Thanks for asking. Here's what's occurred, already:
My old Inspiron One started balking. I failed to take a hint, until it died, all together, reporting that it could not even see the hard drive. I left it sit overnight, and that seemed to allow it to boot up normally the next day. It ran all day, after running a Windows fix to the hard drive, while I still failed to read the writing on the walls and simply do a straightforward copy of the files I wanted.
The next day, it gave me a BSOD, saying something about a KERNEL error. That was followed up with yet another missing hard drive message. I let it sit for hours, before I was once more able to reboot it. I then did a recovery disk, (about 6 or 7GB,) and let Windows itself do a Windows Back-up, (about 61GB.)
At that point, since I had paid the money to upgrade that pesky Dell Data Safe software to the Premium version, I attempted to let it do a complete Dell Date Safe back-up. (I had one of those from a couple of months ago, with whatever files it saves. And I'm assuming that it saves everything, from Dell's partition, to programs and program files like pics, vids, and docs.)
At that point, it just wouldn't reboot. So a couple of days later, I contacted Best Buy and brought it to the Geeks. (I had bought a 4-year Black Tie Plan and only had the PC seven months.)
BB had it for five days, after diagnostics told them it would have to go into their repair facility. They replaced the hard drive, and reinstalled the initial software. (Dell's stuff and Win 7 Home Premium 64-bit,) and called me to pick it up.
When I got to the store, I asked them to boot it up for me, to see how it started out. It died, then and there. they went and put another hard drive into it while my wife and I blew hours around the town, waiting. I pickexd it up after seeing it boot just fine. Within minutes of getting it home, it doed, saying it was intializing teh hard drive to do a dump. That screen never chenged, so I knew could not see the hard drive, again.
I called BB. At that time they said that they'd call that three strikes, and that something other than a hard drive was bad. I was allowed to use the BB Black Tie plan to get a replacement with "comparable technology." I did some research, overnight, to decide which Dell I'd want, or if I'd go for an HP or Toshiba, which has USB 3.0, which I just know I will really want from now on.
I went back to the store, gave them the dead PC, and they told me I could have one of the Gateways. I had built a special crate for the Dell, for when we're on the road in our fifth-wheel. That PC, (as well as the HPs,) wouldn't fit into that crate. So I pressed for getting my entire cost of the dead PC back, and managed to get a deal that allowed me to trade up to the new Dell, which has a different/faster processor, and pretty muich the rest of the same stuff the dead PC had.
So I now have the old, (and have made one from the new,) PC's recovery disk, and the old Windows Back-up files, and simply want what I had on the dead PC to be installed on the new PC. But I'm getting a feeling that the Windows back-up merely copies Windows files, leaving all my valuable stuff to rot. Plus, It doesn't copy the installed programs and settings, leaving me to have to do all that copying and setting up, and downloading updates, etc, all over again.
I simply need to know if, (absent the old PC and its hard drive,) I have what it'd take to use what I now have, from the last possible moment, l to get back to uising the new PC the way I used the old one, without the downloading and updating hassle.
Dell DataSafe will only use what is in the recovery partition, but that's on the hard drive.
If the hard drive failed, I would use a Live KNOPPIX 5.1.1 CD to boot from and get the files off the computer. I used a External burner to burn the files and folders to a disk. You could also use a flash drive.
The computer will not have the programs you installed come back. They'll need to be installed manually. You need the hard drive replaced with a new hard drive. If this was a Dell Warranty, then would send the hard drive with the image, you install it and it automatically installs the operating system. Not sure what BB's policy is.
You could try using a third party software to try to copy the image, but there are not guarentees.
If the computer is regertered with Dell, you could Request Backup Disks USA if in another Country, contact Dell Tech Support in your Country.
Reinstalling Windows 7 is a VERY different experience to reinstalling XP.
As far as Windows System Image ...
It creates an actual image of the entire C: drive (programs, settings, personal data on C:, etc.) ... if a System Image is all you did. If you have a separate drive for data, that is not included in the system image ... you would have had to set up File Backups to protect that data (File Backups WITH a System Image are the defaults in Windows 7 Backup).
To restore that image, you should just be able boot to a Windows DVD, choose Repair your computer, and one of the options will be to Restore from a System Image, which will then copy data to your drive.
