backup image when external usb not an option

hmmmmm was relying on backup imaging program that worked well with the last few PCs I had. However I don't think it likes the graphics card in my new PC. So I can't use the preferred modes on the boot CD. I have to settle for Reduced Graphics Safe Mode. Well, a restore that should take an hour now takes over 8. The external can usually read @25 MB/sec using this restore CD. This restore read @3.1 MB/sec. I can't be running overnight every time I hose my boot partition.

So I'm looking for alternatives. Trouble is it's hard to know what will boot and work until you try it. I'd like to use this restore image, but I might have to bite the bullet and do the all night restore. But for future use I need a quick restore mechanism so I don't have to reinstall stuff.

The other thing is this system has a RAID controller and it shows as "Raid Ready" but no programs that show SMART info can show anything about it. When I try to shrink the Windows partition using Vista or a boot CD with partitioning program, it won't allow creating another partition > 17 GB.. which is useless for storing a backup.

My options are limited. Don't have a Vista Install CD to slipstream or VistaPE.
Looks like backing up this beast is gonna' be one pita unless I find some miracle software.

See my spec profile of system info.

Hi Miles,

Have you tried Macrium - the free version works well for me.

Macrium Reflect FREE Edition - Information and download

Are you using one of the previous versions of Paragon?

I'm using a current version. 9.0 Paragon Drive Backup. For some reason when you boot the CD if you choose the options that let you do anything, the screen goes buggy and it hangs. Maybe it doesn't like this nVidia card. It's real pain to restore at 3 MB/sec man!!! Sheesh!!

The only thing I can figure is there's something going on with this RAID jazz that's preventing me from making partitions as I'm used to. First time I had any raid, so I don't know what's going on with it.

Guess about all I can do is try to make a lean install with enough programs to get me going quickly, and burn a bootable DVD set. Trouble is you don't know what's going to work until you boot up and try to run the restore program. A lousy way to do trial and error.

Thanks for the link.

That's weird, the Paragon 9 series work fine with my 9500gt. No problem with the boot cd's either.

Good luck with the trial and error process.

SIW2 said:

That's weird, the Paragon 9 series work fine with my 9500gt. No problem with the boot cd's either.

Good luck with the trial and error process.

Click to expand...

Do you have a RAID controller?
Seems like it's a big fly in the ointment. I got Marcrium and in the help it says you need a BartPE based rescue CD if you have RAID(I'm talking about when the system is too hosed to restore from Windows of course... that's when you really need it.) Having Vista64 and not a Vista install DVD it's not likely I'd be able to set that up very easily. So it looks like the only viable alternative, until support for this machine propagates, is to lean it down as much as I can and make a DVD bootable restore set. Even then with the RAID the only way I'd know if it was going to work is to try it.

What I need is a slipstreamed Vista64 SP1 without all the trialware crap.
Something you can boot, install, set the time zone and computer name and workgroup and that's that. Without being able to partition the drive it makes it tough to even boot another partition and run the restore from there. What a nightmare!

MilesAhead said:

SIW2 said:

That's weird, the Paragon 9 series work fine with my 9500gt. No problem with the boot cd's either.

Good luck with the trial and error process.

Click to expand...

Do you have a RAID controller?
Seems like it's a big fly in the ointment. I got Marcrium and in the help it says you need a BartPE based rescue CD if you have RAID(I'm talking about when the system is too hosed to restore from Windows of course... that's when you really need it.) Having Vista64 and not a Vista install DVD it's not likely I'd be able to set that up very easily. So it looks like the only viable alternative, until support for this machine propagates, is to lean it down as much as I can and make a DVD bootable restore set. Even then with the RAID the only way I'd know if it was going to work is to try it.

What I need is a slipstreamed Vista64 SP1 without all the trialware crap.
Something you can boot, install, set the time zone and computer name and workgroup and that's that. Without being able to partition the drive it makes it tough to even boot another partition and run the restore from there. What a nightmare!

Click to expand...

Hey Miles, are you sure that you are using RAID?
You should see this when the RAID screen comes after the BIOS screen

It shows a screen that says Raid Ready then some stuff about drive letters. It goes by too quick to read. There's a Windows Service for configuring RAID but I've disabled it as there's only one drive in the system. Thing is though, I think the controller is running my optical drives and I have no idea what will happen if I mess with it.

I've tried 4 or 5 system and drive info programs and none of them can show any info. Says doesn't support SMART. All I can get is AMD 1+0 RAID Ready SCSI Disk Device and that it's Sata 3 Gb/sec 750 GB.

The only progress I've made is I've made some backup images to the external that are only MBR/Partition Table. At least that way if it's just a hosed partition table I should be able to restore in about 1/2 hour. The mouse clicks are so slow it's killer. I need some other kind of MBR/Partition table restore that will run off Key Drive or something that won't crap out because it sees a RAID controller.

MilesAhead said:

It shows a screen that says Raid Ready then some stuff about drive letters. It goes by too quick to read. There's a Windows Service for configuring RAID but I've disabled it as there's only one drive in the system. Thing is though, I think the controller is running my optical drives and I have no idea what will happen if I mess with it.

Click to expand...

This is what is troubling me, I would understand RAID Ready to mean it is possible to install a RAID on the PC. (You could print this on almost all PC's) It might also be no more than a marketing gimmick eg Vista Ready.
It is more than possible to install RAID on one HDD. Apart from the marketing angle I really cant see the point though.

You can use the pause key to stop the display........... anykey = resume

MilesAhead said:

I've tried 4 or 5 system and drive info programs and none of them can show any info. Says doesn't support SMART.

Click to expand...

Lack of smart info is normal from a RAID array

MilesAhead said:

AMD 1+0 RAID Ready SCSI Disk Device and that it's Sata 3 Gb/sec 750 GB.

