Boot problem, copied Master

[William B. Lurie]

I'm starting a new thread because the earlier problem
has changed. I have a newly formatted Slave drive, onto
which I have *copied* my Master drive using Partition
Magic 8 to copy it. This is not a Drive Image. I don't
want an 'image' that I can use to recreate the original.
I want an *exact copy* of the original, a clone which I can
simply substitute for the original when the Master goes bad.
(Please note that distinction, Michael).

When I reboot, I am able to boot to either drive by changing
target from HDD0 to HDD1 in the BIOS, and software on each
drive is functioning when I boot to it. My next step will be
to try to run the *exact copy* alone on the system, after
I jumper it as the 'Master or single'. When I did all these
steps before, it booted part way into XP, past the black
logo screen, hanging on the first blue XP logo screen, and I
could find no way to do a repair to make it boot further.
That's why I reformatted and copied the drive again, and
tomorrow I will try that next step.

Perhaps somebody who has 'been there, done that' can tell
me that it should work, or, if not, why not.
William B. Lurie

 

[Michael Solomon \(MS-MVP Windows Shell/User\)]

Bill, if you want an exact copy, that's an image. Ironically, a copy is not
an exact copy, an image creates an exact copy.

 

[Pop Rivet]

Don 't have an answer for you, but please keep us posted - I am about to
try something very similar. Best of luck!

Pop

....

 

[William B. Lurie]

Bill, if you want an exact copy, that's an image. Ironically, a copy is not
an exact copy, an image creates an exact copy.

Michael, I have a lengthy commentary in response to your helpful
but paradoxical explanation above. Rather than force everybody to read
it, unless they really want to, I am putting it on my website:

http://bellsouthpwp.net/b/i/billurie/image1.txt

William B. Lurie

 

[Richard]

I'm starting a new thread because the earlier problem
has changed. I have a newly formatted Slave drive, onto
which I have *copied* my Master drive using Partition
Magic 8 to copy it. This is not a Drive Image. I don't
want an 'image' that I can use to recreate the original.
I want an *exact copy* of the original, a clone which I can
simply substitute for the original when the Master goes bad.
(Please note that distinction, Michael).

When I reboot, I am able to boot to either drive by changing
target from HDD0 to HDD1 in the BIOS, and software on each
drive is functioning when I boot to it. My next step will be
to try to run the *exact copy* alone on the system, after
I jumper it as the 'Master or single'. When I did all these
steps before, it booted part way into XP, past the black
logo screen, hanging on the first blue XP logo screen, and I
could find no way to do a repair to make it boot further.
That's why I reformatted and copied the drive again, and
tomorrow I will try that next step.

Perhaps somebody who has 'been there, done that' can tell
me that it should work, or, if not, why not.
William B. Lurie

While the plot thickens! could you please keep the subject going on this
thread ? I am beginning to lose track when you start a new thread from time
to time.

ASFAIK XP insists on having the necessary boot files on the system drive C.
So if you create another disk,by image and restore or direct copy this drive
will be the boot drive but it will need the system drive C to be present
before it can be booted. You can however create a floppy containing the
NTLDR and boot INI files and you should be able to load this and then the
new drive will boot having got the data from the floppy. Not very elegant
but it works.

A better solution is to create a clone of your master drive on a separate
partition and then separately clone the system drive boot sector so the
replacement drive has--- Partition C system drive containing the boot
records and partition D the XP files.

I am not explaining this very well so I will just describe what I use:-
Physical drive C has the system boot files. Physical drive D contains XP.
The system boots and runs normally.
It is also possible when using the floppy,mentioned above, to boot to D
drive bypassing C drive.

Back up is of C and D using Drive image 7 to another partition on a daily
basis and to an external drive weekly.

Yes I have tested it by restoring C and D to two new drives from the
external drive. I did find it necessary to restore D first and then C. I
assume that the D restore wrote something to C which was corrected when C
was restored.

I hope this is of some help .

Richard.

 

[William B. Lurie]

While the plot thickens! could you please keep the subject going on this
thread ? I am beginning to lose track when you start a new thread from time
to time.

ASFAIK XP insists on having the necessary boot files on the system drive C.
So if you create another disk,by image and restore or direct copy this drive
will be the boot drive but it will need the system drive C to be present
before it can be booted. You can however create a floppy containing the
NTLDR and boot INI files and you should be able to load this and then the
new drive will boot having got the data from the floppy. Not very elegant
but it works.

A better solution is to create a clone of your master drive on a separate
partition and then separately clone the system drive boot sector so the
replacement drive has--- Partition C system drive containing the boot
records and partition D the XP files.

