Questions About Disk Clones And Disk Images

I bought and set up an external hard drive (Seagate Expansion 5TB USB 3.0 3.5" Desktop External Hard Drive STEB5000100) and attempted to create a disk image using Macrium Reflect.

On Starting Image, Macrium failed to create the Volume Snapshot, giving error code 0x8004231f.

I'll study up and try to and figure this out for myself before posting a VSS Log and asking y'all for help, but I do have a few questions at this point.

Macrium Reflect gave me a choice of creating a disk clone or a disk image.

I see online that "Disk cloning creates a functional one-to-one copy of a hard drive, while disk imaging creates an archive of a hard drive that can be used to make a one-to-one copy."

If I had to guess, I'd guess that a disk image offers the advantage of being smaller than a disk clone, and possibly also allowing the option of restoring only selected parts of the entire content of the image. Or not.

But I see from the article I've linked to above that, unlike a disk image, a computer can be booted directly from a disk clone without going through a presumably lengthy and time-consuming process to restore it. That sounds very convenient to me.

But that article goes on to say that you can store only one clone on any given hard drive. If I again had to guess, I'd guess that the reason for this is so the machine doesn't get confused about which OS to boot up.

But I thought that it wouldn't get confused because, when you boot up, the machine just looks for the OS to boot from at some particular place, like address zero on the disk, or wherever the BIOS told it to look or wherever.

So is it really true that you can store only one clone on any given hard drive? Because that would kinda negate the whole reason I bought this 5TB drive in the first place, which was to store 3 different clones / images (Win7 as is, Win7 repaired, and a new installation of Win10).

And while I'm bending your ear here, if you'd also like to comment on the relative advantages of clones and images in general, that would also be appreciated.

And no, I didn't attempt to create a disk clone. I thought I'd hold off on that at least until I was certain whether or not I should instead create 3 disk images.

 

The "clone" is a sector-by-sector copy of the original source and has the strength of including anything that may have been deleted accidentally prior to the last time it was created. The "image" only includes items that are present when it is created.
For forensic purposes, only a clone will do.
And, personally, I tend to create backups of the client's files, knowing that if it comes to it, that image or clone will be dated or too time consuming to create on a regular schedule. I also prefer a utility which copies the folder structure so that specific files can be copied back if need be.
In general, if the machine is so messed up that it needs either restored, it probably would be better to "start from scratch" with the only caveat being that you need to know what software should be reinstalled to have it function.
BTW, Microsoft's media creation tool will let you create an ISO or a flash drive for reinstalling Windows 10 and; because you booted into it once, it will automatically activate on that PC.

 

Well, I just followed the instructions at Creating a backup image of your computer, drive or partitions, accessible via both the Macrium Reflect KnowledgeBase and the Macrium Reflect v6 User's Guide.

I was careful to not set the destination drive as also a source location.

Nonetheless, I got the same error again.

And unfortunately, Macrium support and its forums are not available to those using the free version of Macrium Reflect.

So if anybody knows what I might be doing wrong, I'm all ears.

By the way, I'm using the current version of Macrium Reflect, version 6.1 (Free Edition for 64-bit).

 

I forgot to upload the VSS Log. Here it is from the first of the two times I tried to create a disk image.

 

VSS Error: 0x8004231f - Failed to Create Volume Snapshot

 

Personally, I make a clone of my hard disk to back it up. It may not be as small as an image, and generally the clone disk must be the same size or bigger (though some cloning software, if it finds the clone-disk is smaller than the original, just cuts off the copy at the point when the clone-disk is full, which means that if the higher numbered sectors on your original are empty, you have probably lost nothing). It also has the presumed advantage that when you need it, it is immediately ready (if you can find it !), and the manufacturers of your image making software have not updated it so that is unable to recreate the original from the image you made.
Clones can also be made by EaseUS Partition Master and AOMEI Partition Assistant (which are so similar they might be the same). I have used a bootable CD EaseUS DiakCopy v3.2.1

Dumb_Question
27.March.2016

 

I've been imaging for about 20 years, originally with Acronis but these days I mainly use Macrium Reflect but others too. I prefer imaging to cloning as you can store as many image files on a disk as you have room for. With a sensible system and data partition arrangement system images can be created in about 10-15 minutes.

 

yes it takes a few to clone a dew hundred GB

Dumb_Question
27.March.2016

 

OK, I tried this again, with the same result.

BTW, these friggin' smiley faces are supposed to be ":", ")". Carumba...

In the Macrium Reflect knowledgebase, 0x8004231f - Failed to Create Volume Snapshot

says:

Solution 1 - Remove drive letters allocated unnecessarily to small partitions

Solution 2 - Increase shadow storage space

Solution 3 - Remove old VSS snapshots

Device Manager says:

Lenovo_recovery (Q 10000 MB
SYSTEM_DRV 1200 M
Windows7_OS (C 465738 MB

There's 86,311,084,032 bytes of free space, BTW.

Macrium Reflect says:

MBR Disk [4A9C44DF] - ST3500418A5 CC66 <465.76 GB>

1 - SYSTEM+DRV (None)
NTFS Active
636.7 MB
1.17 GB

2 - - Windows7_OS (C
NTFS Primary
374.41 GB
454.82 GB

3 - Lenovo_Recovery (Q
NTFS Primary
9.76 GB
9.77 GB

So I'm guessing that Solution 1 doesn't pertain.

The knowledgebase goes on to say:

Solution 2 - Increase shadow storage space

To see the amount of storage space allocated and used for Volume Shadow Copies run the following command from a command prompt with elevated privileges:

Vssadmin list shadowstorage

To allocate more storage (e.g. 50GB) run the following command:

vssadmin resize shadowstorage /For=C: /On=C: /MaxSize=50GB

Running either one of these commands at an elevated command prompt gives the following response:

This program is blocked by group policy. For more information, contact your system administrator.

