Winows Imaging Tips and Tricks

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Recently I was forced to use Windows Imaging due to Acronis True Image not having the driver for the Surface 3 storage controller. I have always been disappointed in how difficult Microsoft makes this process just so that they don't stand a chance of loosing a few pennies. So in order to put an end to some confusion I have posted some helpful tips so that others can shortcut the mistakes I made.

  • The first thing you will need to do is make an image on an external hard drive.
    1. Logged in as an Administrator, Navigate to "Control Panel\All Control Panel Items\File History" (Windows 8.1 Pro) or Control Panel\All Control Panel Items\Backup and Restore (Windows 7 Pro)
    2. In the left panel select "System Image Backup" (Windows 8.1 Pro) or "Create a system image" (Windows 7 Pro)
    3. Select the Hard drive, DVD drive, or network location that you would like to save the image to. Be aware that if you save to a network location that you will most likely have to provide network drivers or copy to an external hard drive in order to recover.
    4. Once the image is complete, be sure that you have a recovery disk that is capable of recovering the image. This is very important because if you have your original windows installation disk but are now on Windows 7 SP1 or you upgraded to Windows 8 or 8.1 then you most likely will need to create a recovery disk in the menu at step two. When in doubt, just create a disk.....trust me.
  • After you have verified that your image was successfully taken and that you have a recovery disk that will work with your version of windows you are set to recover to a new disk.
  • The second part of this process is more tricky and requires a minor bit of command line. But don't fret because it's simple disk part commands.
    1. Assuming that you are in an emergency situation where your computer won't boot or you are changing disk because of failures, you will need to boot from the recovery disk or the system disk. (Hopefully you created a recovery disk when you took the image)
    2. Once you have booted from the recovery disk you will want to get the menu "Recover System Image" or something along those lines. Microsoft seems to think that changing the options around in their recovery environment is fun, I find it highly annoying.
    3. Run through the wizard and see if it lets you recover the image. (it most likely wont)
    4. This is the point where things become a little more complicated. You will need to back out and open the command prompt and get the disk ready to be imaged. Basically you are formatting it so that the image has a clean drive to go to. Don't be afraid of this as it is a good thing to learn and be comfortable with. Follow this link for explicit instructions and screenshots on Formatting in Command Line.
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