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Can't Restore Windows 7's Image Backups to a Different PC?



 
 
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  #1  
Old December 4th 18, 03:46 AM posted to alt.windows7.general
Ant[_2_]
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Default Can't Restore Windows 7's Image Backups to a Different PC?

Hello.

According to
https://www.howtogeek.com/239312/how...ws-7-8-and-10/,
it says you can't restore a back up to another PC. Is that true?

Thank you for reading and I hope to get answers soon.
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  #2  
Old December 4th 18, 04:47 AM posted to alt.windows7.general
Mayayana
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Posts: 6,438
Default Can't Restore Windows 7's Image Backups to a Different PC?


"Ant" wrote

| According to
|
https://www.howtogeek.com/239312/how...ws-7-8-and-10/,
| it says you can't restore a back up to another PC. Is that true?
|

It's complicated. First is the license. If you have
an OEM computer the system is tied to that. It
won't activate if you move it. If you bought a full
version it can be moved as often as you like, as
long as it's only on one machine at a time.

The other issue is the hardware. I've never tried
moving Win7 to a different machine but XP handles
it just fine as long as the IDE drivers are
uninstalled first. It's easier if you remove as many
drivers as possible, then shut down and image it.
I've even adapted an XP install from a single-core
CPU to multi. It requires swapping out hal.dll, which
is a rather esoteric task, but doable.

I would guess that 7 handles it easier than XP.

Another thing you need to consider is boot
partitions. Win7 has a messy system for boot.
If you want to move it, it'd b e easier to put it
all on on partition before imaging. I do that in general
with all Win7, before doing any disk image backup.
It's too confusing keeping track of multiple partitions
dependent on each other. And consolidating them
is not difficult.

Relaed to that is editing the boot config. That's
another area that's an easy text edit on XP and a
big production on 7. I use BootIt, which includes
instructions and an editor for Win7 boot.

Those are just a general outline of things you'll
need to know about. But the only real showstopper
is OEM licensing. I've heard you can cheat the system
somehow. I don't know about that. I know that
under normal circumstances an OEM license --
on a store-bought machine or from an OEM disk
that you bought for about $100 -- is tied to the
first system it's installed to. On a homemade machine
that means you can only move it to a similar machine,
with the same motherboard. On an OEM machine the
activation is on the motherboard, put there by the
OEM company. Either way, copying a disk image to
a different computer is probably not going to activate.


  #3  
Old December 4th 18, 04:56 AM posted to alt.windows7.general
Paul[_32_]
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Posts: 11,873
Default Can't Restore Windows 7's Image Backups to a Different PC?

Ant wrote:
Hello.

According to
https://www.howtogeek.com/239312/how...ws-7-8-and-10/,
it says you can't restore a back up to another PC. Is that true?

Thank you for reading and I hope to get answers soon.


There's two levels of concern.

1) Flat out fails to restore. The program tells you in
no uncertain terms, it will not listen to your request.
2) After restoration, system has trouble booting because
the drivers needed on the *different* hardware are *different*.

The (2) case is more likely than the (1) case. You still
have files in the (2) case. The files are restored. A Windows
"repair install" could be used, but you can only do those
from a running OS. If the OS won't run, you can't repair
install it (at least, I've not heard of a way to do that).

And as the article explains to you, the container format
is VHD, and modern Windows OSes can "mount" a VHD as if it
was a file system. If you have NTFS inside a VHD, then
you'll see a nice drive letter, with the properties
saying it is NTFS. You can shovel out your files.

The only OS which is a PITA is WinXP, and for that one,
there is VHDMount or OSMounter perhaps (if you wanted to
use WinXP to look inside a Win7-made VHD file).

I can access those right now, as I'm typing this. Not
a problem.

However, my different machines take different drivers,
and I wouldn't expect the image from the old machine,
to boot the new machine. My experience with this, is
when you move an OS, the worst-case is the OS "freezes"
and just stops on you. In some cases, you get 3 days grace
to fix the license. In other cases, you get 30 days grace
(like it was a new install). Windows 10 is relatively
forgiving, and it's unclear how long it will run without
rebooting or something (could go past the 30 days grace,
and run for hours at a time without tipping over).

The Windows 7 backup has two options:

1) "System Image" = works at partition level, insist on backing
up C: no matter what. But you can include
additional partitions in the backup if you want.
Output is a VHD file, per partition.

wbAdmin start backup -backupTarget:E: -include:C:,D:,F: -allCritical -quiet

2) "File by file" = used to back up a home directory. Output
is 200MB ZIP files which are not chained
together.

The (1) method is how you would be attempting to back up C: .

Some commercial backup softwares, have a re-targeting capability
where they inject the drivers to make restoral of a boot image
work on different hardware. The Windows tool is just a basic
one, without such frills.

A number of competitive products can do this. Not just this one.

http://reflect.macrium.com/help/v5/h...w_hardware.htm

You can redeploy an OS your own self, using "sysprep",
but my experiments with that were far from satisfactory.
It was for me, a useless exercise (the OS practically
had to be "gutted" for the operation to finish, and
it starts up in OOBE state). Just a waste of time.
There wouldn't be a WinAmp waiting for me when it
starts for the first time. The Win10 OS was practically empty
of Program Files. There's probably some way to fix that,
but I was having trouble with the recipes I was using.
This is what IT guys do all day long, so you'd have
to ask one of them how to do it right.