As most image backups are intended to restore the same computer after a crash, the process may vary restoring to different hardware. In any case - worst case, you should be able to reinstall a fresh install (around 10-15 minutes, then 2 hours for updates on a 7Mbps Internet connection), then once installe, you should be able to "mount" the System Image and copy the data over manually. The System Image is just a VHD file that can be "mounted" in Disk Management (right-click Computer, Manage, Storage).
The previous steps may be required if Windows does not have the drivers for the new/target computers' storage device. As you mentioned, there may be a substantial difference in other hardware and devices. Except for the storage controller, these are fairly easy to take care of - of those that Windows 7 doesn't already have drivers for.
You may also need to re-activate Windows using the Product Key on the new/target computer, as the different hardware will kick off the activation wizard. There is also a possibility that it will not activate automatically and you would need to call to activate by phone.
The chance to get anything off the original hard drive, (which may have actually been OK, but for some other possible system board trouble,) on the old Inspiron One was was never an option for me, since that was replaced at Best Buy's repair facility, prior to the second apparent hard drive problem that inspired their letting me use the Black Tie Plan to replace the thing with this new Inspiron One.
The drive is someplace old drives go to die, I suppose. And I do hope they wiped it, or made certain no data could ever be retrieved from it by some styranger.
I've been doing a load of Googling on Windows 7's back-up and restore functions.
It's getting to appear as though I can actually use Restore to go to the back-up image I made on the external hard drive, and actually select the directories or files I want to copy to the new Inspiron One. It will also allow me to select a single user's files, or all users' files, (Libraries,) as well.
It almost seems as though I will be able to copy the program files, as well.
My only worry, without attempting it, is that with the new system, there might be the old system's drivers that might also be copied over, if I chose to retsore the entire image, that will cripple the new PC.
I've got a couple other things on my plate, right now, and can't dig into this process entirely as needed. But when I discover whether my programs will also be retsored, without a bunch of hassle, I'll make sure to post it, here.
So far, the Windows 7 restore functions are a vast improvement over the old XP, and even when compared to Vista's functions.
I hope this doesn't deter someone from piping up, if they' ve actually had a similar experience, and want to share. Surely something like this has happened to many other people.
For anyone who finds him/herself stuck high and dry by the advertised virtues of the abilities of Windows 7 Home Premium 64-Bit OS to get to and retrieve individual, files, I finally managed to stumble upon the solution that seems to mystify and stupefy readers, here.
While I'm sure the entire old PC's image could have been installed upon the new PC's hard drive, (I can only assume as much at this juncture, since that's not what I wanted to do,) one cannot use that OS to browse the files in the image file, (a ".vhd" Virtual Hard Drive file type,) using the installed Microsoft OS, there are some utilities that can be freely downloaded from the 'Net, that will allow you to get to the files contained in the image file.
I managed to download from jmedved.com, a utility called "VHD ATTACH," (I copied the latest version,) that allowed me to "attach" the .vhd file that was on my external drive, which then allowed me to use Windows' Disk Explorer to browse and copy the necessary files to my new PC's hard drive.
I now have all my desired files residing upon the new PC.
I will never use Windows' Back-Up as the sole method of saving files on my hard drive, in case of future catastrophes. I'm still angry with the Geek Squad, and Microsoft. More so with Microsoft, because their documentation is still misrepresenting their OS' capabilities. And it seems that somewhere along the line, many forum residents have drunk the MS KoolAid, and sing their tune about Windows' Back-Up and Restore. Or, they just blindly lash out against "the man" and tell folks that there is no possible way to help themselves.
With as many people finding themselves with a relatively useless Windows Image File, when they're attempting to retrieve their allegedly saved files, you'd think there'd be more chatter more easily located about what it really takes to fix things.
I hope this lesson helps someone, sometime. I sure learned a lot.
That's what I was seeing in the many documents offered up by MS and many forums about Windows 7.
That's not what I found out when following MS's documents to get to view files in the Image File that I had created. This Windows configuration didn't believe it existed, apparently.
It could be that perhaps when the Geek Squad at Best Buy set this new PC up, installing the Dell partition, and its Windows 7 Home Premium features, they may have pted out of whatever it would take to allow me to have followed what I was reading, and actually see the results I was assured I'd get.
I suppose this might just be something one has to undergo, personally, to learn the truth about. What I do know is that I managed, despite many obstacles, to get around the situation I found myself in, through no fault of my own. And one I am just guessing that a large percentage of PC owners have been facing when their old system goes to the graveyard, and they acquire a new system, without OEM disks to allow them to install the exact same Windows copy the old machine used to create its back-up image from.
