How do you back up Windows itself?

[benali72]

Well, I learned a lot about backups from everyone's answers in the previous thread, so I hope you all don't mind if I try another question ....

How do you back up Windows itself? Do Acronis or Windows Backup do this? I'm wondering how people back up the OS itself rather than their data, so that they can recover Windows from backup media.

Thank you.

[I D Shukhov]

Well, I learned a lot about backups from everyone's answers in the previous thread, so I hope you all don't mind if I try another question ....

How do you back up Windows itself? Do Acronis or Windows Backup do this? I'm wondering how people back up the OS itself rather than their data, so that they can recover Windows from backup media.

Thank you.

Windows backup backs up the system image by default.

Windows backup does do incremental backups on the user files.  Maybe it backs up the entire system image.  Anyway, it doesn't take all that long.  I know because it will not run if the machine is hibernating, which of course it does at 3 am.  So when I would turn it on at 7:30 am it would start backing up.   In the task scheduler, you can select "Wake the computer to run this task", which you would think would be the default for the backup task.  At any rate, by checking it off you'd think it would fix the problem, which it didn't.  I created a task to wake the computer up and run a windows command: whoami.exe, at 2:59 am,  and this does wake the computer up and backup runs when it's supposed to now.

Windows backup recommends that you use an external drive and lists pros and cons vs. internal.  I put the drive in my box, mostly to reduce clutter.  I figure it will stay there for the length of time I use the machine.  The drive has a 5-year warranty.

[Carrie Cobol]

Maybe a better question is can you RESTORE the Windows system from a backup.  To my knowlege:  no.  Correct me if I'm wrong since it's been a few years since I last needed to try that.  But at that time you couldn't, and after a career working on VMS where you CAN restore the system image from tape, I found that to be utterly useless and archaic.

On the other hand... I think you could use Ghost to "backup" your image!

[Richardk]

You should be able to since that's the whole point but have you actually tried to do it? Your backup might not be good or the process might be "broken". Also with most system backups, you MUST restore to the same machine. I wonder if that's a hard rule or will a similar machine work as well?

Also do you have your Windows restore disc's? A lot of new machines don't even provide those anymore.

I haven't used Ghost in a long time but with any image backup, isn't the assumption that you're always going back to the same machine?

[benali72]

>>>>> you MUST restore to the same machine. I wonder if that's a hard rule or will a similar machine work as well?

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe you can not restore to a similar machine. This is because of Windows' Activation technology. A Windows install binds itself to the particular hardware you have, based on the serial numbers for the mb, install disk, etc., and cannot be changed. Therefore you must not only restore to the same system, but even to the same hard disk. So if you had a disk failure you would have to restore the Windows image, then call MS for a new activation key.

>>>>> Maybe a better question is can you RESTORE the Windows system from a backup

Yes, this is really my original question. I assume with Windows you can buy a backup software product (or use Windows Backup), and backup a system image. Then you can restore it to the exact same hardware without reactivation.

This gives some protection from software problems if Windows gets messed up and you want to restore it to the state of a backup image, but it gives you no protection from hardware failure since that would require changing Activation-required components.  But what I've heard is that in this case you could call MS and request reactivation, and they generally say ok and give you a new key for your updated hardware.

 Again, I'm the guy who asked the question, so please correct me if I'm wrong. Thanks.

[The Gorn]

Ok, here's exactly the way this works. Let me step through it so everyone understands exactly how this works.

With Windows Backup, I am almost positive that if you had a blank system, you must first install Windows to it, in order to have a means to then restore the Windows Backup set. In other words I am fairly certain that the tools that come with Windows Backup are just about nil, it does not support the concept of a restore to a formatted hard  drive, and all that Windows Backup is really doing is safeguarding your data. It assumes that Windows is always available.

Acronis has a broader "mission." An Acronis backup set can be restored to the blank hardware, such as a formatted hard drive. All you need is the backup set data and a means to read it, such as a network connection, USB or a set of backup DVDs. Acronis will prepare for you a CD that is used as a boot CD and which contains a cut down version of Acronis that will restore from backup media.

Acronis supports something called "universal restore". This means that a full backup set, including ALL registry information, from a system can be restored to different but compatible hardware. IE, in theory you could back up an x64 Intel system and restore that data to an x64 AMD system.

How this works: Acronis tweaks the backup set created with universal restore to suppress the machine specific stuff in the registry. The next time Windows is run, it will find the new hardware environment and will install or ask for drivers as necessary. There's no magic to this. But "universal restore" is a proprietary Acronis feature that you can add when you buy the product.

