Ultimate Complete PC Restore From External USB Drive
Jan 14, 2008
I suffered a hardware failure on the system (C:) volume yesterday, which is in a RAID 0+1 configuration (of four Western Digital Raptor 74GB drives). I managed to keep the system up long enough in degraded mode to perform a full (and successful) Complete PC Backup onto an external USB hard drive. This was done just in time, as at the next reboot, the RAID array failed completely and caused data loss (amongst others, my user profile files and the boot manager system file). When I booted up with my original Ultimate DVD and chose to completely restore the PC, it cannot find any images despite the USB drive being connected to the PC. I have verified in the BIOS that the USB drive was recognised. Upon further research, the original (pre-SP1) Vista RE does not support the loading of USB drivers at the Complete PC recovery stage - these drivers have to be loaded in manually via drvload.exe in X:windowssystem32.
I tried to load in drivers in C:windowssystem32 (surprisingly still accessible), but failed to do so. Has anyone done this before? Where do I find the correct INF to load into Vista RE in order to access my Complete PC Backup image? Do I need other INF files in addition to USB.INF to get this working? I presume it may be necessary to get the USB drivers onto a CD-R and loading them in that way, although I'm hoping the solution will be more self-contained on the PC's system drive.
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Mar 23, 2008
I did a complete PC backup of my system onto an external USB HDD using the backup facility in VISTA Ultimate. When I went to do a complete PC restore I am told form the Help info on VISTA Ultimate to restart my computer, push F8 and choose the 'repair' option to run the restore. WHen I do this I get the safe mode options, debugging mode etc etc but there is no 'repair' mode. How do I get to the repair mode??
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Jul 19, 2008
I would like some advice on which external hard drive to buy for Vista Ultimate x64. I am not a techy and have read some posts which have left me more than a bit confused! The external hard drive needs to be easy to set up and use. I just want to be able to (very) easily back up my files on a daily basis and save photos, spreadsheets to the external hard drive.
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May 30, 2009
I went to see when the last time my complete PC image was made, on boot up I entered F8 and went to repair PC and went to complete PC backup. There was none made. So I rebooted and went to backup and restore center to make one. There is no backup button. Is this because I have home Premium? It's not offered on Home Premium. Is there a Freeware program that I could use to make it appear on the System repair menu?
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May 5, 2009
The hard drive was of SATA type. I attempted to use VHD file to migrate the system from the old hdd to the new hdd but failed. The following was the steps taken:
1. Created a VHD file on the laptop machine and stored it on an USB interfaced external hdd.
2. Temporarily installed the new SATA hdd on a desktop machine and created partitions including data partitions.
3. Moved the VHD file to one of the data partitions on the new hdd.
4. Replaced the old hdd on the laptop machine with the new hdd.
5. On the laptop machine, the first primary partition of the new hdd was set active since the Vista system was installed on the first partition of the old hdd.
6. Started the laptop machine, let the system boot from the installer DVD and selected "Repair".
7. "PC Complete Restore" was selected. The installer located the VHD file and the restore process began.
Then the following message was displayed:
The Windows Complete PC Restore operation failed.
Error details: The parameter is incorrect.(0x80070057)
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May 26, 2008
I want to build a PC. I've browsed around the 'net looking for information on Complete PC Backup. The only thing that I've found on the 'net explains how to do a backup & restore. I've browsed around the Microsoft Vista discussion groups & found out that it is possible to do incremental (I wish that it would do differential instead of incremental backups.) as well as full backups.
Can I give the backup files names or does Windows? For example, before I install certain software can I give the backup a file name such as "before installijng XYZ software"? The way I understand it with incremental backups, the full backup has to be restored first & then the incremental backups are restored next starting with the oldest & proceeding to the latest. Since the Complete PC Backup does incremental backups, does the Restore wizard restore the incremental backups in order?
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Mar 23, 2008
I can create restore points but when I try to restore to a previous point, always get the message: "System Restore did not complete succesfully.
An unspecified error occurred " How can I fix System Restore?