I'm still surprised that there isn't any more documentation or shared experiences like this on line. I can't really be alone in this.
Maybe Geek Squad somehow messed it up, but it works as designed on over 50 workstations at work and on three at home.
Notice in the screenshot I have the VHD attached in Disk Management, and its contents displayed in Windows Explorer. The image itself can be restored as a whole in a couple of different ways - or the image can be browsed for individual files to restore (as in the above picture). I'm not saying you are alone in your troubles - I have heard of the occasional problem - but all-in-all, I think most users are happy with Windows 7 Backup.
I agree that it might be the Geek Squad who somehow fudged the installation. Ideally, I would have preferred to get a full Windows 7 Home Premium Disk, when I get a new PC. (The Dell doesn't even come with a single disk of any sort!) Long ago, I bought an OEM disk, after building my own Windows XP Pro PC. That was then. But now, when one buys a store-bought PC, one usually gets the OS pre-installed. Though they usually are able to do the customer set-up on their own, as I did with my now-dead Dell All In One.
I saw what you showed in that screen shot in many of the articles and Windows docs about Virtual Disk Management. And a whole lot of those articles pointed out how that feature comes in their Server OS, as well as the references to Windows 7. (I presume Server is what the workstations you referred to use. I don't know if you three home PCs do, though. Probably not.) I have to admit that the links to the "free MS Virtual Disk Management Tool" were dated. (Two years old.) So when I went to MS's website, the links failed, and I could not find a single offering at the MS download pages, where I might attempt to download and install that tool, and do my own work.
So I ended up using a free utility crafted by someone else, (and maybe absorbed at some point by MS so that it was what I was seeing referred to...I don't know,) which allowed me to do what I was led to believe I should have been able to do, all along, with this MS OS.
And, again, as a refresher: I had one validated copy of Windows 7 Home Premium, on an AMD-powered Dell, that had made a back-up of its own system. It might just be that trying to use a completely different validated copy of Windows 7 Home Premium, on an Intel-powered Dell, to go poke around and actually utilize that old back-up, is now somehow verboten by MS's own grand plan. Though I dunno.
All I know is it's not as easy as advertised, when one finds themselves in what surely has to be a very common situation, given today's propensity of pre-installed Windows 7 operating systems on PCs that surely aren't made to last a lifetime, like my old XP Pro system was.
I've already copied my individual files to two different external drives. I will go through the motions of making the Windows image, just in case there is some failure on this Dell that will result in me getting the same basic hardware back, again.
Most OEM's (Dell, HP, Acer, etc.) anymore do not supply reinstallation DVD's - starting with Vista, and with 7, it is all but standard practice. This irritates the heck out of me, and there is no good reason for them NOT to include a disk that can't cost them more than 20 cents to make. That said, you can order a replacement disk at the time of order (if ordering directly from Dell) or afterwards for a small fee (any where from free to $20). Alternatively, you can use a Retail Windows DVD (available from Digital River's website - a Microsoft Online Partner) to install a fresh installation of Windows 7. Automatic Activation will fail, but a 2-minute phone call to Microsoft will get it activated.
When I say "workstation", I only mean a business-class system (Dell's Optiplex PC's). Workstations vary from a regular PC in the HARDWARE features and tools used to manage them in an enterprise environment. It runs the same Windows 7 software that a desktop or laptop PC uses. Server OS's (Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2) are completely different, although 2008 R2 also has the same Backup program integrated into it. While they are built on the same kernel as client OS's, they have many more software features built-in for business environment use (Active Directory, DNS, DHCP, Terminal Services, IIS, etc.) that client OS's do not have ... and are also designed for different hardware (servers - high performance and redundant computers).
Windows 7 has full support for VHD - creating, attaching, and some versions can even boot to a VHD file.
I'll be poking around to see why I couldn't browse my old PC's back-up, given all the advertised features that claim it can in this OS.
The mentions of "Server" I was making, weren't meant to say I'd have to have a full legal copy of an MS Server OS. The articles I was reading made it seem as though that Virtual Disk Management Tool, as found in Server, was available free, as what I would call a utility, for anyone, with what seemed to be running what was implied to be XP, Vista, or Windows 7.
