TeraByte Unlimited

I'm trying to restore a Windows 10 image to a different machine with identical hardware and disk, keeping everything the same.

I use IFL to restore the image made by IFW. The image contains:

ESP (500 Mib) **Active) **
Microsoft Reserved 128 Mib)
Basic Data Partition (242587Mib) NTFS
WINRETOOLS (990 MIb)


I used "Normal" restore, and didn't change any options.
This resulted in the system trying to boot with PXE - it did not see a bootable SSD.

I then booted into IFL partition work and set the ESP partition as active, and wrote the "Win7 MBR".

With this change the system reports "Missing Operating System"

I repeated the restore, and this time only set the ESP partition active but did not write the "Win7 MBR".
The system still fails to boot with "Missing Operating System"

Then I tried to write the "Standard MBR" to the ESP partition
The system then fails to boot with "Error Loading Operating System"

I reviewed the KB articles under "Vista/Win7/8.x/10" but I don't see a basic guide for restoring Windows 10.

What did I miss?

I'm trying to re-create the image on the Windows system after booting to IFL (in case there is an issue with IFW running with the active OS).
Creating the approx 20 Gib image takes about 2 minutes with IFW running from within Windows 10.
Running from IFL booted from USB, the predicted time for the same image is about an hour.
Why would it be slower?

I tried a full restore from the image of Windows 10 created by booting into IFL.
I have the same results.

Still stuck - any guidance other than trying every combination of options?

The source system is Windows 10 Insider Preview build 21343.

I notice when I look at the drive from IFW Backup within Windows, the third partition is
C: basic data partition 236.88 GiB Bitlocker (03)

When I look at the restored partitions on the target system with Partition Work in IFL, I see:
basic data partition 242567 MiB NTFS/exFAT/HPFS/+


When I look at the save TBI image file in IFL during the Restore process in the target system I see the same thing:
basic data partition 242567 MiB NTFS/exFAT/HPFS/+

Why does IFL see the partition differently?

BTW - I confirmed that the source drive _does_not_ have Bitlocker enabled.

The issue may be due to BitLocker. That would explain why IFL takes longer and has a larger image. Note that the Windows partition can be encrypted with BitLocker without BitLocker being "fully" enabled. Many systems ship this way so the user just needs to supply a password. Or maybe something is different with that build of Windows.

Can you browse the partition outside of Windows? For example, can you browse it when booted to IFL? Does IFL also show BitLocker for that partition when you're looking to select it for a backup?

The bitlocker control panel page does say "Bitlocker Waiting for Activation"
Other systems say "Bitlocker off".

I found http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads ... on.832054/
The key is
manage-bde c: -off

Apparently MS is now proactively encrypting Windows 10 main partition and waiting for user "activation"?

I removed bitlocker from the source drive. The control panel reported decrypting for a while, then reported Bitlocker off.
I then created a new image of all the partitions using IFL

I restored the full image (all partitions) to the target machine.
When it attempts to boot, it shows the "Green screen" with "boot device inaccessible"
Then it reboots and tries the "Automatic Repair" and "repairing system" from the Dell logo screen, and "Automatic Repair" from Windows Recovery which all fail.

I observe that in IFL when creating the image the ESP partition is marked **active**
When I load the image in IFL during Restore, the image the ESP partition is marked **active**
After the restore completes, I look at the drive in Partition Work and the ESP partition is NOT marked **active**

From the fresh restore I try to directly boot Windows.
Without changing anything, I get the result above - spinning dots for a while then "Green screen" with "boot device inaccessible", then a loop of attempted repairs ultimately failing.

If I use partition work to set the ESP Active, then the system will not boot at all. I get "No Operating system" or it attempts PXE boot.




PS -When IFL boots, I see a notice flash by "unknown filesystem EFIVARFS" - don't know if that is significant

I'm going through the source and target systems BIOS line by line:

Source:
Boot Sequence - Windows Boot Manager.
Boot List Option UEFI
Advanced Boot Options: Enable Legacy Option ROMs (unchecked) Enable Attempt Legacy Boot (grayed)
UEFI Boot Path Security: Always except internal HDD
SATA Operation: RAID On (I didn't set that - did Windows do it?)
Secure Boot: Enabled

Target:
Boot Sequence - Micron 1100 SATA Partition 1, UEFI Generic Flash (that is the IFL media)
Boot List Option UEFI
Advanced Boot Options: Enable Legacy Option ROMs (unchecked) Enable Attempt Legacy Boot (grayed)
UEFI Boot Path Security: Always except internal HDD
SATA Operation: AHCI
Secure Boot: Disabled

Odd that the target doesn't see Windows Boot Manager as a boot option after restore?
Is Secure Boot required in the target system if enabled in the source system?

I turned on Secure Boot - no change - still fails to boot the same way.

Are the chipsets the same in the two systems? Having RAID drivers in the source and the other wanting AHCI isn't going to work in most cases. You could try enabling RAID in the target system if same, but you may need to use OSDTOOL to configure to use the correct storage drivers.