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Mar 26, 2008
upgrade HD from 60G to 250G without having to reinstall all files and programs. Windows Complete PC Restore cannot see DVD with backup image file
1. Backed up C: using Windows Complete PC Backup. (6 DVDs no errors.)
2. Removed old HD and inserted new.
3. Booted Windows Vista install DVD. (I proceeded to partition HD but did not complete the install.)
4. From Windows Recovery Environment, I chose Windows Complete PC Restore.
5. Inserted Backup image DVD disc1.
6. When it looked for the location of the image it couldn't find it so it fails.
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Mar 23, 2008
when booting up from a vista cd I accidentally had my usb external hard drive plugged in and the drive has been emptied and replaced by windows there are sintimental photos etc on the drive can anyone help me to restore them
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Jul 2, 2008
Does 'Local Disc' D mean it is a drive inside my machine or could it be my external hard drive?
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Sep 5, 2008
I have Vista Home Premium 32bit running on a Sony notebook. I actually ran system restore last night and have not installed anything since so my system is clean/fresh. I have a Maxtor 500GB external HDD which I connect to my PC via USB2.0.
When I connect the drive, it shows up in Explorer, it shows up in Disc Management, it gives the correct capacity, etc. However, every once in a while (yes this problem is random) when I try to access files/folders on the drive, Explorer will just hang. The busy cursor shows up, and nothing responds. The ONLY way to fix it is to pull the USB cable. Rebooting doesn't work b/c on the "shutting down" screen it just hangs UNLESS I disconnect the drive. Other times, I can go into a folder on the drive but only a few of the many files inside show up. However, sometimes the drive works NO PROBLEM and is very speedy!
I can't run any disc scan utils b/c they hang and the HDD again becomes unresponsive until I disconnect it. And I can never see properties of ALL the folders, nor can I change folder icons. While any of this is going on, the drive NEVER grinds while hanging. It doesn't seem to be searching for anything. It's like it's clogging up something w/ Windows. Also, in Explorer, the green bar is always growing as if searching.
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May 31, 2008
Just received a USB drive today from ebay 8 gig drive. Upon putting it into my computer it comes up as unformatted. So press format and errors at the end (unable to complete format). Then tried to format the drive via computer management in admin tools. All goes OK - 8 Gig showing. Copied 6.5 Gig onto it to test, and only some of the files work. About 2 Gig of AVI work but the others open as corrupted - same problem on my PS3. Thinking its either faulty or got a feeling its a fake 2 Gig. If its fake can you somehow restore the orginal boot / bios to get it back (better than nothing i suppose). Eneco flash drive 2.10 16777216 lba
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Oct 6, 2009
I was starting my computer today (that has Vista), and during the start up process, a black screen came up stating that there was an error opening up my external hard drive and it was checking for errors. After it finally booted up, I went to open the hard drive files, and it was totally BLANK! I then restarted the computer, and still the hard drive is EMPTY! I had ALL my important files in there!
The ONLY thing that looks promising is that when I go to Start then to Computer, it shows the hard drive there, and it still shows that 43GB are free of 111GB of storage (same info shows by right clicking on it and going to Properties). Why would it show this if nothing is on the hard drive anymore? Is there ANYWAY to recover these files again you think???? I NEED those files!!!! Remember that the hard drive STILL PHYSICALLY WORKS. It's just that I cannot access the files on my pc at the time for some reason.......
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May 21, 2008
I just bought and installed a external hard drive. I am fairly knowlegable about computers but this is my first Ex. Hard drive and know very little about there use. So what I want to know is how to save my Family Tree Makers files to it. And once I do that how do I know for sure it is opening from my new drive and not my computer C: drive? I saved it to a DVD one time but when the time came when I needed it all that was there was a short cut but no files.
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May 10, 2009
I did a system "complete pc back up" throught the "Back up status and configuration" program that comes with vista. This saved the items to my external hard drive but using the restore feature I can not do a system restore from these files. I can find the external harddrive, it just can not access the files on the drive.
