Please.... for your own peace of mind!

[bj33813]

no luck, will not let me in at all, just a blue ms screen with the not genuine.
Looks like I am between a rock and hard ploace...roll back or do a clean install of win7 all over again>

 

[Toni]

Which did you use? Do the trial versions work ?

Acronis and the trial version worked.

 

[Goodgenie4u]

I am not a Windows savvy senior. Must have made a big mistake. I have 2 HDD's. One was the boot for Win 7 Professional which received the Win 10 upgrade offer. The other used to be Vista but was formatted and left blank.
When I initiated the set up for Win 10, everything went fine; so it seemed, as it fired up. Then 3 things made me confused and wary
(1) I thought my apps would be functional but they were not.
(2) Both HDD's boot to Win 10 Pro. Is it because the BIOS shows one as Raid 0 and the other as RAID 1?
(3) I am being asked to activate Win 10 install. Did not need that when I upgraded my laptop from Win 8.1 to Win 10.

Because the activation has a time deadline, the last thing I need is to neglect resolving what went wrong. I had an app that I have used to track the Product codes of apps like MS Office and Windows OS. I used it and it came up with a Win 10 Pro Product code. . Is this the code I will need to activate Win 10?

I am capable of following step by step instructions to get out of this mess; short of buying a retail copy and starting all over again; without MS Office. Any help will be appreciated. (BTW I do not have any back up image of the original Win 7 Pro)

 

[Goodgenie4u]

Do some looking on the internet for what system image is. I used it as a backup in case of a major failure. If you have 700GB available that's more than enough. My copy of 8.1 was 22.2 GB and the system image of 10 was 54.1 GB. I'm going to delete 8.1 because 10 is so much better.
Just thought of something else-system image includes all your files, pictures, games, whatever as well as settings of how your computer runs. It's like a carbon copy of everything you need to keep.

I have a small Wndows 10 media centre PC (Minix Neo Z64 ). It came with Win 8.1 and I took the free Win 10 upgrade. How can I create an image that would restore OS and Apps?. One thing; the boot is an eMMC 32 G's. I added a 32G micro SD storage that I plan to use to store apps like MS office, Adobe, XBMC/Kodi, Games. ( using SD Mount named folder in the C drive directed to the Micro SD partition)

Thanks kindly, if you can show me the steps, as I know nothing about imaging and backing up my system and files. I have a 2 TB ext drive that has 400G's spare. I wish I could take a course,except that I avoid driving as much as possible during our snow and bitter cold 6 months! The tribulations of mobility for seniors.

 

[Trouble]

Goodgenie4u.
You need to start a new thread in the https://www.windows10forums.com/forums/installation-setup-and-updates.14/
Click the post new thread button top right and outline your issues there.
This thread was not intended to address or resolve such issues, which will likely be a relatively long drawn-out process if even possible.

 

[AlanS]

Thanks for the heads-up , I am now prepared to image my 8.1 machine thanks to the information here.

 

[Trident]

I have not upgraded to Windows 10 yet.
Reading the posts I haven't seen anyone mention using AOMEI (partition assistant) or Macrioum Reflect. Both were suggested to me on Win 7 Forum and each has done what I expect. Macrium, free edition has allowed me to 'clone' or create an 'image' to an external drive - I've done both. The cloned disk allows me to replace the original HD in the event of a crash - and it does boot at startup. The image disk I use before making any major changes (just in case).
So I guess my question would be; Does anyone know if either or both of these programs will perform in Win 10?

 

[clifford_cooley]

The cloning process from Windows 7 and Windows 8 has not changed any in Windows 10.

 

[alva114]

thanks

 

[Gideon]

I have been using Macrium Reflect for almost a year (paid) and it has never failed. The free version is also very good.

 

[Regedit32]

There is no good excuse for not being able to safely and reliably recover in the event of a catastrophic event or if you decide you simply don't like or want Windows 10.

If every help forum announces a 20 month Sabbatical, perhaps then people will learn to help themselves and prepare before disaster occurs. Till that day happens, there is an excuse for someone not to bother

Forgot to mention, Ian's dog after eating the local school boys homework,, chewed through my backup — Excuse #1 O¿— *wink*

 

[Bob Morgan]

Image your disk prior to the upcoming Windows 10 release....There is no good excuse for not being able to safely and reliably recover in the event of a catastrophic event or if you decide you simply don't like or want Windows 10.

TROUBLE, from a separate thread you may recall that when I get my NVIDIA problem resolved with confidence, I plan to go to Windows 10. I'm a big fan, having already converted a half-dozen machines.

My question is backup. Windows 7 has something called "system image backup"

Control Panel > All Control Panel Items > Backup and Restore​

This allows the user to create a system image on an external device (I have a 2TB USB-connected device for this) and also a system repair disk burned on a DVD blank. I've used this in the past on a few occasions to recover from a problem. It this not adequate for restoring from a bad Win 10 install to a previously good Win 7 install (including apps, such as MS Office)?