Click to expand...

This is also interesting as it again points to a RAID device.
RAID 1+0 on a single disk??

MilesAhead said:

The only progress I've made is I've made some backup images to the external that are only MBR/Partition Table. At least that way if it's just a hosed partition table I should be able to restore in about 1/2 hour. The mouse clicks are so slow it's killer. I need some other kind of MBR/Partition table restore that will run off Key Drive or something that won't crap out because it sees a RAID controller.

Click to expand...

It would seem to me that your speed problems are caused by the setup, on a normal PC if you copy from one drive and write to the same drive at the same time (partition to partition) you will get a speed loss. On your set up and I am thinking now RAID you are trying to do this twice, two lots of data along a single cable in both directions

I cant see your PC but I believe that you may have RAID 1+0 on a single disc

My two cents

Either get rid of the RAID completely or add a second disk to it.
When your system is running properly you will be in a much better position to back it up

No I think what's going on is it has to have a Windows driver. Having Vista 64 bit doesn't help because now I can't even make a BartPE restore to use the Paragon BartPE plugin.

The boot CD has to have the Windows driver for the RAID controller and be able to use it. So that kills the Linux-based boot CD. Copy from the USB when Windows is booted is at 24 MB/sec. afaik BartPE only supports 32 bit Windows(I was just at the site) unless somebody modified it.

Looks like all I can do is try some vLite solution. Then I need a way to hot restore my programs and their state. A real pita!! It's ridiculous to have to open up the box just to enable image restores. Really sucks!

I have been looking through the net and a program to back up a RAID array seems to be very hard to find.

Going back a bit,would it maybe be possible to use a defrag program that will consolidate all the files on your drive allowing you to shrink it more? or even to temporarily reduce page file size?
see capture

I tried that. Ran jkDefrag with optimize. The recovery partition was 13 GB I think. So when I blew it away, I expanded the Vista to the full size. When I tried shrink, it only wants to let me shrink 13 GB. That's after turning off swap, deleting pagefile.sys and doing jkDefrag.

I think the only way that may work is to set up a bootable external USB. Then maybe I can copy the image back on quicker. The "safe mode" thing on the Linux boot CD slowed it way down I'm sure. I have an enclosure that's supposed to support booting so I'll take that route and see what happens.

Back in the early '90s when I ran Linux I could make a boot disk. If I couldn't boot off the HD I put the boot disk in, and it booted the Linux install right from the HD. Then when you are running the full Linux you can use utilities to fix up your boot loader or whatnot. It's hard to believe Windows still doesn't have this, like 16 years later!! It would make life a lot easier.

I have been thinking a bit more about your disc I was wrong before about having RAID 1+0 on a single disc I think now it is more like only one disc from a RAID 1+0 set, hence the Raid Ready if you add an identical disc you can rebuild the RAID and run at full speed.

Take this thinking further if you add an external disc and make an exact copy then use a program to synchronize the discs you would then have a bootable back up as the RAID drivers, bootup bits and even the original back up would be copied, rather like the second disc if you rebuild the raid, this would also have everything as it is a mirror disc.

I haven't got a clue about a program to synchronize two discs but hell that's what this forum is for
you only have to ask

I hope this helps

Pooch

pooch said:

I have been thinking a bit more about your disc I was wrong before about having RAID 1+0 on a single disc I think now it is more like only one disc from a RAID 1+0 set, hence the Raid Ready if you add an identical disc you can rebuild the RAID and run at full speed.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the reply. I tried Macrium Reflect paid version. It has a newer Linux Rescue CD than the free version. I did a backup and restore from the external USB last night. The restore took about 90 minutes total for 30 Gig and change image, so that's quite reasonable!! I feel much better now!!

Plus for grins I looked in Disk Management and now it shows me that I can shrink my C: partition down to about 300 GB if I want. When Macrium laid the image back on it must have fixed up my partition table. I had a free space where the restore partition used to be!! Well worth $40!! I think something similar happened to me a couple of years ago. You have to slice off the free space or make a partition or something in advance when you try to make a backup capsule with Paragon. If you just use the wizard and tell it "make a backup capsule" it will say, "sure but you have to reboot now" and then it boots down, but not back up.. and your table is hosed!! I forgot about that. But I remember now!!

Anyway, looks like with this Raid Ready stuff the thing to do is make a Rescue CD for any product you're going to use for backup and boot it, and try to see the HD from the restore program. If there's any glitch, just get another program. The nice thing about the Macrium trial is it lets you do full backup and restores for 30 days so you can actually try it out. The Paragon "trial" downloads are really demos so you can play with the wizards and see how easy it is to use. With Paragon to try before you buy you really need to download the Express free versions to see if they work on your hardware.

Have you considered Windows Home Server w/PP-1 for your backup needs. It will do everything you are looking for and it plays nice with RAID. Further it will run on an older pc if you have on laying around. That way you get a files server / automated backup server with bare metal and raid recovery all in one box for around $100 + 1 old re-purposed pc. you can also connect up to 10 pc's to your home server.

Paragon does work for RAID, but there are limits (same as for Complete PC backup and Restore In Business/Ultimate Versions)

I have a RAID 0, and I have used these.

You cannot-
Install a RAID backup onto a non-RAID hdd setup (or vice versa)
Cannot install the image onto a partition smaller than the one it was created from


for Partitioning the HDD for sizes not allowed by Vista manage utility use This free ISO I uploaded (burn to disk), and boot into it.Paragon Partitioner
burn it with this:BURNCDCC

For futher info on creating partions see:http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/163304-dual-boot-using-free-partitioning-software.html


If this doesnt solve you issue, or you have questions, Ask.