I was reading under the documentation for the "Back-Up & Restore" in Windows 7, that I would be able to simply use Disk Explorer and click on the back-up image .vhd file, and it'd look to me exactly like those screen shots you put up, like any other Windows Hard Drive. When all the variations of using Back-Up & Restore failed, I even tried to find plain old "Disk Management" on this PC. I must have missed a step, but I couldn't even get that option to drop down.
I'm not a computer newbie. I'm not a software wizard, either. But I am persistent. I'm old enough to have lived through several versions of Windows, and MS's increasingly rapid lack of support for previous versions. I was starting to think that maybe this was just another one of those things, (like some of what were referred to when various Windows screw-ups happened,) that were referred to as "Unadvertised Features," but in reverse, where it used to be there, but now it's not.
Thanks for participating. Hopefully, I won't be needing to darken the forum's pages with another whine for a while now. Though...I would love it to find a good way to remove the shortcuyt arrows from my desktop. I loved TweakUI for XP. That was the sole reason I bothered to download it. But there seems to be no Windows 7 version of that. And from what I read and tried, initially, I'm not sure I have the wisdom and expertise to do what it takes to wipe that pesky "feature" out. I'd still love to know why MS insists upon placing that annoyance over what is, created willfully by customer effort, an obvious shortcut.
PudgyOne
9 Legend
•
30.3K Posts
0
November 4th, 2011 03:00
Steve,
Do you have all your files and folders backed up?
Try running the full Diagnostics and report back any error message. How to Run the Dell™ Diagnostics Utility
Let's see the error code(if any) then proceed from there.
Is the computer under warranty?
Rick
Gyro1949
8 Posts
0
November 4th, 2011 11:00
Rick,
Thanks for asking. Here's what's occurred, already:
My old Inspiron One started balking. I failed to take a hint, until it died, all together, reporting that it could not even see the hard drive. I left it sit overnight, and that seemed to allow it to boot up normally the next day. It ran all day, after running a Windows fix to the hard drive, while I still failed to read the writing on the walls and simply do a straightforward copy of the files I wanted.
The next day, it gave me a BSOD, saying something about a KERNEL error. That was followed up with yet another missing hard drive message. I let it sit for hours, before I was once more able to reboot it. I then did a recovery disk, (about 6 or 7GB,) and let Windows itself do a Windows Back-up, (about 61GB.)
At that point, since I had paid the money to upgrade that pesky Dell Data Safe software to the Premium version, I attempted to let it do a complete Dell Date Safe back-up. (I had one of those from a couple of months ago, with whatever files it saves. And I'm assuming that it saves everything, from Dell's partition, to programs and program files like pics, vids, and docs.)
At that point, it just wouldn't reboot. So a couple of days later, I contacted Best Buy and brought it to the Geeks. (I had bought a 4-year Black Tie Plan and only had the PC seven months.)
BB had it for five days, after diagnostics told them it would have to go into their repair facility. They replaced the hard drive, and reinstalled the initial software. (Dell's stuff and Win 7 Home Premium 64-bit,) and called me to pick it up.
When I got to the store, I asked them to boot it up for me, to see how it started out. It died, then and there. they went and put another hard drive into it while my wife and I blew hours around the town, waiting. I pickexd it up after seeing it boot just fine. Within minutes of getting it home, it doed, saying it was intializing teh hard drive to do a dump. That screen never chenged, so I knew could not see the hard drive, again.
I called BB. At that time they said that they'd call that three strikes, and that something other than a hard drive was bad. I was allowed to use the BB Black Tie plan to get a replacement with "comparable technology." I did some research, overnight, to decide which Dell I'd want, or if I'd go for an HP or Toshiba, which has USB 3.0, which I just know I will really want from now on.
I went back to the store, gave them the dead PC, and they told me I could have one of the Gateways. I had built a special crate for the Dell, for when we're on the road in our fifth-wheel. That PC, (as well as the HPs,) wouldn't fit into that crate. So I pressed for getting my entire cost of the dead PC back, and managed to get a deal that allowed me to trade up to the new Dell, which has a different/faster processor, and pretty muich the rest of the same stuff the dead PC had.
So I now have the old, (and have made one from the new,) PC's recovery disk, and the old Windows Back-up files, and simply want what I had on the dead PC to be installed on the new PC. But I'm getting a feeling that the Windows back-up merely copies Windows files, leaving all my valuable stuff to rot. Plus, It doesn't copy the installed programs and settings, leaving me to have to do all that copying and setting up, and downloading updates, etc, all over again.