I am not explaining this very well so I will just describe what I use:-
Physical drive C has the system boot files. Physical drive D contains XP.
The system boots and runs normally.
It is also possible when using the floppy,mentioned above, to boot to D
drive bypassing C drive.

Back up is of C and D using Drive image 7 to another partition on a daily
basis and to an external drive weekly.

Yes I have tested it by restoring C and D to two new drives from the
external drive. I did find it necessary to restore D first and then C. I
assume that the D restore wrote something to C which was corrected when C
was restored.

I hope this is of some help .

Richard.

Richard, I started a new thred because I felt the old one
was getting too long to follow. Also, I picked up and
summarized so that the old thread didn't have to be present.

I'll save and print out what you wrote, but I'd appreciate
your being a little more explicit. When you use Drive Image 7,
to make the 'copy' ... are you using its DISK COPY mode,
and not Drive Image mode? Gosh, it's nice to know that I'm
not alone in what I'm trying to do!

William B. Lurie

 

[William B. Lurie]

Richard, I started a new thred because I felt the old one
was getting too long to follow. Also, I picked up and
summarized so that the old thread didn't have to be present.

I'll save and print out what you wrote, but I'd appreciate
your being a little more explicit. When you use Drive Image 7,
to make the 'copy' ... are you using its DISK COPY mode,
and not Drive Image mode? Gosh, it's nice to know that I'm
not alone in what I'm trying to do!

And, Michael, let me reprise again: my recreated drive boots
fine when connected as Slave with the reliable drive as Master.
When the recreated drive is jumpered as Master or Single and so
run, it boots past the black Windows logo screen, to the blue
Windows XP logo screen, and hangs there for a couple of minutes
and then gives the (sic) Windows Product Activation error window,
saying "A problem is preventing Windows from accurately checking
the license for this computer. Error code OX80090006".
It is not because it is a copy or an image, it is because something
involved with the activation is standing in the way. I am hoping
that you will tell us how to identify that problem and help us
overcome it. Possibly something is in the boot sector on the old
Master drive which needs to be reinstalled on the clone, maybe it
has to be re-activated by a phone call to a Microsoft number that you
can get for us.

 

[Richard]

Richard, I started a new thred because I felt the old one
was getting too long to follow. Also, I picked up and
summarized so that the old thread didn't have to be present.

I'll save and print out what you wrote, but I'd appreciate
your being a little more explicit. When you use Drive Image 7,
to make the 'copy' ... are you using its DISK COPY mode,
and not Drive Image mode? Gosh, it's nice to know that I'm
not alone in what I'm trying to do!

William B. Lurie

I originally tried using Drive copy but had problems. So I thought through
various disaster scenarios and decided that I was most likely to have an
image to restore from so that is what I use.
Richard.

 

[Michael Solomon \(MS-MVP Windows Shell/User\)]

Unfortunately, I was had to get offline rather quickly last night or I would
have tried to give you a better explanation.

To cut right through this and put it at its most basic level, a copy of a
drive, copies the "contents" of the drive. An image is a sector by sector
duplicate of the drive and, as such as in exact duplicate of the drive.

The reason I made the distinction is you had previously tried a copy and it
wasn't working. It appeared to me that perhaps XP's activation scheme might
be playing a role in your problem as a copy is not an exact physical
duplicate of the original. I'm glad it's working for you now but if you
should have boot issues with that drive, it's possible that cause may be
that the drive is not an exact duplicate. Further, when you posted last
night, you stated you wanted an exact duplicate of everything on the drive
and that's precisely what an image does right down to the sectors. It is
not a difference without a distinction, there is a distinction.

So, to try to bottom line it for you and the rest of the thread, a copy
copies the contents of a drive but an image makes an exact sector by sector
duplicate and that was what you had originally said you wanted. The
implication of your OP in this thread was that a copy was closer to that
than an image. However, it is the reverse.

 

[Michael Solomon \(MS-MVP Windows Shell/User\)]

Yes, I'm of two opinions as to why this happens. Either it recognizes the
second drive as a copy and when used as a single master as it triggers the
activation scheme which then causes the error or it's not happening when the
drive is a slave because it is recognized as a copy on the same system.

In essence, when booted as a master, it appears to XP that it has been
copied to a different computer.

 

[William B. Lurie]

Yes, I'm of two opinions as to why this happens. Either it recognizes the
second drive as a copy and when used as a single master as it triggers the
activation scheme which then causes the error or it's not happening when the
drive is a slave because it is recognized as a copy on the same system.

In essence, when booted as a master, it appears to XP that it has been
copied to a different computer.

