Restore Backup

I currently have three partitions on my 500 GB main system hard drive.  One of these contains my OS (Vista Ultimate) and the other two of these partitions are essentially empty.  I would like to know if I could restore a backup image (either Shadow protect or Windows Vista Backup from my external hard drive) to one of the empty  partitions to test the validity of the backup.  I know Manny and several others have emphasized the need to test the backup system before actually needed.  I never did see any specifics as to how the backup image integrity is actually tested.
 
Thanks for any answers and further suggestions for alternate approaches.
 
Bob
  

Bob
Learn from the mistakes of others. You won't live long enough to make them all yourself.

Bob, I would just start the restore and see if it gives you the option of putting it on one of the empty partitions.
 
I do not use Windows backup so I am unfamiliar with its options.

I hear and I forget.
I see and I remember.
I do and I understand.

William A. Gustafson
CH User Manager

Bob Daun


I currently have three partitions on my 500 GB main system hard drive.  One of these contains my OS (Vista Ultimate) and the other two of these partitions are essentially empty.  I would like to know if I could restore a backup image (either Shadow protect or Windows Vista Backup from my external hard drive) to one of the empty  partitions to test the validity of the backup.  I know Manny and several others have emphasized the need to test the backup system before actually needed.  I never did see any specifics as to how the backup image integrity is actually tested.
 
Thanks for any answers and further suggestions for alternate approaches.
 
Bob
  

Hi Bob

In theory yes.  In shadowprotect you can specify the image and where it restores to.   The danger is you imaged a bootable partition, and I am not sure what will happen if you restore that image anywhere, but your bootable partition.

In my case I have only one partition, so I image the volume, check the image while in recovery mode by mounting the image, and being sure I could move a file from the image to my machines desktop.  If so, then I just first delete the volume, and then do a restore.

As I've said elsewhere the first time is a gut wrencher.   What I did, was make sure I had my data safe on another drive, make sure I had all my program exe's so if necessary I could rebuild from scratch.   Then I did the restore.  The more I did the more confidence.    Now I do a restore, with no more thought then if I was opening a word doc.

Also Bob there are many suggestions about going part way, but all that proves is going part way worked.  Far as I am concerned there is only one way to know the image will restore and your system will boot and be fine, is to do it.

Pete

I wouldn't restore an image of an active system to another partition.  I think you'll mess up in how it boots although in theory maybe it will work.  Technically, it's not an issue actually restoring to a different partition.  But I'm not so sure how it will react to having two identical systems on different partitions.

How about you practice with just some other files first? 

Make a copy of some files in one of your partitions.  Image that and restore it from the recovery environment.  That's what you'll need to do to restore the system partition.  Do it a few times until you are comfortable with the process.

Then, restore your system!

Knowing full well the possible danger that if something goes wrong then you may have to reinstall everything.  All, I can tell you is that I've used ShadowProtect to restore an image of my system a number of times without a problem.  Like Pete, I now do it with confidence when needed but I understand you have to get there.

Best Regards,
Manny Carvalho
MS-MVP Windows 

Your donation to this site is greatly appreciate

I have several partitions on my drive as well, the first one and the last one are identically sized NTFS
partitions XP is on the first and Win 7 on the last.
I use Clonezilla as my imaging tool and I always perform a restore after making an image.
I do this while still in Clonezilla.
The first time this is done is the gut wrenching part but after the first time you have the previous
proven image to fall back on.
I maintain at least 3 images of my OS's on an external drive as well as the latest one's that are saved to a 16 GB USB flash drive that I can restore from.

You question intrigues me so I'm going to partition a spare drive with a few partitions and test your
question.

I'll get back to you.

UPDATE: Tried to restore to a different partition using Clonezilla no dice.

Frank Golden
Acer Aspire 5672WLMi, 2 GHz Core 2 Duo, 500GB HDD, 4GB DDR2 ram, ATi X1400  [Win 7 Home  + XP-SP3 Pro + Ubuntu 10.04 LTS  + Ubuntu 8.10 + PCLinuxOS 2010  Gnome and PCLinuxOS 2010  KDE]

fjgold

....
UPDATE: Tried to restore to a different partition using Clonezilla no dice.

