Rand Al'Thor wrote:
> My hard disk has failed, I have a hard disk with a recent non-bootable copy
> on it using Ghost. I've booted Ghost CD but there is nothing on there to
> make this hard disk bootable! Also no recovery points on the non-bootable
> hard disk. Any Gurus' out there can help?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Alan
>
I can recount a little example for you.
I had two partitions, like this.
+------------+ +------------+
| C: | | E: |
+------------+ +------------+
I decided one day, it would be fun to copy C: to E:,
then erase C by reformatting it, then copy the files
back from E: to C:. To do the copy, I used the Microsoft
"Robocopy" to copy all the files. Since I have a dual boot
system, I could do this from "outside" the OS. So the
Windows stored on C:, isn't running when this copying
madness was in progress.
Well, I finished, then set the boot order in the BIOS,
to actually boot from the freshly prepared C:. It wouldn't
boot! What I didn't realize, is there are boot sectors put
there during install. So, at a minimum, your hard
drive actually looks like this.
<----------- This is the whole C: -------------->
+---+------------------------+----------------------+
|MBR| partition boot sector | files for C: |
+---+------------------------+----------------------+
When I did the copy of the files, I got the bit on the
right of the diagram. But a file copy, does not save
the boot sector in the middle of the diagram.
To repair the partition boot sector, use "fixboot" from the
Recovery Console.
To repair the MBR, use "fixmbr" from the Recovery Console.
Once I used "fixboot", my C: screwup was fixed. And I'm using
that C: right now, to type this.
If you have a genuine WinXP CD, you can boot from that and
enter the Recovery Console. It is also possible, to install
the Recovery Console, as a boot option when the computer
starts. But few people (myself included) don't bother to
do that. There is a third way, which is to get an ISO9660
image of a recovery console boot CD. One problem with that
idea, is perhaps the Service Pack level has to match. I
haven't tested this idea, of using a separate recovery
console boot CD, so I can't help you with that.
(Click a link here, and download the file. Inside the 4,677,680 byte
"xp_rec_con.zip" is an ISO9660 file. If you look inside that with 7ZIP,
you can see the contents of a Recovery Console CD. Looks like a couple
hundred files inside the "i386" folder. You need to use something like
Nero, to make a bootable CD from the contents of the ISO9660 file.
You don't just "copy" that file to an empty CD. There is no way of
knowing how trustworthy this particular compilation is and this is just
so you can see the files needed to make a Recovery Console CD. A genuine
WinXP installer CD has the ability to boot into Recovery Console, which
is why I don't need to test this compilation. This could very well have
been built from the floppy image set from the Microsoft site for all I
know.)
http://web.archive.org/*/http://www....xp_rec_con.zip
So if you were to Ghost back the simple file backup you hold in
your hand, make sure the partition is set active, do the
"fixboot" thing from the Recovery Console, maybe it might boot.
To do the experiments that I do, I have backups in case they fail.
What I do for backups, is a sector by sector copy of the entire
disk, or of the partition. I use "dd" in Linux for that, or there
is a "dd" for Windows port I use sometimes as well. This has saved
my bacon a few times. But any decent backup software, should be
able to make a "bare metal" backup, for recovery even to a new
empty disk drive. And the results should then be bootable, since the
tool claims to be able to handle "bare metal" and make it work.
The boot sector should get copied during a bare metal backup.
Paul
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