FYI: I have these storage devices on my system, and plan to unplug all but "C" during the Win 10 update:

1. Drive C - 223 GB SSD for system & software. 92GB free, but I'll kill some trash.
2. Drive D - 111 GB SSD for web development source
3. Drive E - 139 GB hard drive for personal files
4. Drive F - 931 GB hard drive for system image backup files
5. Drive G - 931 GB hard drive for data backup
6. Drive H - 139 GB hard drive, currently for no particular purpose

The 139GB drives rotate at 10,000 rpm; the others at 7,200.

 

[Trouble]

Windows 7 has something called "system image backup"

Control Panel > All Control Panel Items > Backup and Restore​

This allows the user to create a system image on an external device (I have a 2TB USB-connected device for this) and also a system repair disk burned on a DVD blank. I've used this in the past on a few occasions to recover from a problem. It this not adequate for restoring from a bad Win 10 install to a previously good Win 7 install (including apps, such as MS Office)?

I think it's a matter of opinion.... I've heard more than one person suggest that the native Windows System Image process is more than adequate, but......
Personally, I've been disappointed on more than one occasion by Windows System Image recovery and while I don't lay all the blame on its' functionality, it very well could have been just me, not knowing what I was doing.....
I will never use it again and when I say never I mean..... I will always test it from time to time just so I can properly evaluate it but I will never rely on it as my Disk Imaging software exclusively or even primarily.
I'm a big fan of Acronis True Image and have been using it for years and years and while I try different products from time to time I always come back to Acronis True Image.
Others seem to like Macrium Reflect or AOMEI Backupper or AX64
As I said.... it's a matter of opinion and I think it depends on what you're used to, especially if it has saved your bacon a few times.

 

[davehc]

Yes. I am a fanatical Acronis user. On an initial clean install, for myself and others, the first thing I do is customise the raw installation to my known and reliable requirements, make an image, and save it to a safe place. With a few friends and colleagues, I have used Macrium and, eusus todo..

I then install and customise all my software and make another image, also saved to a safe place.

From then on, I can fool around with my computer as much as I please.

Periodically (quite often),when biggy updates come along, I repeat the image backup process., and, if all works well, delete earlier, Full, backups.
Maybe overkill for some, but I have a neurotic habit of fooling to extremes with add-ons and new products. I also have a very slow internet connection, and to leave it too long between making images, can mean a long, long wait for updates to download and install.

 

[clifford_cooley]

Yes. I am a fanatical Acronis user.

I just recently purchased Acronis True Image 2016. Before hand I was using Seagate DiscWizard, which is based on Acronis. I think it was Rufus I used to boot the Acronis ISO from an external USB 3.0 HDD. I now manage all my backups from a bootable USB HDD. And then copy the images to a secondary location for safe keeping.

Periodically (quite often),when biggy updates come along, I repeat the image backup process., and, if all works well, delete earlier, Full, backups.

I usually do the same as you.

 

[Trouble]

I now manage all my backups from a bootable USB HDD

I do something very similar. I just boot from the rescue media on CD and image my three physical drives from that interface onto USB 3.0 external drive.
I actually prefer that method rather than doing it from within the software on a running machine. Seems to work better offline so other services and processes aren't contesting for system resources, especially on the OS drive.
At least, that's what I tell myself.

 

[clifford_cooley]

I do something very similar. I just boot from the rescue media on CD and image my three physical drives from that interface onto USB 3.0 external drive.

I could use an optical drive most of the time. However I get my hands on a device that doesn't have an optical drive. And I don't have an external optical either*. So instead, I figured out how to make my HDD boot to Acronis.

*That is without using a USB to SATA cable on a internal 5.25 optical drive. More trouble than it's worth, trust me.

 

[Bob Morgan]

Strangest thing: I have a paid-for copy of True Image 2013, but I don't recall ever having used it. Must of gotten it on some deal or something. Anyway, I have 1,457 GB of free space on my 1TB drive, and my system disk (C) uses only 141GB, so I'm good to go. I selected "full" since this is my first -- is this a correct assumption?

Don't I need to create something on a DVD that is bootable in the event I need to recover?

 

[clifford_cooley]

Anyway, I have 1,457 GB of free space on my 1TB drive

lol - 1.4TB of 1TB free

 

[Trouble]

Don't I need to create something on a DVD that is bootable in the event I need to recover?

Yep.... you need to create the rescue media from within the True Image software once installed.
I'm not sure about version 2013 on windows 10 but I can vouch for version 2014.
AND that is pretty special, reference the free space being almost 1.5 terabyte on a 1 terabyte drive. I'm gonna speculate and guess that you meant a 2 terabyte drive.