That's one of the nice features of Shadow Protect.  Besides being quick, it has no problem with this or even restoring to a smaller sized partition, disimiliar hardware or a totally different machine.

Best Regards,
Manny Carvalho
MS-MVP Windows 

Your donation to this site is greatly appreciate

In testing ShadowProtect, I'd hate to tell you all some of the nasty stuff I did to my systems to try different things.  Even there beta's were pretty stable, all though I had a couple of adventures.  But SP, always put the system back when I was done.  I guess that's where I got in the habit of deleting the volume first.  That wipes the slate clean.

Bob, I've lost count, but I bet it's well over 600 restores at this pint, with no issues.

Peter2150


In testing ShadowProtect, I'd hate to tell you all some of the nasty stuff I did to my systems to try different things.  Even there beta's were pretty stable, all though I had a couple of adventures.  But SP, always put the system back when I was done.  I guess that's where I got in the habit of deleting the volume first.  That wipes the slate clean.

Bob, I've lost count, but I bet it's well over 600 restores at this pint, with no issues.

I hope those are just test restores.....not actual restores needed for some reason.

I hear and I forget.
I see and I remember.
I do and I understand.

William A. Gustafson
CH User Manager

Knowing Pete - they were needed. 

Best Regards,
Manny Carvalho
MS-MVP Windows 

Your donation to this site is greatly appreciate

Manny


Knowing Pete - they were needed. 

That's the nice thing about system images, it frees you to do some pretty risky stuff.
I will make a new image before doing anything that might be risky.
My restore count must be approaching 100, that includes the test restores that I always do
with new images.

I'm always messing around with Linux distros and having images of them is invaluable.

I remember last spring, I hadn't done any upgrades to PCLinuxOS for a while and when I checked
Synaptic Package manager there were over 400 updates (300 MB's of them).

Before performing the updates I imaged the partition.
Good that I did, this many updates could have been a real disaster.

Thankfully the updates went smoothly.
I did have a recent image in case everything went south.

All this with Partimage and more recently Clonezilla.

BTW, at $79.00 a copy for ShadowProtect I think I'll stick with my absolutely free Partimage and Clonezilla.

Frank Golden
Acer Aspire 5672WLMi, 2 GHz Core 2 Duo, 500GB HDD, 4GB DDR2 ram, ATi X1400  [Win 7 Home  + XP-SP3 Pro + Ubuntu 10.04 LTS  + Ubuntu 8.10 + PCLinuxOS 2010  Gnome and PCLinuxOS 2010  KDE]

BillG

Peter2150


In testing ShadowProtect, I'd hate to tell you all some of the nasty stuff I did to my systems to try different things.  Even there beta's were pretty stable, all though I had a couple of adventures.  But SP, always put the system back when I was done.  I guess that's where I got in the habit of deleting the volume first.  That wipes the slate clean.

Bob, I've lost count, but I bet it's well over 600 restores at this pint, with no issues.

I hope those are just test restores.....not actual restores needed for some reason.

Hi Bill

WIth the exception of the continous incrementals which run all day, whenever I manually make an image, I test it by doing a full blown restore.   Then I know it's good.  I do image a lot.   Never had a failure, except of course a couple if issues with beta versions, but that's what beta testing is all about.

Pete

Peter2150
 

Hi Bill

WIth the exception of the continous incrementals which run all day, whenever I manually make an image, I test it by doing a full blown restore.   Then I know it's good.  I do image a lot.   Never had a failure, except of course a couple if issues with beta versions, but that's what beta testing is all about.

Pete

So let me get this right.  You have faith in it but still test it every time?  Wasn't it Khrushchev who, among other things, said "Trust but verify" ?

Best Regards,
Manny Carvalho
MS-MVP Windows 

Your donation to this site is greatly appreciate

Manny

Peter2150
 

Hi Bill

WIth the exception of the continous incrementals which run all day, whenever I manually make an image, I test it by doing a full blown restore.   Then I know it's good.  I do image a lot.   Never had a failure, except of course a couple if issues with beta versions, but that's what beta testing is all about.

Pete

So let me get this right.  You have faith in it but still test it every time?  Wasn't it Khrushchev who, among other things, said "Trust but verify" ?