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Apr 29, 2009
If I do a complete backup on my Vista Ultimate laptop and do the restore to a larger hard disk, will it work? I have read differing reports of whether it will or not.
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Feb 17, 2009
Bought a 750 gig Hard Drive in September and haven?t had problem with it until now. I?m about to install a fresh copy of window vista and have backed up everything that?s on the 750gig to an external HDD (no problems there), but when I?ve come to format the 750 gig Hard Drive I?ve notched that it stayed on 99% for a while and in computer management, its showing up as raw, even after the format, I?ve now deleted the partition, re-created it and get the message ?the format did not complete successfully? and then get ? you need to format disk drive D: before you can use it? with the option to format which I choose but even if I try to format it, I get the message ?windows was unable to complete the format?.
Even though I?ve not had any previous problems with the drive, as its worked fine, when I installed the drive when I was using Windows XP, I used partition magic to try and format the drive it and even that didn?t work. So am I right in thinking that there?s a problem with this drive or should I try the Windows Vista Dvd and see if formats in that before I RMA it? Btw the drive in questions is a Western Digital 750GB Hard Drive SATAII 7200rpm 16MB Cache - OEM Green Power
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Jun 13, 2008
I have two external HD's.. Vista isn't reading either one of them when I connect them to the machine.. even after turning off firewall and restarting the machine..I brought one of them to work today, where am on XP, connected the drive machine read it right away, no problems..
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May 18, 2008
I just used Windows Vista to back up my drive to an external drive. It said the backup was successful but when I went to safely remove hardware, I got this message: " Windows can't stop your Generic volume device because it is in use. Close any programs or windows that might be using the device, and then try again later. "I made sure everything was closed, checked with Task Manager and tried again. Same message. After 20 minutes, I finally just disconnected it.
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Sep 8, 2009
I have Windows XP and Vista. I always go through "safely remove hardware" before pulling off USB drive on XP. However, I have been trying to do the same on Vista, it seems that I cannot do the same as XP. For instance, I plug in my USB on Vista and it appears as H drive on Vista, when I am ready to do "safely remove hardware", I don't see the device drive H is on the "Safely remove hardware" window, so I cannot stop the H drive. I am concerned about the Vista hardware.
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Mar 23, 2008
I recently bought a western digital 1TB hard drive which I had to reformat before I could use. Everything works good now, except for onething. Sometimes the computer doesn't want to restart while the new drive is plugged in. If I remove it from the USB port prior to restarting, it will restart just fine.
It shuts down and turns on without an issue. This only happens when I
restart the system with it plugged in.
So while it's not a big issue,it is an annoyance.
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Dec 8, 2008
I just Bought a 120Gig External HardDrive and i want to put An O/S on it how do i do that? i bought an external HDD because all my PC games take up all my HDD space in my computer :P)
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May 9, 2009
I got a large external hard drive today and it's instructions say to go to
disk management and do format and partition. I messed up and deleted the
drives volume. Now it is not listed in disk management. I looked everywhere
to get it back and can't figure it out. How do I make Vista recognize this
drive again so I can partition and format it?
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Apr 24, 2010
For some reason, It's unable to either normally format any external memory devices into a FAT or FAT32 format, or unable to read it at all. I keep trying to open the device but it keeps saying that i need to format it, but because of problem 1, it can't be formated (it almost completes but the process shuts down, stating that it can't be formated). This problem has been happening for the longest time and I really need this fixed.
When I say external memory devices, i mean CDs, DVDs, Flash drives, SD cards, memory card readers. Everytime I check the disk management of these devices, it says they are Primary Partitioned (which is the normal status right?). And the only thing that seems to be the problem is the RAW file system (which I heard windows doesn't read). However, the wierd thing is if I plug in something like a USB mouse, or a camera, it has full functionality (I.E. the mouse works/files are reachable on the camera). I then tried to format it using the cmd lines, and tried to format it to FAT32, but after it says 100% formated, and i try to use it again, Disk Management tells me that it's back in RAW format.
