Issue with creating Image on Laptop with Macrium Reflect

steveh69 · 26 Dec 2015

OK here's my scenario, I have successfully used Macrium Reflect to create images saved on a 1TB external drive. I had 2 good images stored on it and tried to put 3rd image on the same drive. Please note that I have used one of save images to restore the system after replacing the failing hard drive. The create image process runs to what I think to be the very end then comes up with msg: "an error has occurred, Please see the history log for more details"

I could not find this history log, but figured maybe there was not enough space on the 1TB drive to completley write the image file. On my next attempt to create the image, I used a brand new 3TB external drive and it fails the same way. I have attached a photo of the error, does anyone have any advice on what could be happening and also direct me to where the history file is? I have left laptop up and running after clicking ok, did not want to risk losing the history file by booting back up. BTW, on the 3TB external drive it did create a temp file named xxxxxx.mrimg.temp with size of 0 kb.

Word Man · 26 Dec 2015

There will be a log of the backup attempt on the "Logs" tab (rightmost tab) in the Macrium Reflect interface. I would "OK" out of this and read that log. It could be power/energy saving features dropping the external drive. Does the external drives have an independent power supply or is it receiving power only through the USB connection?

steveh69 · 26 Dec 2015

thanks for the swift reply Word Man, My 3 TB external drive is just connected via USB so was my 1 TB drive that worked in the past. The right most tab is Help, I don't see a log option listed there. Here's a pic of my menu options

steveh69 · 26 Dec 2015

Trying something, the USB port my External drive was connected to felt kind of loose. I also thought that the 2 failed backups ran kind of quick, just over hour and half. My previous image creations took over 3 hours. I started another one different USB port and this time its running a lot longer, crossing my fingers that it completes successfully this time. I will post my results.

steveh69 · 26 Dec 2015

Well I guess I spoke to soon. It failed again with the same error msg, I still cannot locate the history log.

Word Man · 26 Dec 2015

Sorry, I didn't notice you were in the rescue WinPE interface until now. The log tab is in the Windows interface. Not sure where that history log would be unless it's accessible from the command prompt you can open in the WinPE environment (see icons at lower left). I think you open that prompt to a ~~RAM~~ drive lettered X and not sure it will actually store a copy on a physical drive unless perhaps there's one on the target drive.

Some things you could do short of visiting the Macrium support forum would be:

1) run a "chksdk /f:" on the source drive - MR won't complete a backup of a disk with errors (it checks before beginning) unless you override that default behavior). Even escalate to a (lengthy) "chkdsk /r" if you want to be more thorough.

2) be certain there is enough room on the target drive for the image you're trying to make.

steveh69 · 26 Dec 2015

thanks for the info. not really sure what to do from command prompt. This drive I'm using is brand new 3TB drive and this error has occurred on my other 3 1TB drives so I think there is not an issue with bad drives I'm using have now seen this error 4 times on 4 different drives. The error references a history file that cannot be found in the WinPE Environment. I'm going to run a test by making an image of my other laptop. I have a good image of that system as well. This is a very strange one for sure.

Word Man · 26 Dec 2015

steveh69 said:

thanks for the info. not really sure what to do from command prompt. This drive I'm using is brand new 3TB drive and this error has occurred on my other 3 1TB drives so I think there is not an issue with bad drives I'm using have now seen this error 4 times on 4 different drives. The error references a history file that cannot be found in the WinPE Environment. I'm going to run a test by making an image of my other laptop. I have a good image of that system as well. This is a very strange one for sure.

I will have a look from my own MR WinPE environment to see if I can find something. Meantime, can you tell me the version number displayed when you boot into the WinPE environment? Most current is 6.1.1000.

steveh69 · 26 Dec 2015

The version of WinPE is 6.1 build 879

The test I ran on my other laptop just failed with the same error. Both of these systems were backed up shortly after completing the Win10 upgrade and have ran perfectly flawless. A major batch of updates ran a couple of weeks ago that's why I wanted t create new images. This is only real common thing I can think of. Would be worth creating a new recovery DVD and try again?

Word Man · 26 Dec 2015

steveh69 said:

The version of WinPE is 6.1 build 879

The test I ran on my other laptop just failed with the same error. Both of these systems were backed up shortly after completing the Win10 upgrade and have ran perfectly flawless. A major batch of updates ran a couple of weeks ago that's why I wanted t create new images. This is only real common thing I can think of. Would be worth creating a new recovery DVD and try again?

I did a test backup and then found NO log file of any type on the X drive from the available command prompt. But, then again, it threw no error to log.

It never hurts to have the most up-to-date MR rescue media and, as long as one more DVD is not too dear for you, I certainly would give it a try. As your next step may be to spend some time at the Macrium support forum (if you have paid version, you can register there and get support, otherwise you can only read posts), they would probably advise you use latest version before diagnosing the problem further.

Sorry, I couldn't help further at this point - perhaps another member here can make a suggestion.