/boottbwr for automated restores

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Brian K
Posts: 2214
Joined: Fri Aug 12, 2011 1:11 am
Location: NSW, Australia

/boottbwr for automated restores

Post by Brian K »

Absolutely fantastic method for initiating a Windows OS partition restore. From Windows. No scripts or command lines or boot media are needed.

It took a minute to build the WIM on the first effort but only 8 seconds on subsequent efforts.
Mr.X
Posts: 35
Joined: Mon Oct 20, 2014 12:31 am

Re: /boottbwr for automated restores

Post by Mr.X »

I agree with you Brian. I was looking for this feature for so long. Running some tests now...
Hadron
Posts: 37
Joined: Tue Oct 22, 2019 1:29 am

Re: /boottbwr for automated restores

Post by Hadron »

You got me intrigued now.

To enable this, do I add BootTBWinRE=1 to the [Options] section of TBWinPE.ini?

Edit: It appears that it goes in the [Options] section of IFW.ini.
Brian K
Posts: 2214
Joined: Fri Aug 12, 2011 1:11 am
Location: NSW, Australia

Re: /boottbwr for automated restores

Post by Brian K »

Hadron,

You don't need to do anything as it's enabled by default.

If you want to test it immediately, do this...

Install IFW 3.48
Make a backup image of your system (this is mainly for the Windows partition)
Start IFW, run through the restore screens (restore the Windows partition only from the above image), click Start.
You will then see an Error window showing "Unable to obtain a lock on drive C:". Click Reboot. You can now go and have dinner. When you return, your computer will be in restored Windows.
Make another backup image of your system This is to backup the WinRE partition containing the altered winre.wim.

Now you can make and restore Entire Drive images if you desire.
Hadron
Posts: 37
Joined: Tue Oct 22, 2019 1:29 am

Re: /boottbwr for automated restores

Post by Hadron »

Hi Brian.

Page 165 of the current user manual mentioned about enabling it, but if it's already enabled by default, even better.

A few questions.
Does it have to be a new backup?
Does winre.wim get altered to allow this?
If I decide to restore all partitions from within Windows, will this still work?
Brian K
Posts: 2214
Joined: Fri Aug 12, 2011 1:11 am
Location: NSW, Australia

Re: /boottbwr for automated restores

Post by Brian K »

New backup, yes. If you use an old backup then you will need to reinstall IFW 3.48.

If you restore an Entire Drive backup before you have backed up the altered winre.wim then IFW will have to rebuild a new altered winre.wim. No big deal but it can take a minute or more. The numbers I posted above were for my test computer. My main computer numbers were 50 and 4 seconds.
If I decide to restore all partitions from within Windows, will this still work?
Sure. After you have the above backups.
Hadron
Posts: 37
Joined: Tue Oct 22, 2019 1:29 am

Re: /boottbwr for automated restores

Post by Hadron »

Thanks, Brian.
Mr.X
Posts: 35
Joined: Mon Oct 20, 2014 12:31 am

Re: /boottbwr for automated restores

Post by Mr.X »

Brian, this CMD line does the job building the winre.wim file required for automatic restores:

Code: Select all

"C:\Program Files (x86)\TeraByte Drive Image Backup and Restore Suite\tbwinre\tbwinpe.exe" /build /ifw
Great.

With it, it's possible to create the wim at will and not wait to do a restore. I like that.
Mr.X
Posts: 35
Joined: Mon Oct 20, 2014 12:31 am

Re: /boottbwr for automated restores

Post by Mr.X »

Nevertheless, Terabyte needs to implement a solution via GUI. A message and/or button offering to create after installing IFW for the first time.
If a user clicks No, then another way to create wimre.wim via GUI should be available.
Terabyte must make that solution via GUI available for anyone.
TeraByte Support
Posts: 3598
Joined: Thu May 05, 2011 10:37 pm

Re: /boottbwr for automated restores

Post by TeraByte Support »

Mr.X wrote: Sat Dec 11, 2021 6:24 pm Nevertheless, Terabyte needs to implement a solution via GUI. A message and/or button offering to create after installing IFW for the first time.
If a user clicks No, then another way to create wimre.wim via GUI should be available.
Terabyte must make that solution via GUI available for anyone.
You don't have to do anything, it's all automatic. Only if updates occurred will it take an extra bit of time to rebuild what it needs to rebuild.
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