Hi LQ and visitors,
Those of us who continue to use Windows continue to cringe over its innovative ways. I'm still using Vista Ultimate and plan to keep it around for gaming and other occasional use. I don't update it very often, because I consider that safe usage policies keep the OS safer than system updates do; anyway I recently installed 39 updates. Upon rebooting, checking for updates again revealed SP2 waiting in the wings. Now see, I didn't even know it existed until then...
The incentive
I got burned upon installing SP1, I think it was around spring when SP2 was about to be released, heh. I broke down and used Microsoft's support services for the first time. (I've used Windows since 1992.) This was a time-consuming ordeal from which I learned little, so I did even more research to prepare for SP2. Although I don't actually need or particularly want its features, that's the way I understand MS's security model to work -- install SP2 or you don't continue to get security fixes. Well, possibly, but it's recommended by Redmond, so it should work. Right?
Wrong. Not for me: the
first non-Microsoft article I found (published in mid-May; SP2 released end of April) explains that "The second service pack for Windows Vista will fail to install on computers that have cloned disks or partitions via what Microsoft referred to as third-party disk management tools." This is confirmed by Microsoft:
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Microsoft Article ID: 971204
Cause
When you install Vista SP2, the Vista SP2 installer must update the system boot files. If third-party disk management tools are used to "clone" disks or partitions, the SP2 installer will be unable to uniquely identify the correct system boot files.
Resolution
To work around this issue, turn off the computer and physically unplug all drives that are not required for starting Windows. Power up the computer and restart the service pack installation.
If the workaround is not successful, the alternative is to perform a clean-install.
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Sounds bad, eh? To quote Foghorn Leghorn, "We have been flim-flammed." But does this mean that having GRUB installed in the MBR will prevent SP2 from installing? From the comments in that article, it sounds like it. A failed SP installation is painful -- it lets you go through the whole process, then after hours, at the very end, informs you that it didn't take and spends more time still rolling back the installation. I'm not going to take that risk without first imaging my Vista partition.
As an aside, there are many clever people who work for Microsoft. Since "Try this, otherwise, you'll just have to do a clean install," is the kind of solution they came up with (I've kept my system stable for over two years, do you know how long it would take to reinstall and configure the software the way I have it?!? This isn't exactly apt!), it's a telling indication of the kinds of constraints this proprietary approach places on their methods of development. Conventions such as "Our way or the highway," and "Doesn't play well with others," spring to mind.
Option 1
Alright, fine. This is Vista Ultimate -- aptly named, since I'd like to think this is the last Windows license I'll ever pay -- and Ultimate has the capability to "backup your entire computer," which they call Windows Complete PC Backup. This is performed while Vista is running the Volume Shadow Copy service, of course -- Microsoft apparently doesn't like to implement much of anything without a GUI. I trust Microsoft to get this right for my machine about as much as I trust them to get the SP2 right. After all, "
You cannot install some programs after you restore Windows Vista by using a Windows Complete PC Backup and Restore image." The resolution? "To resolve this problem, obtain the latest service pack for Windows Vista." Brilliant.
So... complete PC backup, yes, I'll do that, but I want to make a second image in parallel.
Option 2
All further options involve third-party software to make the bare-metal backup I need as a safeguard against the screwy SP2. Paid commercial software such as Ghost and Acronis are off my list, because I have a strong preference for free software. I will mention non-free freeware below for reference and may even try one for comparison. And yes, I realize the hypocrisy of using Vista and proclaiming to prefer freedom -- I still have my addictions. Let's just move to the next option.
Option 3
Imaging bit for bit... there's always dd. Actually, there are menu-driven free apps that can do this too, but I'd prefer a more elegant approach if possible. Some apps that do this are mentioned under the next option.
Option 4
Ideally, the software should be able to backup only the used portions of the partition and still be able to perfectly restore it to its previous state. When I installed Vista, I purposely limited its partition size to 40*GB in order to keep it within reason for imaging, and I install all software that I possibly can on a separate partition. Not every software can do this, however. I've read reports that older disk utilities, such as old versions of Partition Magic and Ghost, are not compatible with Vista's incarnation of NTFS. And now I'm not sure that any free software can deal with Vista's NTFS in this way. The apps I know of are: Partition Image, Clonezilla, FSArchiver, Partition Saving, Macrium Reflect, DriveImage XML, SelfImage, EASEUS, partclone, Ghost for Linux (g4l), Ghost for UNIX (g4u), and dd. There are probably
more; these are all free at least as in beer, and where there is no freedom is noted below. GNU Parted doesn't get very far with imaging and restoring NTFS.
The following summarizes my online research.
G4L,
g4u, and
dd: Bit-by-bit imaging, no support for using only the used portion of the partition. Robust tools.
Partimage: NTFS is experimental: "...you will be able to save an NTFS partition if system files are not very fragmented, and if system files are not compressed." Success has been reported with XP, but
problems have been reported after restoring an image on Vista -- creation and restore may work, but the restored partition is seen as corrupted. Seems something in the algorithm introduces an error, which may have been
patched by someone. Since Partimage is apparently not being actively developed, and I don't hold high hopes of success for restores of Vista.