Okay, Michael, then I'll narrow it down to two questions:
1. Whatever the cause, you know the mode it's in, and the
error message which I transcribed literally........how
do I get rid of it?
2.Whatever I have there, a copy or an image or a duplicate,
it is exactly what I want. A rose by any other name, my
cousin Will once told me......smells just as sweet. Can
you get me booted to it without the activation error message?

 

[Michael Solomon \(MS-MVP Windows Shell/User\)]

1) I can only surmise the error is the result of using copy instead of
image. Understand, I'm not completely sure as it may simply be an issue of
how it's jumpered but I think it might be a combination as it's seeing the
copy as a different disk.

2) In this case, the rose by a different name is different. An image is a
sector by sector copy of the drive and that makes me think when the system
sees the copy you've created in the mode you describe when the error
appears, it is not seeing it as the same drive as the original. A drive
copy is not a clone or exact duplicate of the original drive, an image is,
hence, if there's a way out of this and I'm not saying for sure this will
resolve it because I've never done anything quite like this before, you'd
have to image the first drive to the second drive not copy the contents
which is all a copy does.

3) I'm surmising this because I've restored countless images to my primary
hard drive, it is of course my only hard drive and the image is an image of
that drive but a different installation. Nonetheless, in all the time I've
been doing it, I've never had the activation issue. When you set this drive
as master, the system is recognizing it as a copy, thus not belonging on
this system as though you had this hard drive with XP installed on another
computer and then tried to install this drive on a different computer. I
can't know for sure if this is a hardware issue caused by having copied as
opposed to cloning (imaging) the hard drive or if this is the nature of the
beast. I'm pretty sure I've seen others who have cloned and swapped drives
meaning they made the drive the master and it booted but the information on
those drives was cloned from the first drive not copied.

4)You lose nothing in an image and actually gain precisely what you had been
seeking, an exact copy of everything on the original drive but I don't know
if that resolves the issue and can't know it until or unless you try it. At
this point, what have you got to lose?

 

[D.Currie]

1) I can only surmise the error is the result of using copy instead of
image. Understand, I'm not completely sure as it may simply be an issue of
how it's jumpered but I think it might be a combination as it's seeing the
copy as a different disk.

2) In this case, the rose by a different name is different. An image is a
sector by sector copy of the drive and that makes me think when the system
sees the copy you've created in the mode you describe when the error
appears, it is not seeing it as the same drive as the original. A drive
copy is not a clone or exact duplicate of the original drive, an image is,
hence, if there's a way out of this and I'm not saying for sure this will
resolve it because I've never done anything quite like this before, you'd
have to image the first drive to the second drive not copy the contents
which is all a copy does.

3) I'm surmising this because I've restored countless images to my primary
hard drive, it is of course my only hard drive and the image is an image of
that drive but a different installation. Nonetheless, in all the time I've
been doing it, I've never had the activation issue. When you set this drive
as master, the system is recognizing it as a copy, thus not belonging on
this system as though you had this hard drive with XP installed on another
computer and then tried to install this drive on a different computer. I
can't know for sure if this is a hardware issue caused by having copied as
opposed to cloning (imaging) the hard drive or if this is the nature of the
beast. I'm pretty sure I've seen others who have cloned and swapped drives
meaning they made the drive the master and it booted but the information on
those drives was cloned from the first drive not copied.

4)You lose nothing in an image and actually gain precisely what you had been
seeking, an exact copy of everything on the original drive but I don't know
if that resolves the issue and can't know it until or unless you try it. At
this point, what have you got to lose?

--
Michael Solomon MS-MVP
Windows Shell/User
Backup is a PC User's Best Friend
DTS-L.Org: http://www.dts-l.org/

I'm jumping in this late, so I don't know the whole history, but I've used
both Drive Image and Ghost to create a duplicate image of one drive onto
another, then successfully booted the new drive without any issues. It
appears to the system as the same drive, and it's got all the proper boot
and activation stuff in place, so it just boots and runs.

Some of the hard drive manufacturer's programs work well, others are pretty
skittish. Or maybe it just depends on the drives and data in question.

There are also come "copy" programs that I've tried, and as you pointed out,
those copy the data from one drive to another, and sometimes that's just not
as effective as doing the image. Files can get dropped, and other things can
go wrong. It can sometimes be fixed by running a repair install and then
reactivating, but that's extra work.

Also, if you do a copy from a working "C" drive (for example) to a "D"
drive, you can end up copying everything, but the boot information is
screwed if you remove the original drive, either because it holds the boot
loader or because the drive designation is different. Instead of being
drive1 where it was as the secondary drive, it becomes drive0 and doesn't
know what to do.

