UNSOLVED
Respawn Issues
Just bought a Alienware laptop. I tried making the factory recovery DVDs, all I ended up with is a stack of coasters (a vague error message of "there was an error", followed by an ejected DVD). I tried to do the factory image to a USB key but Respawn stayed lock forever in detection mode. (I could still see and access everything from Windows 8 explorer). I then decided to backup the laptop drive instead of making the factory DVDs (something is better than nothing). This feature in respawn is something extra you have to pay more for. I've used everything from Norton Ghost to Acronis True Image without problems. I foolishly bought the respawn upgrade. It' detected my 4TB USB 3.0 external HDD (TBs of free space), I'll selected it after it was found by Respawn, continue to the next step and the external goes red, and then reverts to the C: drive as the only option. So I'm figuring there's something utterly messed up with the I/O controller or the Respawn program is utter garbage. So far I'm not impressed with Alienware, this laptop should run circles around my 3 year old Dell Studio laptop. It isn't. My old Dell laptop has a Windows Experience of 5.7, this Alienware "gaming" laptop has a Windows Experience Index of only 5.8.... normally I'd be leaning towards defective Respawn Software, but a gaming laptop with only a 5.8 WEI score and a Respawn program that fails to execute properly could translate into a bigger problem. I have run the Alienware hardware scan (everything passed). Has anyone run into this kind of problem with Respawn?
Tesla1856
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Posted February 19th, 2013 22:00
AlienRespawn (actually called DataSafeLocal on my machine from 2010) never worked for me. It broke itself after it insisted it update itself (stopped detecting my Recovery Partition that was perfectly fine). There is a thread here somewhere about the whole experience.
Anyway, I uninstalled it because I couldn't depend on it. I started doing Image Backups with Acronis. It will bare metal restore if needed.
When I got my SSD, I clean installed Win7-64 and installed all the drivers in the proper order. I then created a full (verified) Acronis Image of my C: boot drive. I'll keep that forever with this machine. That's my "Recovery". Of course, I made a better one after I installed the Windows Updates, SP1, and vital apps. I'll keep that one forever also.
I can't help with AR or DSL, but if you want help doing it with conventional procedures and tools, just let me know (or check my Favorite Theads #1).
Dell Rockstar
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