How re-activation works: YES, restoring Windows to different hardware WILL trigger activation. In fact, even MS Office components will bug you to reactivate the next time that they are run after a restore to new hardware. All that universal restore does is insure that Windows can start and run its GUI and can get to most core system devices when it starts up on new hardware.

[Richardk]

>With Windows Backup,...

I wonder if they make that clear? If it said I was doing a system backup, I'd naturally assume I could restore it to a blank system.

The Acronis "universal restore" option is well worth it considering how much time you'd spend reinstalling everything without it.

[The Gorn]

I did a little Google - a search for Windows Backup boot disk or "bootable" only returns results for creation of a Windows recovery disk. Which is bootable but is NOT usable as a restore tool. Recovery console is only intended to be used to fix startup problems in an intact version of Windows.

So I didn't miss anything. I assumed that Microsoft's bundled tools were pathetic and limited beyond belief and I was rewarded for my correct assumption. You have to use a third party tool in order to restore to blank hardware.

Why should MS make that clear? You're assuming. That the tool is useful. MS doesn't assure anything of the sort. That is for an add-on.

[The Gorn]

BTW, to correct another possible misconception:

Acronis Universal Restore only deals with restoring to foreign hardware. If you know that you will never attempt that and will only restore the full backup to the same hardware, you can save the $20 and not add on Universal Restore.

The base Acronis product provides full bootable restores.

[Richardk]

Acronis Universal Restore only deals with restoring to foreign hardware. If you know that you will never attempt that and will only restore the full backup to the same hardware, you can save the $20 and not add on Universal Restore.

Yeah but when does that happen? If your system crashed, it did so for a reason. What are the odds that you'll be able to find the EXACT same piece of hardware that needs to be replaced?

[The Gorn]

That's entirely your call and your decision.

Me, I bought Universal Restore for those specific reasons.

However, you can *also* make the argument that the OS that you're backing up will be superceded by the time your existing hardware is out of service, which makes Universal restore not that big a deal.

For example, I have an Acronis set made with Universal Restore for my old Windows XP 32 bit box but I am not terribly interested in restoring it to a new machine. Windows XP and 32 bit OSs are both on the way out. I used the backup set from that machine to seed my current machine with all of my data, thereby ignoring even the non hardware specific registry data that Acronis captured. Then I reinstalled all of the apps I needed.

I think Universal Restore would make the most sense as a site license for an IT support organization that was managing dozens of PCs and up. So they could seamlessly migrate users to new boxes with minimal downtime when they suffered catastrophic failure.

I just figured, in my case... it could happen... $20 to make transferral to a new system seamless... seems like a good "bet" to me.

[Richardk]

I just figured, in my case... it could happen... $20 to make transferral to a new system seamless... seems like a good "bet" to me.

That was my point. I've had a motherboard go bad on a new machine some time back. Say they fix it and as a "bonus" they bump you up one version or maybe it's not available anymore. Without universal restore, odds are good that you'd have a problem.

[I D Shukhov]

I just figured, in my case... it could happen... $20 to make transferral to a new system seamless... seems like a good "bet" to me.

That was my point. I've had a motherboard go bad on a new machine some time back. Say they fix it and as a "bonus" they bump you up one version or maybe it's not available anymore. Without universal restore, odds are good that you'd have a problem.

First of all, thanks to Goddard for clearing up the differences between Windows Backup and Acronis. 

If the motherboard changes and the rest of the machine stays the same, would the machine maybe not boot from your old HD?  Would you possibly have to do a restore in this case?

[The Gorn]

If the motherboard changes and the rest of the machine stays the same, would the machine maybe not boot from your old HD?  Would you possibly have to do a restore in this case?

YES. Absolutely yes to both questions.

Windows (everything from NT onward) "burns in" the hardware profile into the registry when Windows is installed. If you change the motherboard, the OS that is on the hard drive simply does not know how to talk to the new hardware.

That is where a new Windows install, or a restore prepared with a tool like Universal restore, comes into the picture. When the OS starts to run on the new motherboard, it has to know to "forget" the old hardware configuration, and to start to identify and pick up drivers specific to the new hardware.

[I D Shukhov]

If the motherboard changes and the rest of the machine stays the same, would the machine maybe not boot from your old HD?  Would you possibly have to do a restore in this case?

YES. Absolutely yes to both questions.

Windows (everything from NT onward) "burns in" the hardware profile into the registry when Windows is installed. If you change the motherboard, the OS that is on the hard drive simply does not know how to talk to the new hardware.

That is where a new Windows install, or a restore prepared with a tool like Universal restore, comes into the picture. When the OS starts to run on the new motherboard, it has to know to "forget" the old hardware configuration, and to start to identify and pick up drivers specific to the new hardware.

I think I'll get the Plus Pack version.