I simply need to know if, (absent the old PC and its hard drive,) I have what it'd take to use what I now have, from the last possible moment, l to get back to uising the new PC the way I used the old one, without the downloading and updating hassle.
Thanks,
Steve
PudgyOne
9 Legend
•
30.3K Posts
0
November 4th, 2011 15:00
Steve,
Dell DataSafe will only use what is in the recovery partition, but that's on the hard drive.
If the hard drive failed, I would use a Live KNOPPIX 5.1.1 CD to boot from and get the files off the computer. I used a External burner to burn the files and folders to a disk. You could also use a flash drive.
The computer will not have the programs you installed come back. They'll need to be installed manually. You need the hard drive replaced with a new hard drive. If this was a Dell Warranty, then would send the hard drive with the image, you install it and it automatically installs the operating system. Not sure what BB's policy is.
You could try using a third party software to try to copy the image, but there are not guarentees.
If the computer is regertered with Dell, you could Request Backup Disks USA if in another Country, contact Dell Tech Support in your Country.
Rick
theflash1932
9 Legend
•
16.3K Posts
0
November 4th, 2011 16:00
Reinstalling Windows 7 is a VERY different experience to reinstalling XP.
As far as Windows System Image ...
It creates an actual image of the entire C: drive (programs, settings, personal data on C:, etc.) ... if a System Image is all you did. If you have a separate drive for data, that is not included in the system image ... you would have had to set up File Backups to protect that data (File Backups WITH a System Image are the defaults in Windows 7 Backup).
To restore that image, you should just be able boot to a Windows DVD, choose Repair your computer, and one of the options will be to Restore from a System Image, which will then copy data to your drive.
As most image backups are intended to restore the same computer after a crash, the process may vary restoring to different hardware. In any case - worst case, you should be able to reinstall a fresh install (around 10-15 minutes, then 2 hours for updates on a 7Mbps Internet connection), then once installe, you should be able to "mount" the System Image and copy the data over manually. The System Image is just a VHD file that can be "mounted" in Disk Management (right-click Computer, Manage, Storage).
The previous steps may be required if Windows does not have the drivers for the new/target computers' storage device. As you mentioned, there may be a substantial difference in other hardware and devices. Except for the storage controller, these are fairly easy to take care of - of those that Windows 7 doesn't already have drivers for.
You may also need to re-activate Windows using the Product Key on the new/target computer, as the different hardware will kick off the activation wizard. There is also a possibility that it will not activate automatically and you would need to call to activate by phone.
Gyro1949
8 Posts
0
November 4th, 2011 19:00
Rick,
The chance to get anything off the original hard drive, (which may have actually been OK, but for some other possible system board trouble,) on the old Inspiron One was was never an option for me, since that was replaced at Best Buy's repair facility, prior to the second apparent hard drive problem that inspired their letting me use the Black Tie Plan to replace the thing with this new Inspiron One.
The drive is someplace old drives go to die, I suppose. And I do hope they wiped it, or made certain no data could ever be retrieved from it by some styranger.
Thanks, anyway.
Steve
Gyro1949
8 Posts
0
November 4th, 2011 20:00
Flash,
I've been doing a load of Googling on Windows 7's back-up and restore functions.
It's getting to appear as though I can actually use Restore to go to the back-up image I made on the external hard drive, and actually select the directories or files I want to copy to the new Inspiron One. It will also allow me to select a single user's files, or all users' files, (Libraries,) as well.
It almost seems as though I will be able to copy the program files, as well.
My only worry, without attempting it, is that with the new system, there might be the old system's drivers that might also be copied over, if I chose to retsore the entire image, that will cripple the new PC.
I've got a couple other things on my plate, right now, and can't dig into this process entirely as needed. But when I discover whether my programs will also be retsored, without a bunch of hassle, I'll make sure to post it, here.
So far, the Windows 7 restore functions are a vast improvement over the old XP, and even when compared to Vista's functions.
I hope this doesn't deter someone from piping up, if they' ve actually had a similar experience, and want to share. Surely something like this has happened to many other people.
Thanks,
Steve
Gyro1949
8 Posts
0
November 16th, 2011 20:00
For anyone who finds him/herself stuck high and dry by the advertised virtues of the abilities of Windows 7 Home Premium 64-Bit OS to get to and retrieve individual, files, I finally managed to stumble upon the solution that seems to mystify and stupefy readers, here.
