Windows 7 Restoring a backup image from USB external hard drive

Andrew Forbes

New Member
Joined
Jun 16, 2010
Hello, I hope someone can help me. I have a problem I wasn't expecting. I am using Windows 7 Home Prem and have used the OS software to create a back up image of my hard drive onto an external one, no probs so far.
I then go into the repair computer section on boot up that has a restore from back up image section, no problem, but when I go to do this it does not show the ext hard drive as an option from which to restore the image. I then try the advanced option I think it is, which allows me to search for some driver for the external piece of hardware I want to use, which is odd as I can search the ext hard drive for this anyway, so therefore it doesn't need it, so I think. Can someone point me in the right direction maybe? Thanks in advance, Andrew
 
Have you ever had a problem with Win 7 seeing the drive?

Have you looked at your bios settings to see if anything might need to be changed to allow for recognition of USB devices during boot?

Did you change the name of the backup folder on the external drive?
 
I have never had a problem with win 7 seeing the drive, and sees it fine now.
Did go into Bios, and added USB to the boot list, even moved USB to number 1, but nothing doing there either.
Did I change the name? Not 100% sure, I think not, certainly it is in a folder in a folder etc on the drive, it's actual file name has not changed though I may have moved it. How can this affect it? The ext hard drive appears to have some software on board that came with it, would any of this help when I am prompted for a driver?
Are there any other ways of restoring from a USB image?
 
Just as a quick fix, can you boot into windows safe mode? If you can, try copying the image file to an internal HDD and then run the backup from there.
 
I believe the backup has to be where it was placed originally. If you moved it out of the root directory, move it back and try.

You should not need any drivers that I know of, but I never used a drive with your type of software. I have always used and external enclosure and placed the drive myself. Under USB devices in the bios, I assume you have Legacy enabled and possibly others. You do not want it set to boot, since you are not doing that.

Yesterday to test, I backed up an install of Win 7 on an external USB drive and the recovery found it immediately.
 
Thankyou very much for both helping, although I don't have time right now to do it, I am going to start by moving the image about on the ext hdd and see if it can be detected first, then I will see what happens... Will get back when has been tried. Andrew
 
Solved! Moved the image from where I had moved it on the drive to root, and the image recovery software found it immediately, created a repair disc, booted from that after moving CD/DVD to number one on boot menu in Bios, and the image restored perfectly. Thanks Salt and zvit for help!
 
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