"Trust, but verify" was a signature phrase of the Gipper (Ronald Reagan).
He used it several times in public, often when dealing with the Soviet Union.

At the signing of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) in 1987 he used it and Mikhail Gorbachev responded that he seemed to use the phrase a lot. Reagan replied "I like it".

This is the treaty that amongst other things requred us to destroy a large number of B-52 bombers.
To satisfy the Soviets that we were doing that we chopped up the planes and they are on display from space at Davis-Monthan AFB in Tucon, Arizona.
You can clearly see them at Google Earth.




What a waste of taxpayer dollars, those were scary times.


It comes from an old Russian proverb.

Khrushchev was maybe best known for removing his shoe and hitting his table with it to make a point at the UN. LOL

Indeed, "Trust but verify" applies here as well.
I learned a long time ago to never turn your back on a computer. LOL

Frank Golden
Acer Aspire 5672WLMi, 2 GHz Core 2 Duo, 500GB HDD, 4GB DDR2 ram, ATi X1400  [Win 7 Home  + XP-SP3 Pro + Ubuntu 10.04 LTS  + Ubuntu 8.10 + PCLinuxOS 2010  Gnome and PCLinuxOS 2010  KDE]

Manny

Peter2150
 

Hi Bill

WIth the exception of the continous incrementals which run all day, whenever I manually make an image, I test it by doing a full blown restore.   Then I know it's good.  I do image a lot.   Never had a failure, except of course a couple if issues with beta versions, but that's what beta testing is all about.

Pete

So let me get this right.  You have faith in it but still test it every time?  Wasn't it Khrushchev who, among other things, said "Trust but verify" ?

Absolutely.   Let us not forget we are working with computers, and software, and little hiccups happen.  When I image I assume it's good based on experience, but what if a little gremlin slipped in, it can happen.  This way, after imaging, and restoring, I know with certainty that the image is capable of restore, because it has done so, not because I assume it will.

One thing I've learned is that when you NEED to restore an image you are already under stress.  You don't want the added stress about wondering if an image will restore.

Two now humorous examples.

1.  I was beta testing KAV 6.0 and it was pretty straight forward.   I was imaging the system every Friday evening.  Turned it on Saturday, and noticed something funny so I rebooted.  Had a trashed system.  Restored my FDISR archive, and in minutes had a trashed system.   No sweat, restore the image, and in short order it is now corrupted.  Hmm,  restored and image from two weeks back, and again, in short order the same corruption, same symptoms.  When back to an even  earlier image with same results.   Really puzzling, and getting a bit scary.   Went on line with a system, I didn't beta test on and it was fine.   Light bulb time.   Shut down my modem, did a restore, and it was fine.  Turned off the KAV auto update and all was well.   Turned out, KAV had released a corrupt driver to the beta server, so you'd restore an image, it would download the driver, and game over.

2. But even worse then that, I had been shown how you can in ShadowProtect use the partition table editor and zero out the table, deleting it.(Don't recommend playing with this).  It worked.  So one bright saturday morning, I had loaded up the Acronis Disk Director via Bartpe, and was playing with the same feature.  Really bad idea.  Got a BSOD.  Tried rebooting Bartpe, and got another BSOD.   No sweat just restore the system.  Booting Winpe, got BSOD.  Not a good feeling now.  Finally I thought, I just take my trusty Windows XP CD and reinstall WIndows and then restore. When the WIndows CD generated a BSOD, a cold sweat developed.  This is a really big Uh Oh.  After 8 hours of grief, Bootit NG to the rescue.  It was able to delete the corrupted partition table, and then I could restore.

The StorageCraft guys figured out there was a problem with the XP partition table subroutines.  They could handle any partition table, no partition table, but if the partition table was corrupt, the just threw up there hands and quit, causing the blue screen.

Manny, I take nothing for granted.

Pete

I knew I'd get some interesting stories out of somebody.

A take away lesson for those following along is that those that do crazy things on their machines wouldn't without a backup strategy to recover when things go wrong.  And feeling confident with that strategy knowing that it will work is a key part of the whole thing.

Nikita's phrase that still resonates with me: "We will bury you!"  Which a computer can do if you aren't prepared for it.

Best Regards,
Manny Carvalho
MS-MVP Windows 

Your donation to this site is greatly appreciate