system restore doesnt see backup image when booting from boot disc
I have created a boot disc and I also created a complete system backup of my main C drive and that backup is stored on my second storage drive inside the computer which is my F drive. I wanted to test booting from the boot disc I created to make sure I could see the backup in case i ever needed to do a restore. so I booted from the boot disc and that worked perfectly and I was able to boot into the aomei software. when i attempted to do a restore it said "unable to get the backup information because the image file does not exist, or it cannot be accessed. If the backup task has never been run, you need to execute the backup task firstly." i don't understand why the backup could not be viewed? i even attemped to manually direct it to the file and i was able to see the file when i directed it to my F drive but it still came up with the same error. i then exited the program and booted up normally back into windows and when i went into the aomei software i attempted to explore the backup image and that worked perfectly. so i don't understand why when i booted up using the boot disc aomei wasn't able to see the backup and gave me that error when the backup is obviously there. please help because if this was a real emergency and i needed to restore my computer from my backup it wouldn't of worked. ive attached 2 pictures that i took. these are pictures from when i successfully booted up using the boot disc. it appears to see the backup image as its listed there and thats why i dont understand why i got the error saying it couldnt be accessed. ill wait for your reply, thank you.
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Did I understand correctly that you also did browse to the correct ADI file using then Path option at the bottom in the Restore tab? That is the way to do it. Don't use the Task names part (Upper half) of the screen when booting from bootable media. Drive letters can have changed from booting directly in the OS.
yes, i did also browse and use the path option and i still got the same error. i was able to see the backup file there as it did let me browse to it but when i tried to access it the error i listed came up. the strange thing is when i booted back into windows and used the program to see/explore the backup it worked flawlessly.
I wonder can it have anything to do with Windows access rights on F: disk? What happens if you make a Linux Bootable CD, boot from it and try to restore?
Or copy the image files to another (external) location?
i cant copy the image files to another external location because i dont own an external drive. i only have 2 hard drives in my computer, my main C drive and my backup storage F drive and on that F drive is where i keep the image files. as far as windows access rights on my F drive i dont think that should be an issue because i have used norton ghost in the past as well as macrium reflect and both of those were able to see the image files when i booted up off their boot disks. the reason i dont use ghost anymore is its outdated and stop being supported in 2015 and twice i had issues when trying to do a restore. i dont want to use macrium because their free version doesnt support incrementals.
so i made aomei boot disc using linux and it worked! i was able to see the image file and access it if i wanted to do a restore. not sure why the linux one worked and the windows one didnt? i appreciate your advice and ill keep the linux boot disc to use if i need to do a restore. im not familiar with linux, is using this linux boot disk to do a restore going to be ok and not cause any problems since i do have a windows 7 64bit system? also, is there anything else you can recommend that i could try to get a working windows version boot disk? thank you.
The Linux CD should do the job even for a Windows system. It's only a restore (or clone) no matter what the content of the HDD is.
I mentioned the Linux CD because I thought it has something to do with access rights, which Windows respects but Linux may be not. And so it seems.
I wonder what happens if you copy the image files to another location, with other or standard permission rights. But since you don't own a external drive, may be it will work too when you copy these files to another location on the internal drive. Make a new folder in its root directory.
You can also try making a WinPE boot disk on another PC, maybe on a Win10 PC. I don't think it matters if that is a 32 or 64 bits machine.
hi again johnnyboygo. im ok using the linux boot disk since it appears to work so im not going to worry about copying the files to another location on the internal drive because i want to keep those files on a different drive than my main C drive in case the C drive totally fails and i cant access it.
so i tried making another windows boot disc in case the first one i created had an error and i then booted into aomei using that boot disc. when i attempted to browse to the path of my image file on my F drive i could see the file and when i clicked it and attempted to do a backup this error came up "invalid image file. this file may not be complete or had been damaged or it does not match with the current software version." ive attached a pic so you can see the actual error. while still in boot mode from the windows boot disk i then tried just using the image explore option to see if i could view the image that way and when i tried that i got the old error that said "unable to get the backup information because the image file does not exist, or it cannot be accessed. If the backup task has never been run, you need to execute the backup task firstly." so im not sure why the windows boot disc is not working because the image files are obviously ok and not corrupt because i can view them when using the linux boot disc and i can also view them when i normally boot up into windows and use the aomei utilities to mount the image.
so i guess for now ill just be content that the linux boot disk is working and i hope that if i ever have to restore my system from the image it will work. thanks for all your good help, its sincerely appreciated.
by the way i do have one other question. my screensaver works perfectly and always kicks in with no problem. but when im running an aoimei backup the screensaver NEVER kicks in. this only happens while im running a backup. is this normal and is this something that is known with this software? thanks.
I guess that it is programmed that way. You also don't want an energy saving option to become active when doing a backup. And that affects the screensaver i guess.
When you say "I created a boot disk and booted into aomei using that boot disc" You sound like you created a boot disk with another program and then opened Aomei somehow. I hope i am wrong and you did make a WinPE boot disk from within the Aomei program through the Utilities menu
yes, i made the boot disc using the aomei program using the utilities menu. thanks again for all your good help, its sincerely appreciated.
Did you store the backup image on local drive?
no, the backup image was stored on my 2nd internal F drive which is just used for backups.
Can you send us the log files in WinPE?
im not sure what that means or what youre asking? can you give me the steps to get the log files in winpe so i can do this for you, thank you.
It seems a little difficult to give you the steps here, please contact [email protected] via email, we will send you a step by step instruction.