I've also seen some copy programs that do fine with the copying, but if you
don't remove the original drive before rebooting, the new drive becomes D
and stays that way, which pretty much messes things up as far as ever
getting it to boot and run from that copy.

 

[William B. Lurie]

I'm jumping in this late, so I don't know the whole history, but I've used
both Drive Image and Ghost to create a duplicate image of one drive onto
another, then successfully booted the new drive without any issues. It
appears to the system as the same drive, and it's got all the proper boot
and activation stuff in place, so it just boots and runs.

Some of the hard drive manufacturer's programs work well, others are pretty
skittish. Or maybe it just depends on the drives and data in question.

There are also come "copy" programs that I've tried, and as you pointed out,
those copy the data from one drive to another, and sometimes that's just not
as effective as doing the image. Files can get dropped, and other things can
go wrong. It can sometimes be fixed by running a repair install and then
reactivating, but that's extra work.

Also, if you do a copy from a working "C" drive (for example) to a "D"
drive, you can end up copying everything, but the boot information is
screwed if you remove the original drive, either because it holds the boot
loader or because the drive designation is different. Instead of being
drive1 where it was as the secondary drive, it becomes drive0 and doesn't
know what to do.

I've also seen some copy programs that do fine with the copying, but if you
don't remove the original drive before rebooting, the new drive becomes D
and stays that way, which pretty much messes things up as far as ever
getting it to boot and run from that copy.

--
William B. Lurie


Thanks for coming into this, DC.....another voice with
experience is certainly welcome. Now to both you and Michael,
I have to reveal a mitigating circumstance. You may wonder
why I don't just continue to use Drive Image 7 but in Image
mode instead of Copy. While I have been struggling back and
forth as the records show, I have a battle going on with
PowerQuest (now Symantec) In order to restore the original
drive from a Drive Image, it is necessary to boot from their
CD, to get to the PowerQuest Recovery Environment (PQRE). My
computer, for reasons as yet undetermined, will not boot to
the PQRE. I set the BIOS to boot CDROM>>CDROM>>CDROM and stick
in their CD as they told me, and I see on the screen as it
boots, "Boot to CD" followed by "Boot to CD" and then it
ignores their CD and boots to the hard drive. Other CDs it sees.


Now I'm in the waiting mode with them.....I filed the problem,
and I'll get an answer, and it will take time while I sit on
the edge of my chair and chew mynails, and when it gets here,
it's not likely to solve the problem. This whole mess is
Frustration City. I can't recreate from a Drive Image because I
can't boot to PQRE, and I can't recreate from a Drive Copy
because of the Windows Activation confusion. I've been hoping
that Michael could get me a patch to delete that test or get me
around that stumbling block. So I'm stuck with all kinds of
backup software but nothing that works. Grrrr.

 

[Michael Solomon \(MS-MVP Windows Shell/User\)]

Thanks for the information.

 

[D.Currie]

Thanks for coming into this, DC.....another voice with
experience is certainly welcome. Now to both you and Michael,
I have to reveal a mitigating circumstance. You may wonder
why I don't just continue to use Drive Image 7 but in Image
mode instead of Copy. While I have been struggling back and
forth as the records show, I have a battle going on with
PowerQuest (now Symantec) In order to restore the original
drive from a Drive Image, it is necessary to boot from their
CD, to get to the PowerQuest Recovery Environment (PQRE). My
computer, for reasons as yet undetermined, will not boot to
the PQRE. I set the BIOS to boot CDROM>>CDROM>>CDROM and stick
in their CD as they told me, and I see on the screen as it
boots, "Boot to CD" followed by "Boot to CD" and then it
ignores their CD and boots to the hard drive. Other CDs it sees.


Now I'm in the waiting mode with them.....I filed the problem,
and I'll get an answer, and it will take time while I sit on
the edge of my chair and chew mynails, and when it gets here,
it's not likely to solve the problem. This whole mess is
Frustration City. I can't recreate from a Drive Image because I
can't boot to PQRE, and I can't recreate from a Drive Copy
because of the Windows Activation confusion. I've been hoping
that Michael could get me a patch to delete that test or get me
around that stumbling block. So I'm stuck with all kinds of
backup software but nothing that works. Grrrr.

Have you tried a repair install on the almost-working drive? You might need
to reactivate, but that isn't as much a hassle as people make it sound like.

When you're getting that boot from CD message, is there an option to press
some key to get it to boot? Usually that goes by so fast, it's hard to read
and act in the amount of time you have. Even if there isn't a message, try
hitting a key to see if anything happens

Or, if all you need is to get working is the Drive Image software, you could
install XP on a clean drive, install Drive Image, and then use that to get
to the image you need.

