Hi all

I hope you understand my english :-) It's not so good. I have the newest StorageCraft Desktop Version. I have a 500GB harddrive with 4 partitions.

Partition 1: WinXP C:\
Partition 2: Data D:\
Partition 3: Vista E:\
Partition 4: Data F:\

I have made from all partitions an image with the backup wizard that was included with the StorageCraft recovery disc. I have startet with the VistaPE the first option when u start with the recovery disc. That was no problem and it looks like everything works fine. I have now a new harddrive. The exactly same harddrive. This harddrive is clean and have no data and partitions on it. Now i have restored all partitions from the backup i have made. When i start now my comuputer with the new harddrive then i see the Boot-Manager from Vista. There i can select Windows XP or Vista for starting. My problem is now, that the Windows XP works fine, but i'm not able to start the Vista. It tells me, that he cant find the \windows\system32\winload.exe . What have i made wrong? Do i need to select a special option when i recover the partitons from the backup? It looks like there is something wrong with the MBR. When u set up the computer from ground up, then u install first Windows XP, and then on the second partition Vista. Vista modify then the MBR so i get the Vista Boot-Manager where i can select Windows XP and Vista for starting. Is there someting i made complete wrong? Windows XP works fine, and i can see the Vista Boot-Manager, but i can only start Windows XP. I hope you have some idea what i can do. I do not want to reinstall my complete machine from ground up. Thank you all for some infos.

Regards
Christian

Hi all

I was able to fix the Boot-Manager problem, with a special tool that can edit the settings in the boot-mager from Vista. Now i can start Vista, but there are an new problem. When Vista have started, then i see the login screen where i can select my profile. When i select my profile, then Vista beginns to work on the harddrive for about 2 minutes, and then it says, it was not able to access the hardware/hardrive and a rundll failure show up. I dont know what the problem is with my image i have made, but it looks like the image is damaged :-( But why im not able to recover the harddrive with a working boot-mager from Vista? I think thats another problem.

Regards
Christian 

Based on the dates this post is way overdue, but it may help anyone reading it.  I have had the same problem.  Windows stores drive/partition information in its registry under HKLM\SYSTEM\MountedDevices.  My experience has been if you change your drive or restore a partition image to a different partition location it cannot resolve the drive letters in this section and it may not boot.  Paragon Software's Partition Manager allows you to boot from a recovery disk and fix this problem by manually assigning the correct drive letters to the Windows registry.  Then all you have to do is reboot and walla, system back to normal.  It has saved my tail time-and-time again!  Well worth the price of $39.95 for the personal edition.  (No I'm not a salesman!  Just a satisfied customer.)

ShadowProtect seems to do the best job at making your life easier when it comes to backing up, and restoring, a Windows based machine. Most of the issues I've encountered are not produced by ShadowProtect, or the images it creates, but by other issues. Dual boot systems (especially with Vista) is a prime example. Just creating a dual boot Vista/XP from CDs can be much more painful than you'd expect. I guess Microsoft didn't expect people to create such systems...... 

There are lots of details on the web about Vista/XP dual boot systems, but many miss out on some critical information, so here are some hints:

(1) Ideally install WinXP (or Win2003, Win2000 etc.), either as a fresh install or restored image, BEFORE installing Vista.
Wh? Because Vista uses a completely different boot loader (Winload.exe) rather than the older version (ntldr, NTDETECT.COM, boot.ini).

(2) Vista needs to go on the first BOOT partition. Vista needs to be in charge of the inital boot up process.
If you install Vista on a machine before WinXP, or have a PC with WinXP already installed, it's best to shrink the WinXP partition and create a Vista partition just before on the disk. If you install Vista on a second hard drive in a PC you can normally change the HD boot order in the BIOS so that HD boots first. That will make sure the Vista boot loader (first boot disk, first partition, BOOT) will load before the WinXP ntldr.

(3) The WinXP boot loader files (ntldr, NTDETECT.COM, boot.ini) ALSO need to be on the first boot partition in order for you to boot WinXP.
However strange this may seem, it means that you must place the WinXP boot loader files on the system root directory of the Vista install, along with the native Vista boot loader, called winload.exe. The boot.ini file should then point to the partition that WInXP is installed on, say, partition 2.

(4) At boot up the PC will use the BIOS to find the first HD to boot from first, reference the MBR (in this case it should be the Vista-centric version), and then load the associated Vista bootloader. This will show the OSs listed in the Vista's BCD database: Vista, and WinXP. If you select Vista it will simply load the Vista OS. If you select WinXP it will drop the Vista bootloader and reload the ntldr from the same directory. This WinXP boot loader will read the boot.ini file and use it to find the location of WinXP to load.

SOME IMPORTANT THINGS TO REMEMBER:

(A) If you install WinXP (from CD) AFTER Vista then it will overwrite the Vista-MBR and Vista will not boot.
In this case, boot into WinXP, download EasyBCD, and use it to (i) overwrite the MBR with a Vista version, (ii) updated the BCD database with an entry for WinXP.

(B) If you install WinXP (from backup image) AFTER Vista then don't select "Over-write MBR". Doing so will overwrite the Vista-MBR.
After performing the restore, boot into Vista. Copy the ntldr, NTDETECT.COM, boot.ini files from the WinXP system root to the Vista system root directory.
Make sure that the boot.ini points to the correct partition number for the WinXP install. Download EasyBCD and update the BCD database to include a reference to the WinXP install (this will produce in the second "Windows XP" boot option appearing on the boot menu.)

(C) If you install (or restore) Vista to anything other than the first partition you're going to have trouble booting it up. Overwriting the MBR with a Vista-MBR and putting the Vista boot loader file (winload.exe) into the first (BOOT) partition probably will not work at all, and may even stop the OS in the first partition from booting up. Always try and put Vista in the first boot partition - it makes things much easier.

(D) If you install Vista (from CD or restore) onto a second HD, use the BIOS to make that the first boot disk. You will then need to copy the WinXP boot loader files to the system root of that disk, updated the Vista BCD with an entry for WinXP (so you get the second boot option on boot up) and then update the boot.ini file, making sure to reference the second disk.

(E) If your PC is running fine, don't be tempted to "try out" a restore by restoring an image of that same OS onto a HD in the same PC. You are asking for trouble. It's good to practice a restore before you need it but just be smart about it.

(F) If you perform a restore of WinXP (or Vista) on a PC, just keep in mind a couple of things. First, Windows will often ask you to activate BEFORE you can log into one of the accounts. If you restore to different hardware you may not have a NIC driver installed......so you can't activate online, and have to call Microsoft in India, and speak to a man called "Dave", to get a new Confirmation ID. If the image came from a PC/laptop with Windows pre-installed, the chances are that it is an OEM license. You will not be able to activate the license (and therefore log on to the restore image) if the motherboard is different to the original PC/laptop.

I will share my experience in case it helps.  I have a system with four partitions as follows:

English 64-bit Vista on C:
Storage on D:
English 32-bit Vista on E:
Japanese 32-bit Vista on F:

The E partition is set as the default boot partition.  I have used ShadowProtect to restore the E: partition.  Every time I restore that partition, the Vista Boot Configuration Data (BCD) gets changed so that I am not able to boot on that partition.  I boot onto another partition and issue the command "bcdedit" in a command prompt window (open the window as administrator) and I can see that the values for "device" and "osdevice" for the partition I recovered are set as "unknown".  That is why I cannot boot to that partition.  I can fix it by issuing he following commands in the command prompt window:

bcdedit /set {default} device partition=E:
bcdedit /set {default} osdevice partition=E:

I created a batch file to run these commands.  This as an adequate workaround for me until we come up with something better.