the disk signature on an existing disk.

    TI 2009 added this new option to copy the original disk ID to a new disk if the user wants to do that. The older versions of TI generate a new disk ID when you restore a partition to a completely blank hard disk and the user does not get the option to preserve the old disk signature (unless you are handy with a hex disk editor).
     
  17. shieber

    shieber Registered Member

    Joined:
    Oct 27, 2004
    Posts:
    3,710
    Well, if you frequently back up with ATI, you won't need Sys Restore for previous file versions either. This would mainly be a wise choice for those that save a series fo backups to cover multiple points in time. The w7 option you mention would be a more econimical methof saving file versions if one wasn't already saving a series of of backups.

     
  18. Faust

    Faust Registered Member

    Joined:
    Aug 25, 2008
    Posts:
    258
    The feature you mention is not available for Vista HP I think it's only a feature in Ultimate and business versions so makes no difference to me.
     
  19. itobor

    itobor Registered Member

    Joined:
    Jun 2, 2008
    Posts:
    35
    Location:
    Perth, Western Australia
    Ah - the joy finding a thread directly on point -

    I have had this exact same problem with Vista (Home Premium) and ATI 11 (as in post #1), plus a bit more. After a restore using ATI 11 I noticed the Vista Restore utility had the same image as in Post #1, and figured out how to fix it (as in the above posts) by checking box next to "new" drive C: and unchecking box next to the "(missing)" drive C:\.

    HOWEVER - I also noticed that when I did my next ATI 11 backup the image was only 52GB - when backups before the restore were between 73GB and 81GB. All my programs and data appear to be present and working. From this thread I gather I may have had as much as 15% of my HDD (system HDD is 500 GB) in restore points.

    So MAYBE this solves the mystery of why my ATI 11 restore files are more than 20GB smaller AND my C:/ drive in "Computer" window shows considerably less usage).

    Would appreciate it if anyone can give my some reassurance on that as a likely scenario to solve the missing GB mystery!

    ALSO: after an ATI restore after a crash (wouldn't boot up - seems secondary internal drive was corrupted) my drive designations appear to have gone strange and ATI 11 initialize gets hung up intermittently - but I'll do another posting on that, since it is a bit off thread topic.
     
Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.
  1. This site uses cookies to help personalise content, tailor your experience and to keep you logged in if you register.
    By continuing to use this site, you are consenting to our use of cookies.