 

[D.Currie]

Thanks for the information.

--
Michael Solomon MS-MVP
Windows Shell/User
Backup is a PC User's Best Friend
DTS-L.Org: http://www.dts-l.org/

I've found that copying drives, most of the time, is a flawless operation.
But sometimes, for no good reason, it goes wrong. Sometimes I suspect it's
bad data or bad sectors on the original drive. Running a scandisk and defrag
first is a good idea, as is getting rid of temporary files.

I've found that sometime Ghost works better, sometimes Drive Image works
better, and sometimes the Hard Drive Mfg. software is a better choice.

Since I do thins for a living, I have a few extra tricks up my sleeve that a
normal person wouldn't have available to them. For instance, sometimes it
works better when I put both the old and new drives into another working
machine, booting from neither, and run the copy that way.

Fortunately, most of the time it just works the first time and I don't have
to think much about it, just wait for the copy to finish and plug in the new
drive.

 

[Michael Solomon \(MS-MVP Windows Shell/User\)]

Personally, once cloning (imaging) became available as a relatively
inexpensive option for the purposes of copying a drive, I've found it much
preferable to the copy function for reasons you previously cited.

Now that we have activation to consider, it's all the more important the
system sees such a drive as an exact duplicate, something simply copying the
files doesn't always create. Since the option is there for Bill because he
has an application that supports it, there's no reason for him to use copy
over imaging at least for reasons that he wanted in the first place which
was an exact duplicate.

As you've pointed out to him and I have done the same in a previous thread,
he may have to do a repair install on the cloned drive, at least if he
insists on continuing from where he is and not attempting the image.

I can't speak to his other issue in that regard as it appears to be some
glitch he's having with the Powerquest software and I've not seen that
glitch before.

 

[William B. Lurie]

Personally, once cloning (imaging) became available as a relatively
inexpensive option for the purposes of copying a drive, I've found it much
preferable to the copy function for reasons you previously cited.

Now that we have activation to consider, it's all the more important the
system sees such a drive as an exact duplicate, something simply copying the
files doesn't always create. Since the option is there for Bill because he
has an application that supports it, there's no reason for him to use copy
over imaging at least for reasons that he wanted in the first place which
was an exact duplicate.

As you've pointed out to him and I have done the same in a previous thread,
he may have to do a repair install on the cloned drive, at least if he
insists on continuing from where he is and not attempting the image.

I can't speak to his other issue in that regard as it appears to be some
glitch he's having with the Powerquest software and I've not seen that
glitch before.

You have me pretty well convinced and converted for the future,
Michael. I will stop trying to "copy" and will use "drive image"
just as soon as PowerQuest gives me a way to recreate the drive
from its image. Right now I can make images, but I can't recreate.
Now about the cloned drive I have now....I have nothing to lose by
doing as you say, a repair install on the cloned drive. Could you
lead me to a procedure for it? I believe I have Recovery Console
on that drive already. I believe I can install the cloned drive
as "Master or Single" and boot to Recovery Console. So please give
me instructions. And thank you both.
Bill L.

 

[Michael Solomon \(MS-MVP Windows Shell/User\)]

Just open Drive Image on the drive where you have the application installed,
choose restore, select the image, select the destination, note, you will
have to use the option to first delete the partition to which you wish to
restore the image as it will be restoring a partition. The option is a part
of the drive image application and a step in the restore process.

If everything works as planned, you shouldn't need to use Recovery Console
though, as "D" stated, since the clone will have the boot information from
the drive that is first in line, you may need to rebuild the boot config on
the new drive as follows:
NOTE: The instructions below explain getting to the Recovery Console from
the XP CD, I've never accessed the RC from the hard drive, I assume you do
it from within Windows and it then reboots the system to the RC. If you
can't for some reason, just follow the instructions below and then type the
command:

Place the XP CD in the drive, save your settings and exit. The system will
reboot and should boot from the CD. If you see a message to hit any key in
order to boot from the CD, do so, otherwise, assuming your system supports
it, the system should boot from the CD on its own as it can't find
an OS on the hard drive.

XP Setup will begin by examining your system, don't worry, just let it run,
it's just copying some files to a temp folder. Ultimately, you'll be
brought to a menu. Choose, "Repair a Windows XP installation using the
Recovery Console, press R.

You will be asked for an administrators password. This is not any of the
accounts you've created for XP. It's a hidden system account for which
users are asked only to create a password during setup. Most leave this
blank. If you left it blank, when asked for a password, just leave blank
and press enter.

At the prompt type bootcfg /rebuild and press enter.