Windows Vista Drive Imaging Vista

Do existing imaging apps work?

Anyone imaged their Vista installation yet and what did you use?

Regards - Charles

 

I think Roger answered my question about imaging and partioning apps as well.

http://www.windowsbbs.com/showthread.php?t=59760

I'm getting a dual HD laptop sometime this week and the drive that I'll put Vista on I'll partition before I install it.

Regards - Charles

 

I didn’t know there was such a beast Charles. I’m going to be getting myself a new one in the next couple of months and I certainly now want one with two hard drives. What make/model is the one you are getting?

I’ve successfully cloned Vista with Drive Image 2002, Paragon Partition Manager and Drive Backup, and with the free DriveImage XML. I’ve also read of people doing it with Ghost 2003, the only issue I’ve heard of is that Ghost will automatically write a new and different Disk Signature when cloning to a different hard drive, which is a problem for Vista. You have to use the switch in Ghost not to change the Disk Signature "“ can’t remember what it is. I’ve not actually tried making and restoring an image, but I can see absolutely no reason why it would not work if restoring to the same partition. Apart from the Disk Signature and the fussier boot.ini replacement "“ BCD "“ it seems Vista is not too much different to XP. It might be a different matter if you are using BitLocker.

 

Hi McTavish,

Thanks, I'll try imaging the Vista partition first with my current imaging app - Apricorn EZ Gig which uses the .tb format. I'll be doing it from the MCE installation with the output to HD.

The laptop is an HP:

HP dv9000t

FREE Upgrade to Genuine Windows XP Media Center!!

- Intel(R) Core(TM) 2 Duo processor T7200 (2.0 GHz)

- 17.0" WSXGA+ BrightView Widescreen (1680x1050)

- 256MB NVIDIA(R) GeForce(R) Go 7600

- HP Imprint Finish + Microphone

- 1024MB DDR2 System Memory (2 Dimm)

- 160GB 5400RPM SATA Dual Hard Drive (80GB x 2) I know you can get (100GB X 2)

- FREE Upgrade - LightScribe DVD+/-RW w/Double Layer

- Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 3945ABG Network Connection

- No TV Tuner w/remote control

- 8 Cell Lithium Ion Battery

- Microsoft(R) Works/Money

- System Recovery DVD w/Windows XP Media Center

- Mobile Stereo Earbud Headphones (1 pair)

A review: http://www.notebookreview.com/default.asp?newsID=3422&review=HP+Pavilion+dv9000t

Regards - Charles

 

Usually if you can clone you can image Charles, it’s the other way round that does not always hold. I suppose just check your cloning tool does not change the Disk Signature, especially if you are dual/multibooting with the Windows bootmanager.

Nice laptop, I want one. About £1000 here in the UK. You can also get 2x120gig drives for it. I’ve also found other makes offering 2x200gigs!!! I’ll shop around in a couple of months.

 

Ok, will do and thanks again for the info.

I've agonized over a laptop now for something like six months and the dual drives is what finally convinced me.

Regards - Charles

 

Forgot to write:

I will be dual booting this system with MCE installed on the C primary partition of the first drive and Vista on the primary second drive.

When I image now on my daul booting desktop, I image the inactive OS on the other drive from the live OS - both XP's. I'll be doing the same on the laptop.

Regards - Charles

 

Acronis True Image Home v10 will work on Vista. Interestingly, I tried the Backup tool for the first time today and it "imaged" my hard drive for me fairly rapidly (about the same amount of time that ATI takes).

The "image" isn't as simple as ATI (several layers of files and folders)- but it does have possibilities that I'll have to discover.

Here's the directory structure of my backup:

WindowsImageBackup (folder) (44,636,389,796 bytes)
--FUBAR-PC (folder)(my computer name)
----Backup 2007-01-10 152914 (folder)
-------191d203a-....xml (xml file) (9 of them with different descriptions)
-------239f9a77-....vhd (file) (43,588,265 kb)
----Catalog (folder)
-------GlobalBackupCatalog (file)
-------GlobalCatalog (file)
----MediaId (file)

 

Hello John, and if no one's welcomed you to the Board, a warm welcome and glad to have you

Yes, it may come to that for me - don't know yet.

Got the Laptop yesterday, and in between trying to get work done - getting rid of unwanted OEM stuff, loading my software and security, and just plain playing with it

What a nice piece of equipment

Regards - Charles

 

Anyone try Vista's built in backup and what reads like imaging?

Going to try as soon as I get an extenal HD plugged in.

Regards - Charles

 

Tried Vista's drive imaging.

Its done from Windows - restoring is done on boot using either Windows Recovery Environment or with the OS disc.

Two downers - might be more, but that's all I have time for today:

1. In a dual boot environment, have to image both OS's, or at least have to the way I have set up with MCE on drive 0 Partition C and Vista drive 1 and partition C.

The explanation is that "Two file system locations must be included in the system image, what Microsoft refers to as the boot partition and the system partition."

2. The compression ratio is almost 1 to 1 with no way to change it that I can see. EDIT: forgot - the image file is about 86/87% of the original.

Regards - Charles

 

Just FYI -

I have just used the system restore tool - and it seems to function much more nicely than the one in XP. (it saved my bacon from a series of bad registry tweaks!)

 

Hi John,

Haven't tried Vista's SR yet. Good to know someone's impressed with it.

Despite my particular complaints, Vista's imaging will be usefull for the millions that haven't used drive imaging before. Its "free ", and because its part of the OS, more "acceptable" and accessable.

Regards - Charles

 

I agree, it will be used by many because it's free. But I fear the mess that it will cause because of it's complexity. Acronis is simple - you've got the .tib files and recovery disk to restore them. The number of restore files is a problem here (IMO) because there's that much more that can get messed up.

Bear in mind that this is my first experience with System Restore in Vista. And it doesn't bear a resemblance to my failed attempts in XP. In XP my system was nearly non-functional when I tried it - the result of many, many bad tweaks and programs. The Vista restore was simple in comparison - I knew that the registry tweaks were the only thing that could have done it - so the restore went smoothly.

 

My understanding is the drive imaging tool is only available on Vista Business or Ultimate. Not on Home Premium.

 

From what I've seen, it's offered on Business, Enterprise, and Ultimate. Haven't even looked at Home Premium for that (only have it on the work system). Still, the push will be on for users to upgrade (via the Anytime Upgrade) to Ultimate - and most "geeks" will want to have the extras anyway.

How many folks bough XPPro even though they didn't need the extra features? I was one of them!

 

Hello Fang,

Didn't notice that until you pointed it out. That is disappointing.

Regards - Charles