While I'm sure the entire old PC's image could have been installed upon the new PC's hard drive, (I can only assume as much at this juncture, since that's not what I wanted to do,) one cannot use that OS to browse the files in the image file, (a ".vhd" Virtual Hard Drive file type,) using the installed Microsoft OS, there are some utilities that can be freely downloaded from the 'Net, that will allow you to get to the files contained in the image file.
I managed to download from jmedved.com, a utility called "VHD ATTACH," (I copied the latest version,) that allowed me to "attach" the .vhd file that was on my external drive, which then allowed me to use Windows' Disk Explorer to browse and copy the necessary files to my new PC's hard drive.
I now have all my desired files residing upon the new PC.
I will never use Windows' Back-Up as the sole method of saving files on my hard drive, in case of future catastrophes. I'm still angry with the Geek Squad, and Microsoft. More so with Microsoft, because their documentation is still misrepresenting their OS' capabilities. And it seems that somewhere along the line, many forum residents have drunk the MS KoolAid, and sing their tune about Windows' Back-Up and Restore. Or, they just blindly lash out against "the man" and tell folks that there is no possible way to help themselves.
With as many people finding themselves with a relatively useless Windows Image File, when they're attempting to retrieve their allegedly saved files, you'd think there'd be more chatter more easily located about what it really takes to fix things.
I hope this lesson helps someone, sometime. I sure learned a lot.
Steve -- "Gyro1949"
theflash1932
9 Legend
•
16.3K Posts
0
November 16th, 2011 22:00
VHD files (as used for Windows 7 System Image backup) can be "attached" in Windows 7 Disk Management and browsed just like any other drive.
Gyro1949
8 Posts
0
November 17th, 2011 17:00
Flash,
That's what I was seeing in the many documents offered up by MS and many forums about Windows 7.
That's not what I found out when following MS's documents to get to view files in the Image File that I had created. This Windows configuration didn't believe it existed, apparently.
It could be that perhaps when the Geek Squad at Best Buy set this new PC up, installing the Dell partition, and its Windows 7 Home Premium features, they may have pted out of whatever it would take to allow me to have followed what I was reading, and actually see the results I was assured I'd get.
I suppose this might just be something one has to undergo, personally, to learn the truth about. What I do know is that I managed, despite many obstacles, to get around the situation I found myself in, through no fault of my own. And one I am just guessing that a large percentage of PC owners have been facing when their old system goes to the graveyard, and they acquire a new system, without OEM disks to allow them to install the exact same Windows copy the old machine used to create its back-up image from.
I'm still surprised that there isn't any more documentation or shared experiences like this on line. I can't really be alone in this.
Thanks, anyway.
Steve -- "Gyro1949"
theflash1932
9 Legend
•
16.3K Posts
0
November 17th, 2011 18:00
Maybe Geek Squad somehow messed it up, but it works as designed on over 50 workstations at work and on three at home.
Notice in the screenshot I have the VHD attached in Disk Management, and its contents displayed in Windows Explorer. The image itself can be restored as a whole in a couple of different ways - or the image can be browsed for individual files to restore (as in the above picture). I'm not saying you are alone in your troubles - I have heard of the occasional problem - but all-in-all, I think most users are happy with Windows 7 Backup.
Gyro1949
8 Posts
0
November 17th, 2011 19:00
Flash,
I agree that it might be the Geek Squad who somehow fudged the installation. Ideally, I would have preferred to get a full Windows 7 Home Premium Disk, when I get a new PC. (The Dell doesn't even come with a single disk of any sort!) Long ago, I bought an OEM disk, after building my own Windows XP Pro PC. That was then. But now, when one buys a store-bought PC, one usually gets the OS pre-installed. Though they usually are able to do the customer set-up on their own, as I did with my now-dead Dell All In One.
I saw what you showed in that screen shot in many of the articles and Windows docs about Virtual Disk Management. And a whole lot of those articles pointed out how that feature comes in their Server OS, as well as the references to Windows 7. (I presume Server is what the workstations you referred to use. I don't know if you three home PCs do, though. Probably not.) I have to admit that the links to the "free MS Virtual Disk Management Tool" were dated. (Two years old.) So when I went to MS's website, the links failed, and I could not find a single offering at the MS download pages, where I might attempt to download and install that tool, and do my own work.
