windows 10 system image

BugDroid · 22 Jan 2018

Hi
a few months ago I created a system image from my Windows 10 Tablet. Eventually I extracted the image using 7zip. There seemed to be an image inside for every partition. Since I only wanted to keep a backup of my personal files, I only kept the image of the main partition, called "Basic data partition.img"
Now I wanted to restore some of the files but I dont seem to be able to open the file "Basic data partition.img".
I also tried to restore the image on its original location but windows backup doesnt recognize the file as valid backup image. I eventuall copied the image using linux dd comand which actually worked, although windows is unable to boot.
I would really appreciate some help on this issue

philc43 · 23 Jan 2018

The normal procedure to restore from a system image backup is to use the program in reverse (i.e. restore rather than backup) but this requires that you keep all the original backup files intact. There is another way which is to mount the file for the backup of the partition you are interested in as a temporary drive. If you used the W10 system back up it should have created a file with the .vhdx extension. This very large file can be mounted (right click on it and select mount) and it will be added as a new drive on your system where you can look through the directory structure to find the files you need.

Bree · 23 Jan 2018

BugDroid said:

...a few months ago I created a system image from my Windows 10 Tablet. ... the image of the main partition, called "Basic data partition.img"... windows backup doesnt recognize the file as valid backup image....

What software did you use to make the system image?

We do know that it was not the built-in 'Backup & restore (Windows 7)' because that uses .vhdx files, not .img ones.

In general, whatever software you used to make it, it's a very bad idea to remove parts of a system image. This usually breaks the image and makes it unrestorable - even by the software that created it.

lx07 · 23 Jan 2018

A .img is structurally the same as a .iso.

You can open it with 7-zip. Or (if it isn't compressed) just rename whatever.img to whatever.iso and Windows 10 will mount it with a double click.

cereberus · 25 Jan 2018

I have done extensive testing of backing up and restoring tablets. The only tool that was reliable and worked well on tablets that use 32bit UEFI was our Forum favourite - Macrium Reflect. Easeuse Todo Backup also worked but was so slow.

Acronis, AOEMI, Veeam, Paragon Windows, all failed miserably in various ways.

BugDroid · 26 Jan 2018

Bree said:

What software did you use to make the system image?

I did in fact use the built in Backup Tool. And I did get an vhdx file. I later extracted the vhdx file where I eventually got the "basic data partition.img" from (among others like "microsoft reserved partition.img", but like I said I deleted the rest)

Bree · 26 Jan 2018

BugDroid said:

I did in fact use the built in Backup Tool. And I did get an vhdx file. I later extracted the vhdx file where I eventually got the "basic data partition.img" from (among others like "microsoft reserved partition.img", but like I said I deleted the rest)

The built-in system imaging is one of the most fragile and unreliable of tools. Those of us who use it regularly know that the one thing you should never do is change any of the many files it produces for a system image. Even just copying them to another drive can render the system image unrecognisable as a valid backup.

The usual workaround to recover data from a 'broken' system image is to mount the .vhdx file, but you say you deleted that and just kept the "basic data partition.img". I have tried extracting that from my system images. Neither File Explorer or 7-Zip can mount or open a "basic data partition.img", both say the image is corrupt. There doesn't seem to be any way to recover data from what little you have kept of the original system image.