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May 17, 2009
i have simpletech 160gb external drive. i cannot access my external drive,i can see the drive but i cannot access it i dont want to format because lots of important file are in it. when i check it from disk management right click the drive E: then on the property windows i choose tools clik the check now boton. it gives me error "The disk check could not be performed because Windows cannot access the disk."
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Jul 29, 2009
I am in need of assistance concerning my external hard drive. My hard drive has been working flawlessly for the past 3 years. As of today, my computer no longer recognizes it. This is what I have done so far:
-Unplugged it, plugged it back up, and my computer made a chime saying that it was recognized and said that it was ready to go.
-However, the HDD does not show up on the my computer tab.
-I removed the HDD from its enclosure, purchased a USB 2.0 to SATA/IDE and tried uploading the HDD to my wife's computer. Once again, her computer chimed saying that it was recognized (she runs XP, i have vista), but, once again, the hard drive was not in the my computer folder.
-I then proceeded to Computer Management, Disk Management, and noticed that my external hard drive is not there either.
I thought that maybe intially my power cord to the outlet in the wall just went bad, but after I bought the USB to SATA/IDE adapter and it still didn't work...well, I ran out of options.
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Nov 18, 2009
I have a simpletech external hard drive. When plugging it into the USB port windows vista is not recognizing the disk in my computer.
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Oct 23, 2009
I had to create a windows recovery disk
I used it to system restore her system to a date before she had set her password
and on the menu it said install vista
and on my old laptop that my dad has it's a 2gb compaq presario
they're not made anymore
it has low memory it's very slow and really
hardly useable without getting very stressed
so if I used the recovery disk I created
and click install vista
will it be like a new laptop?
there's nothing needed on the laptop
so nothing is being lost by resetting the laptop
it's got vista home premium x86
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Feb 20, 2010
I am using Robocopy to backup photos and music files to a local network connected 1TB Western Digital drive. The initial backup worked for both tasks. This is the command line in the .bat Robocopy C:UsersOwnerMusic ecordings \externaldrivepublicBackUp-Music ecordings /S /COPYT /MIR /Log:MusicBkupLog.txt Now, the subsequent backup for my music folders fails on a specific folder with error: ERROR 5 (0x00000005) Deleting Extra File \externaldrivepublicBackUp-Music ecordingsAmbroseNewA Fine Romance-Browne.mp3 Access is denied. The process stops there. Subsequent folders are not backed up. The ownership for that folder looks suspect: nobody (Unix User obody)
Other folders that work have owner as: administrator (EXTERNALDRIVEadmin) I can not change the offending folder's owner. I have tried the following as administrator: Properties > Security > Advanced > Owner > Edit > change owner to I get access denied. And with DOS from an administrator command prompt: takeown /f S:BackUp- MusicRecordingsAmbroseNew RMDIR /S S:BackUp-MusicRecordingsAmbroseNew I get access denied. I can access the directory so my path must be correct: dir S:BackUp-MusicRecordingsAmbroseNew How can I change ownership or delete the offending folder?
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Mar 23, 2008
When I try to connect an external USB hard drive or a USB memory stick to my laptop, Vista throws up a message saying: ???Windows needs to install driver software for your Unknown Device???. I let Vista search, but Vista cannot find the required driver. However, when I connect the same external USB hard drive or a USB memory stick to my desktop PC, also running Vista Ultimate, Vista has no problems recognizing the device and installing the required driver automatically and without throwing up any messages. I suspect that some Vista service(s) on my laptop might be disabled or not functioning properly, but I cannot find out which one could be the cause. Perhaps someone here could point me in the right direction.
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Mar 3, 2009
I recently had a laptop not recognize its own operating system. I figured if I were able to load Windows Vista on to an external hard drive and boot the computer from that external hard drive I should be able to recover some files and major downloads before I reformat the computer. However, Vista instillation will not install through USB2.0. Is there any way to install Vista onto an external hard drive? How and what do I do to get it done?
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