Hi Loy,
You certainly asked some excellent and pertinent questions.
Unfortunately most people ask them after the fact, i.o.w , they have the failure
and now have to scramble how to restore their saved backup or image.
I wrote a post about cloning (also backup and imaging) programs a while ago
http://listserv.icors.org/SCRIPTS/WA-ICORS.EXE?A2=ind1109&L=pcsoft&F=&S=&P=16144
in which I emphasized the importance of a program that can use- or create a bootable CD
to restore your backup or image.
Win 7 has a good backup utility built in and has the advantage of of being integrated
into the boot menu for restore purposes.
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/What-are-the-system-recovery-options-in-Windows-7
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/Create-a-system-repair-disc
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/668-system-recovery-options.html
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/675-system-image-recovery.html
This is all well and good if your drive is still working AND you have a Win7 installation DVD,
but if neither condition applies, you'd have to resort to 3rd party programs.
Win 7 rescue discs are available here (for a fee) http://systemdiscs.com/
Also here Windows 7 System Recovery disk Live Boot CD 64 bit DVD (disc is comparable with Home Premium, Professional and Ultimate)
http://www.amazon.com/Windows-System-disc-comparable-Professional/dp/B004RDCEQO
Free links are here:
http://thegift73.wordpress.com/2011/05/06/windows-7-repair-disks-and-windows-vista-recovery-disks/ Read the article -Mega-upload links only!!!
They will give you the menu that is similar to the boot menu and will list Repair.
via this you can navigate to the backup image on a USB drive.
Since you were using Drive Image XML you don't have any facility to create a rescue CD
from within the program, but instead ,you're referred to a link how to build one.
They suggest to use (create) a BartPE disc and incorporate the Drive Image XML plugin.
or you could use UBCD4Win
http://www.ubcd4win.com/downloads.htm It includes Drive Image XML
I haven't used either one on Win 7 and would rather use a more compatible Win7 PE
based on the Win7 WAIK.
An example would be here : http://reboot.pro/12427/
There are several of these projects, but they tend to be quite involved and somewhat tricky
for the average user.
I would rather use and recommend to pick a program such as Paragon Backup and Recovery Advanced 2011 http://www.paragon-software.com/home/br-free/
You can create the recovery (Linux based) CD, which is bootable and allow you
to perform many operations, including restore to your hard drive.
Check the manual http://www.paragon-software.com/docs/manual_BR2011FreeAd.pdf
See Restore from local drive page 94
Other options are to use other imaging solutions provided by hard drive mfrs
Western Digital and Seagate/Maxtor if applicable.
Acronis True Image WD Edition Software
http://support.wdc.com/product/downloaddetail.asp?swid=119&wdc_lang=en
Seagate/Maxtor DiscWizard
http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/support/downloads/discwizard
I would recommend to format and possibly partition the new hard drive beforehand
using eg. Partition Wizard
http://www.partitionwizard.com/partition-wizard-bootable-cd.html
I know this is more than a regular post and resembles an article <g>,
but I feel that a simple 2-line answer won't suffice In this case.
I hope it'll help you and others.
Peter E.
--------------------------------------------------
From: "Loy Pressley"
Sent: Sunday, 16 October, 2011 3:39 AM
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: [PCSOFT] Restoring a Backup
*Good afternoon,
I have been using Drive Image XML to image and backup my Win 7 laptop. It
seems to work very well and when I browse the backup I've created all the
files seem to be there. My question concerns restoring files from a backup
when I have a hard drive failure. How do you do it???
Suppose I have a fairly current backup of my hard drive and my hard drive
suddenly fails. I buy a new hard drive and install it in my laptop. Then,
how do I get the files in the backup to restore to the hard drive I've just
installed for that purpose? Will I have to format the new drive before I
restore from the backup? How do I start the restore operation? I lost the
executable copy of Drive Image XML when the old hard drive failed. The
backup itself is not an executable file, so what do I do? Even if I boot
from a CD, I still don't have an executable copy of Drive Image XML to use
to do the restore.
I must be doing something wrong. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Although I believe my question is pertinent to almost any image/backup
software and computer, my system is Win7 Home Premium, 250 Gig hard drive
with lots of empty space and 2 gigs of memory. I'm using Drive Image XML as
my backup software, but I also have Paragon 4.5 and I have the same question
about that backup, too.
Thanks in advance,
Loy*
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