HTH,
Paul
  #4  
Old December 4th 18, 06:06 AM posted to alt.windows7.general
Bill in Co[_3_]
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Posts: 303
Default Can't Restore Windows 7's Image Backups to a Different PC?

Ant wrote:
Hello.

According to
https://www.howtogeek.com/239312/how...ws-7-8-and-10/,
it says you can't restore a back up to another PC. Is that true?

Thank you for reading and I hope to get answers soon.


As others have pointed out, and with their detailed explanations - not
likely. That said, I can think of one possible exception (and one I'd risk
trying), and that would be to a nearly identical computer, if you have that.
So I think this could come in handy IF you have a backup computer that is of
the same type, with (ideally) the same hardware (although that may not be
strictly necessary). The main bugaboo being the windows licensing, but if
they are the same OEM and almost identical machines, I think it would work.

I also think your degree of success might also, in some part, depend on the
program you're using, too. Acronis True Image (for example) might be more
forgiving or accepting of some differences than some other imaging programs.


  #5  
Old December 4th 18, 03:04 PM posted to alt.windows7.general
J. P. Gilliver (John)[_4_]
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Posts: 2,679
Default Can't Restore Windows 7's Image Backups to a Different PC?

In message , Paul
writes:
Ant wrote:
Hello.
According to
https://www.howtogeek.com/239312/how...age-backups-on
-windows-7-8-and-10/, it says you can't restore a back up to another
PC. Is that true?
Thank you for reading and I hope to get answers soon.


There's two levels of concern.

1) Flat out fails to restore. The program tells you in
no uncertain terms, it will not listen to your request.


(Which program is telling you this?)
[big snip - all useful stuff, marked here to keep. And Mayayayana's post
too.]
Some commercial backup softwares, have a re-targeting capability
where they inject the drivers to make restoral of a boot image
work on different hardware. The Windows tool is just a basic
one, without such frills.

A number of competitive products can do this. Not just this one.

http://reflect.macrium.com/help/v5/h...y_a_system_to_
new_hardware.htm


(Interesting that there's still stuff there in a "v5" directory!) I note
the first line in that says "Applies to: Professional and Server
Editions of Macrium Reflect only." (I note it also doesn't even
_mention_ the licencing/activation question.)
[]
This is what IT guys do all day long, so you'd have
to ask one of them how to do it right.

HTH,
Paul

ID (in theory).
John


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  #6  
Old December 4th 18, 04:29 PM posted to alt.windows7.general
Paul[_32_]
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Posts: 11,873
Default Can't Restore Windows 7's Image Backups to a Different PC?

J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
In message , Paul
writes:
Ant wrote:
Hello.
According to
https://www.howtogeek.com/239312/how...age-backups-on
-windows-7-8-and-10/, it says you can't restore a back up to another
PC. Is that true?
Thank you for reading and I hope to get answers soon.


There's two levels of concern.

1) Flat out fails to restore. The program tells you in
no uncertain terms, it will not listen to your request.


(Which program is telling you this?)
[big snip - all useful stuff, marked here to keep. And Mayayayana's post
too.]


Well, as an example, a Macrium 5 emergency boot CD
would not restore a Macrium 6 MRIMG backup.

That's not what the HowToGeek article is about.

I only made my levels of concern model, to show
possible outcomes. Booting and licensing issues might
be considered "a problem for a redeploy scenario".
Even if your trim level of Macrium didn't support
Redeploy, it could still say something like
"you know, this here image I'm restoring, won't
boot on this machine". But that doesn't take
all the possible outcomes into account, such as
the user moving the drive to the correct computer
chassis when the restore is completed.

For example, I sometimes do restores on my Typing
Computer, then move the drive to the Test Computer.
Such a status message if delivered, wouldn't
do me a lot of good.

There aren't a lot of reasons for a (1) situation
to arise. Macrium versioning is an orthogonal
issue that looks like a (1). Just to demonstrate
you can be stopped by some trivial details.

Paul
  #7  
Old December 4th 18, 10:13 PM posted to alt.windows7.general
Bill in Co[_3_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 303
Default Can't Restore Windows 7's Image Backups to a Different PC?

Ant wrote:
Hello.

According to
https://www.howtogeek.com/239312/how...ws-7-8-and-10/,
it says you can't restore a back up to another PC. Is that true?

Thank you for reading and I hope to get answers soon.


Here's another recommendation, assuming your two PCs are very similar to
each other (so that there's a fair chance it might actually work!):

Make an image backup of your system drive partition (C on each PC first,
so that if you try to restore the backup to another PC and it fails, you can
restore the previously saved image backup. I think that way you'll have
your bets covered, and you can see for yourself. Of course, this is
assuming you have a bootable restore CD that works and a good image program,
AND have made system image backups prior to this. If the PCs are slightly
different, you may have your hands full trying to find the right drivers,
which can be a bit of a PIA. And you'll know soon enough if the OS licensing
is an issue. At any rate, I wonder what you decided, and even if the two
PCs were comparable, or vastly different.


 




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