A fix to make system restore work?

[visch1]

I’m afraid this can get complicated so please KISS for me. On a Dell 8200, XP with sp1 + some updates, P4 2500, 700 meg Rambus, a WD 200G and one 120G BOTH WITH XP on the first partition. The second drive is strictly used for DVD backup. Both drives seem to operate fine except when trying to get into system restore, I get an error message: a problem was encountered and has to close. IT never opened! Also wants to send error to MS.
It seems to work ok for awhile then goes out to lunch.. 9 days ago I formatted and did a clean install, good for about 4 days and gone again. Have tried disconnecting second drive, making it hidden, making it inactive, disk repairs etc. Drive one has about 75G free space.
Could it be that XP can only be on 1 partition period? It seems this problem started when I put XP on second drive, but that was months ago and I didn’t get into restore until a month ago, and as mentioned above it won’t work now even when the second drive is disconnected. Any pointers?? TIA

 

[Del]

You have Win XP installed on both drives?
The system restore is set to restore all drives. Try setting each one where it only will do a restore on the drive it is installed on.

I have ME on C drive, it only will save system restore data on the c drive. XP is on E drive and is set to only monitor and restore the E drive. Works fine like that.

 

[visch1]

I'm shut out from doing anything in regards to restore, with error messages. Disconnecting a drive makes no difference. For lack of anything else working I removed the battery for awhile hoping to reset something---no luck.

If this box can't handle this setup, have never found anything about dual booting the same OS, would I be able to install Win 2000 on one drive and NOT have to reinstall XP on the other? I understand the oldest system needs to be installed first, but is that on the same drive? TIA

 

[Del]

You can install Win 2000 after Win XP. Check out this:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone/tips/dougknox/doug91.asp

 

[mal1930]

Hi, I tried it once but it as not successful Possibly my fault and because of the restore factor or possibly the drive I was using.

Why I did it is because there is a free drive image that works with XP but needs a second system to restore the image if necessary. One system is not enough as XP won't let you change files in itself when running.

I understand the program is popular so many people must have dual systems that work fine. You do have to change the menu so you know which system you are using. Peace Mal

 

[visch1]

Thanks for the comeback. I think I’ll try the suggestions in the above link after doing a backup image of both drives. As I said they both seem to operate fine except for restore. I also get a feeling of wasting my time with this as I have a couple spare 60G – 80G drives I can harness and just use as Drive images. I’m just irritated it doesn’t work as it used to. Would I do ok trying Go Back instead? I have a feeling it might make things too “interesting”. I seem obsessed with back up? Yep, wasted too many hours reinstalling. Now I seem to waste too many hours with backing up.
BE WELL

 

[mal1930]

Hi, I hope you were kidding about Goback as I had that too. With the more complex Goback it is possible to say which drives you wanted protected but with the Systemworks CD that is not possible. As I said in my previous post I had trouble and I am not really sure what was the culprit.

I could install get it up and running even image the drives I wanted to image and then sometime later things would just go wrong.

I was too lazy to find out what it was and correct it instead I went for Powerquest Drive Image and only one OS. Since I did it I have not had any trouble.LOL Peace Mal

 

[visch1]

Thanks for the info. I have a strong feeling that working with XP is working with voodoo. I have a few Drive Image backups so I put one from about a week ago onto a partition on another drive and used it all day yesterday. Made a DI copy of that drive to the partition I’m having a problem with and it did show the system restore window and a restore point. Put that drive in the primary cable position and the “good” drive onto the secondary position, both cable select. LOST system restore ability on the primary. Pulled the primary and put the secondary drive on the primary position. All is fine, though troublesome drive is not connected.

Perhaps I’m missing something in the “rules” of drives.

Both drives have XP Pro with sp1

Both drives are WD. Both recently totally formatted. The one I’m having the restore problem with is 200G, the other is 120G. The box is a Dell 8200 with 768 Megabytes Memory. When I feel gutsy I’m going to put the 200 on the secondary and see if things work.
I downloaded Goback trial but not installed it yet.
Thanks again and BE WELL

 

[mal1930]

Hi, With the trial version the only time you can specify anything is at installation. It was that one on the Systemworks CD. I think it will become confused because there are 2 identical OS. It can't tell one from the other. I am not certain about this but I have something at the back of my mind that won't come forward enough so that I can explain it. Peace Mal