That would be me, such as I am.

So I looked around and found this:

How to Disable/Enable Group Policy

Therein it tells you how to Disable/Enable Group Policy from the Command Prompt:

To Disable Group Policy:

REG add "HKCU\Software\Policies\Microsoft\MMC\{8FC0B734-A0E1-11D1-A7D3-0000F87571E3}" /v Restrict_Run /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f

To Enable Group Policy:

REG add "HKCU\Software\Policies\Microsoft\MMC\{8FC0B734-A0E1-11D1-A7D3-0000F87571E3}" /v Restrict_Run /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f

Very carefully, laboriously and (I'm darn sure) correctly (see attached image), entering the Disable command gives:

ERROR: Invalid key name.
Type "REG ADD /?" for usage.

Can anybody tell me what I'm doing wrong?

 

If you have CryptoPrevent installed, then that is what is blocking vssadmin.exe
Try temporarily disabling CryptoPrevent.

 

Yes, I had CryptoPrevent installed. I tried to disable it but couldn't find out how to do that from within the program itself. So I tried to disable it with WinPatrol, but I couldn't find it there under any tab. So I went back into CryptoPrevent and set the Protection Level to None. But that had no effect, Macrium Reflect was still unable to create a Snapshot.

 

I run CryptoPrevent on all of my Windows versions. I use AOMEI Backupper for imaging/cloning and there are no issues with CryptoPrevent's Group Policy settings.

 

A couple of things you can try:
Launch Macrium Reflect and in the menu select Other Tasks -> Fix VSS Problems.
Run the repair and see if there's any change.

If you still have problems with VSS, then download Tweaking.Com - Windows Repair Portable to your Desktop and extract the folder from the zip archive.
Open the folder and run Repair_Windows.exe. Select the Repairs tab and then click on the 'Open Repairs' button.
Select the following Repairs:

• 19 - Repair Volume Shadow Copy Service
• 27 - Set Windows Services To Default Startup

Press the 'Start Repairs' button. When all repairs have completed, you'll receive a prompt to reboot.
Reboot the PC and test Macrium Reflect.

 

Fix VSS Problems didn't fix the problem, so I went to Tweaking.com's Repair_Windows.

First, a report on Fix VSS Problems, just in case that will help. If not, just skip down to below
" ************************************ ".

Fix VSS Problems said 'Click the "Run" button to re-register VSS DLLs, stop and restart the service, and repair registry entries.'

I clicked "Run".

vssfixx64 immediately launched and said "Press 'OK' to re-register Microsoft VSS components and update the Microsoft Shadow Software Provider registry entry."

I exited and relaunched Macrium Reflect. That didn't halt vssfixx64. I then clicked vssfixx64's 'OK'.

Just to let you know, every time I would plug my external hard drive in, Avira would say "D:\Autorun.inf blocked." Rather than clicking on "Settings", I've just been clicking on "OK".

And every time I would try to create a Snapshot, Macrium Reflect would say "Enter a name for this backup definition." I allowed the default of "My Backup" to stand.

So today I tried it again, and it failed again.

WinPatrol then said

A new automatic Startup Program has been detected.
C:\Program Files\Macrium\Reflect\Reflect.exe -q

I accepted the change.

I rebooted and tried again.

Prior to this, I had been unplugging the external drive when rebooting because it seemed to me that every time I tried to reboot with ANY storage device plugged into a USB port (e.g., thumb drive, external hard drive), that the computer wouldn't boot up. This time I absentmindedly left the external hard drive plugged in, but the computer DID boot up with no problem, and this time, for the first time, Windows Explorer showed the external hard drive as "Seagate Expansion Drive" rather than "D:". And My Backup.xml was there where I wanted it to be.

But, bottom line, Fix VSS Problems didn't work, so I went on to Tweaking.com's Repair_Windows.

****************************************************************

Tweaking.com's Repair_Windows.exe said:

Have you ever heard someone say their computer wasn't working right, so they unhooked it, took it to a computer repair shop and when they got there the system was working fine? This is because the power had drained out of the system!

(Step 1) Shut down and power off the computer.

(Step 2) Once the computer is powered off, unplug the power cord. If it is a laptop also remove the battery. It is important that any way for the system to keep getting power is unplugged or unhooked.

(Step 3) With the power cord unplugged and the battery removed (if you have one), hit the power button a few times as if you are trying to turn on the computer. When you do this and the computer tries to turn on, all the electricity is drained out of the system.

(Step 4) Plug the power cord back in and reinsert the battery (if you have one) and turn the computer on.

All done!

Once Windows is loaded you can continue on with the other steps and repairs.

As I interpret the above message, I don't need to remove my desktop computer's battery. But maybe you guys will tell me that I should.

Device Manager shows that my computer DOES have a Microsoft Composite Battery.

Doing a Google image search on "ThinkCentre M75e battery" shows a number of diverse images, of which one might be the appropriate battery. But I myself wouldn't know which one, if any, was the right battery, even if I tripped over it.

Suggestions? Including about how to be sure I don't break anything by removing and reinstalling the battery, if in fact I need to do so?

 

Here's where I'm at now:

After COMPLETELY powering off, I'm still getting the same error when trying to create a disk image.

But now Tweaking.com Windows Repair says a new version is available, and I should use it.

Going to the download page it sent me to, it says "Before you download, run a free scan for hidden Windows errors”.

Just to cover all my bases here, I take it that it's safe to do this, right?

 

More than likely, that free scan is for third party software and you'll likely get marketing for that third party software.

 

As images.

 

Just download it from MG

http://www.majorgeeks.com/mg/getmirror/tweaking_com_windows_repair,1.html