So I ended up using a free utility crafted by someone else, (and maybe absorbed at some point by MS so that it was what I was seeing referred to...I don't know,) which allowed me to do what I was led to believe I should have been able to do, all along, with this MS OS.
And, again, as a refresher: I had one validated copy of Windows 7 Home Premium, on an AMD-powered Dell, that had made a back-up of its own system. It might just be that trying to use a completely different validated copy of Windows 7 Home Premium, on an Intel-powered Dell, to go poke around and actually utilize that old back-up, is now somehow verboten by MS's own grand plan. Though I dunno.
All I know is it's not as easy as advertised, when one finds themselves in what surely has to be a very common situation, given today's propensity of pre-installed Windows 7 operating systems on PCs that surely aren't made to last a lifetime, like my old XP Pro system was.
I've already copied my individual files to two different external drives. I will go through the motions of making the Windows image, just in case there is some failure on this Dell that will result in me getting the same basic hardware back, again.
Steve -- "Gyro1949"
theflash1932
9 Legend
•
16.3K Posts
0
November 17th, 2011 19:00
Most OEM's (Dell, HP, Acer, etc.) anymore do not supply reinstallation DVD's - starting with Vista, and with 7, it is all but standard practice. This irritates the heck out of me, and there is no good reason for them NOT to include a disk that can't cost them more than 20 cents to make. That said, you can order a replacement disk at the time of order (if ordering directly from Dell) or afterwards for a small fee (any where from free to $20). Alternatively, you can use a Retail Windows DVD (available from Digital River's website - a Microsoft Online Partner) to install a fresh installation of Windows 7. Automatic Activation will fail, but a 2-minute phone call to Microsoft will get it activated.
When I say "workstation", I only mean a business-class system (Dell's Optiplex PC's). Workstations vary from a regular PC in the HARDWARE features and tools used to manage them in an enterprise environment. It runs the same Windows 7 software that a desktop or laptop PC uses. Server OS's (Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2) are completely different, although 2008 R2 also has the same Backup program integrated into it. While they are built on the same kernel as client OS's, they have many more software features built-in for business environment use (Active Directory, DNS, DHCP, Terminal Services, IIS, etc.) that client OS's do not have ... and are also designed for different hardware (servers - high performance and redundant computers).
Windows 7 has full support for VHD - creating, attaching, and some versions can even boot to a VHD file.
theflash1932
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16.3K Posts
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November 17th, 2011 19:00
In any case ... I wish you luck.
Gyro1949
8 Posts
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November 18th, 2011 07:00
Flash,
Thanks.
I'll be poking around to see why I couldn't browse my old PC's back-up, given all the advertised features that claim it can in this OS.
The mentions of "Server" I was making, weren't meant to say I'd have to have a full legal copy of an MS Server OS. The articles I was reading made it seem as though that Virtual Disk Management Tool, as found in Server, was available free, as what I would call a utility, for anyone, with what seemed to be running what was implied to be XP, Vista, or Windows 7.
I was reading under the documentation for the "Back-Up & Restore" in Windows 7, that I would be able to simply use Disk Explorer and click on the back-up image .vhd file, and it'd look to me exactly like those screen shots you put up, like any other Windows Hard Drive. When all the variations of using Back-Up & Restore failed, I even tried to find plain old "Disk Management" on this PC. I must have missed a step, but I couldn't even get that option to drop down.
I'm not a computer newbie. I'm not a software wizard, either. But I am persistent. I'm old enough to have lived through several versions of Windows, and MS's increasingly rapid lack of support for previous versions. I was starting to think that maybe this was just another one of those things, (like some of what were referred to when various Windows screw-ups happened,) that were referred to as "Unadvertised Features," but in reverse, where it used to be there, but now it's not.
Thanks for participating. Hopefully, I won't be needing to darken the forum's pages with another whine for a while now. Though...I would love it to find a good way to remove the shortcuyt arrows from my desktop. I loved TweakUI for XP. That was the sole reason I bothered to download it. But there seems to be no Windows 7 version of that. And from what I read and tried, initially, I'm not sure I have the wisdom and expertise to do what it takes to wipe that pesky "feature" out. I'd still love to know why MS insists upon placing that annoyance over what is, created willfully by customer effort, an obvious shortcut.
Thanks,
Steve -- "Gyro1949"