If the tech is coming to the house to replace the motherboard and SSD they are only going to remove the Motherboard and SSD. They don't even need to start the computer. I would make the image of the SSD and leave the rest to the tech.
Do you see the check boxes? There only 1 is checked. Only the checked one would be imaged.
That's the optional choice you have when you specify what is to be imaged.
Assuming you are using a backup definition (job) each time you create an imcremental image, it will image what you specified.
Did you specify all- or just some partitions?
You can check by either looking at the backup definition, or by mounting and exploring an image to see what had acutally been imaged.
You are the user. You have control.
As I understood, a Dell technician will go to your house and replace the MB and the SSD.
You must have to do some homework before he arrives.
- Make a Disk image of both drives (SSD and HDD) and save it to an external drive.
- As they will take the old SSD and MB, I suggest you wipe the SSD (it has many user data on it) before he arrive as it can take some hours to clean all clusters.
To wipe the SSD:
- Disconnect the HDD from the MB.
- Boot from a Windows installation media (USB, DVD, etc.) When the Windows setup wizard shows up, simultaneously press the Shift + F10 keys on your keyboard. It will open a CMD window. Type:
diskpart
list disk (it will list all drives. Identify the SSD drive number)
select disk n (replace n by the SSD drive number obtained with list disk)
clean all
exit (to exit diskpart)
I don't know if the tech will wipe the disk. Premium Support contracts cover technician visits among other items.
- - - Updated - - -
When I click on "Create an image...", all six boxes are checked, and I am quite certain that I would not have removed any of the check marks, given that I have no real knowledge of what the six partitions are.
Do you see the check boxes? There only 1 is checked. Only the checked one would be imaged.
That's the optional choice you have when you specify what is to be imaged.
Assuming you are using a backup definition (job) each time you create an imcremental image, it will image what you specified.
Did you specify all- or just some partitions?
You can check by either looking at the backup definition, or by mounting and exploring an image to see what had acutally been imaged.
You are the user. You have control.
I would say that the technician will only replace the SSD and the MB. It takes about 15 minutes.
I strongly suggest you do the homework or the technician will take the drive with some data on it.
I was about to report a totally successful process, but I found one problem. After the new motherboard and ssd were installed, I booted to the Macrium Reflect rescue disc and restored the full backup from a few days ago.
Then rebooted to Windows and opened Macrium to restore the interim backups from after the full backup. That stated that Windows PE was still running, so I rebooted, which started to do a restore using Windows PE. I cancelled that, and then, after a few clicks on the icon at the bottom left which stated that that would turn off Widows PE and reboot the computer.
The computer rebooted, but when I again tried to restore the interim updates, I was again told that Windows PE was still running. How do I turn it off?
Well, now PE does not run after restarting, but I still cannot restore interim backups as PE continues to run. Curiously, after trying again, I rebooted, and Macrium ran an ucommanded interim backup, but when the scheduled one tried to run, it ran into an error, and shortly thereafter, my scheduled backups were all gone.
I quickly created a new one for the D:\ (Data) drive, but when I started to create a new one for the C:| (SSD) drive, I could only find a disc with three partitions. There were six before, with six operations to run at backup time, now only three.
To add to my confusion, a bit later, returning to try to find a six-partition disc, Macrium said that that could not be done, as a backup was running. I could not find out what that was; whatever it was, it was running according to a popup when I started to reboot. Told reboot to go ahead.
This all rather upset my good feeling that I had properly prepared to restore Windows 10 after the repair was completed.
Last edited by Not Myself; 05 Mar 2021 at 20:47.
Hi, if your back set is base (initial image) + a set of incrementals (or a base + differential) I wonder if you realise you only have the latest image to restore.Then rebooted to Windows and opened Macrium to restore the interim backups from after the full backup.
You do not start with the base (full, initial) image, unless you particularly want your PC /partition restored to as it was when you created the base image.
Macrium does the work of sorting out what is placed onto your disk from its set of image files.
At the risk of sounding snide, I'm not sure that I understand what you wrote. Yes, I restored the full backup as I wanted the computer to return to the state it was in before the hardware replacement. I did not know that there might be a different way to do this.
You also said that Macrium sorts things out, which I take to mean that it included the interim backups made after the full backup. At any rate, I certainly got some emails, but I think they may have only been from the full, not the interim backups, but I did not take a close look at their date. Should I now try to restore those interims, or am I done?
As for there now only being three partitions, looking at the full backup, apparently the ones no longer there were from Dell: When the computer was started after the repair, it went through a long set up updating things that were there when the computer left the factory. Then, when I started the restore, Macrium warned me that two (I believe) files would be overwritten, but from their names I have no idea what they were. Now that I know the three missing partitions were from Dell, I will ask them about this.
I checked, and, use, I am using UEFI, so that does not account for there only being three partitions, and as, at least so far, I have not found anything missing, I concluded that the missing items are not usually used nor contain anything that I have installed.
As always, thanks for your reply; this process had me really upset when I thought all had gone well, then I ran into the problems with Macrium. Those appear to have been fixed: I created two new sets of scheduled backups, one for the boot drive, the other for the data on D:\. I was then able to run a theoretical interim for C:\, but as I expected, it was a full backup which passed the verification test.
I'll try to make it simple.
If you wish to restore a disk image of 1 or more partitions that are available for you to choose at the time you are restoring them, that's one restoration that you have to start. 1 only. Once.
.
The decision you take are
a. to which date you wish to restore them
b. which of the partitions available in the imaged set you wish to restore.
Put the opposite way, restoring a given partitition or partitions does NOT mean working through a sequence of restorations for those same partitions. Oncce only. 1.
To me it sounds like you think you have to start by restoring using the base (initial image) then restore from each of any incremental images in turn. I apologise if I've misunderstood what you're doing.
There are plenty of guides and youtube videos on line for Macrium Reflect.
No need to apologize, it is simply that I did not quite grasp how you had expressed it. You are completely correct: What you said is what I thought I had to do is what Macrium Reflect had already done for me.
As far as I can remember, this is only second time I ever had to use the program to do a restore, and that was to an entirely blank disc that Dell had put in my computer, and that episode was perhaps three years or so ago, and I don't recall doing anything further after running the full backup restore.
I know that there is plenty of information about using Macrium, but I have rarely needed any: I create scheduled backups, restore perhaps one or two files a year, and that is it. I don't find the Macrium manual very helpful when I do need help, doing a Google search for what I need to know is often better.
I'm going to call this solved.
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