WindowsImageBackup USB Issues

Hi, I have a HP laptop running Win10 20H2 (64 bit), which I made a "WindowsImageBackup" of, on a USB 3.0
external drive connected to one of the laptops USB 3.0 ports. However, when I boot into recovery
(Trouble Shoot, Advanced Options, System Image Recovery) to restore the Image, the external drive is
not visible if connected to the USB 3.0 port. If you connect the drive to a USB 2.0 port on the laptop
or use a USB 2.0 extension cable between the laptop USB 3.0 port and the external drive, it is
recognized. Any thoughts as to why this is happening?


-Wn10-

However, when I boot into recovery

Did the laptop come with an earlier version of win10 which has subsequently updated to 20h2?


What is model of the laptop?

What do you mean by not visible. Did you check by browsing with notepad , or by using cmd prompt > diskpart ?

SIW2 said:

Did the laptop come with an earlier version of win10 which has subsequently updated to 20h2?

The version has been updated a couple of times. Microsoft does this. You really don't have a choice.
What is model of the laptop? HP 14z

What do you mean by not visible. Did you check by browsing with notepad , or by using cmd prompt > diskpart ?

The external drive is not listed when connected to USB port. So you can not select the image file to restore.

dalchina said:

Assuming you have used Backup and Restore (Windows 7) (deprecated, legacy, not supported) to create your image, please note this is very definitely not recommended - even MS says people should use 3rd party tools.

Instead, as has been said time and again here, use e.g. Macrium Reflect (free) -regularly updated, documented, robust.


What you're seeing is probably because there's no USB3 driver available in that scenario. You can find similar reports if you search e.g. this from 2013:

The USB 3.0 driver not being loaded in the recovery mode is what I think the problem is also. There is probably no easy fix for this.

I normally use Clonezilla for backups, but I can't get it to work on my Win10 laptop. It has trouble trying to mount the USB external target drive. I will try it with a USB 2.0 port and see what happens.

- - - Updated - - -

dalchina said:

No USB3 driver. Using the USB2 cable reduces transmission capacity and defaults to USB2.

See my post above.

That's the part (USB 2.0 extension cable) that really had me puzzled, but makes sense now.

Thanks.

Might have to give Macrium a try if I can't Clonezilla to work. I perfer to Image/Clone when the OS is not active. I like to use a bootable program.