Clonezilla: There are
reports of success with Vista and
mixed reports, so it
can work, but I'm not a big believer in proof by example. Clonezilla uses Partimage, ntfsclone, and dd, for imaging, so I see no reason why it should have better success than just Partimage when imaging only the used parts of the partition, unless it uses a patched version. About a year ago I used Clonezilla to image this Vista partition (using CD version 1.2.1-23), but have never restored the image to test it.
Other projects also use Partimage, notably
PING (Partimage Is Not Ghost). I again see no reason why these should succeed where Partimage does not, unless they make a 1:1 physical copy.
Notable projects for OS rescue include the
Trinity Rescue Kit (specific for Windows machines, usable for Linux, uses
mclone for Vista/XP starting with TRK 3.3 build 321, looks interesting) and Ultimate Boot CD, based both on
Linux and
Windows. These have many other tools for recovery, you should have one handy, but the disk-imaging tools on UBCD and UBCD4Win are either listed here or don't add anything.
Mondorescue: Status of NTFS support unclear, online documentation not updated since 2006. It warns, "Mondo was written for Linux users," and NTFS support is almost certainly less than other apps.
FSArchiver: "works at the file level. It can make an archive of filesystems (ext3, ext4, reiserfs, xfs, ntfs, ...) that the running kernel can mount with a read-write support. It will preserve all the standard file attributes (permissions, timestamps, symbolic-links, hard-links, extended-attributes, ...), as long as the kernel has support for it enabled." Interesting. It
claims, "Tests have been made with Windows XP, 2003, Vista, and fsarchiver has been able to save and restore the ntfs filesystem. After the restoration Windows was still bootable even if the partition is smaller or bigger."
Here is a success story. The down side is that it is not yet considered stable. We'll keep an eye out.
partclone: Advertises itself as similar to Partimage and as being the utility for cloning and restoring ext2/3. Mentions NTFS support through ntfsprogs, little to no documentation and empty forums, so a big question mark.
Partition Saving looks like a possibility, but honestly it was hard for me to make heads or tails of exactly whether it can successfully image and restore Vista. If so, it's complicated, more so than a sector-by-sector copy from a program with a simpler interface and instruction set.
DriveImage XML is yet another non-free freeware (no charge for private use) offering Vista support, which I seem to recall having used to make an image of Win XP Pro. I think I recall even restoring it and the OS more or less working. It also uses the volume shadow service, so at least you could play solitaire while using it. You can also use a WinPE CD. As I recall it backs everything up, not just the used portions; I couldn't find the answer very quickly in their listed features or documentation to verify.
SelfImage is something I used on that Win XP Pro partition in addition to DriveImage XML. I don't recall which one I used to restore it. I recall it feeling slow on that 2.4 GHz machine, though both were. SelfImage runs on Windows, but is under the GPL. It claims to "skip reading a disk's 'free space', treating it as if it were zero. This decreases the size of a compressed image." It too comes with a quite nice
Vista success story, although the last news article is from 2007, so it doesn't seem to be actively developed. Restoring requires a Windows, so since Vista is the only version of Widows I'm booting, it'd probably require the (still?) experimental BartPE plugin or UBCD4Win -- I've been there (though not with SelfImage), and, well, live CDs that require a proprietary license... slipstreaming... yuck. Great reminder of why I strongly prefer freedom in software. SelfImage itself is a nice project, though.
EASEUS is a non-free freeware advertising sector-by-sector copy, which offers no advantage over the above programs, unless you find it easier to use.
Macrium Reflect has apparently been newly made available for free, although it is apparently not free as in FOSS. It advertises Vista support (though it uses shadow copying, bleah) can use a Linux-based recovery CD, not bad. Might be worth a try for comparison.
Appraisal
This post turned in to a blog turned into a full-blown article, lacking only benchmarking and screenshots. I originally just wanted to ask the forum for experience and ideas (in that order) on what free software is best suited to imaging the Vista partition with a view on
reliably restoring it on the supposition that it will go belly-up, SP2 or no. I think I ended up answering my own question: the only reliable method is to make a physical copy (sector-by-sector, bit-by-bit or whatever it is properly called), and the surest way is as always by redundancy: use Vista's Complete PC Backup (& Restore), use a version that makes a sector-by-sector copy, and use a version that at least attempts saving just the used portions of the partition. Yet another justification of my decision to limit the partition size to 40 GB. Let us close with a quote from Foghorn Leghorn: "Fortunately, I keep my feathers numbered for just such an emergency."
..when I wrote that last line I
thought I was being original.
Outlook
I'll be getting a chance to try some of these out sooner than I care to. As preparation for SP2 I'll be using a Live CD or Debian to save my MBR, then try "repairing" it with Vista, and afterward replacing GRUB in the MBR. Then again, there's no hurry to install SP2.
Ball's in your court... anyone have experience imaging and restoring Vista?
