Windows Server 2008 Backup/Restore Troubles

matthab

matthab

matthab

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Joined
19 Apr 2009
Posts
3,159
Hi Guys

I have a Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise server at home. Last week the OS drive died. I thought no biggy I backup everyday using the windows tool to do a full backup.

So I get my 2 new drives from OCuk yesterday, ones faulty so that's gone back. But in the mean time Im testing I can restore my backup. Ive installed the one remaining drive and booted from recovery disc and selected repair my computer. Does a search of the drives and cant find the backup. The backups are stored on a WD My Book. I have even tried moving it onto one of the internal sata drives and it still fails to see it.

The old drive was a 10,000rpm 36gb raptor. The new drive is a 500gb WD RE drive.

Just like to highlight this drive is only the OS not the data and its not the end of the world to have to reload it all but annoying why windows backup cant save me.

Am I forgetting something kind of obvious or is there something I need to do?

Matt
 
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Well i wanted to try the baremetal restore and it wouldnt do it.

But I installed the OS on and did a restore but this as far as I could make up (getting bored by this point so stopped for the night) it just copied the contents of the backup onto the OS drive. But couldnt see a way to do a complete restore in windows. i.e how it looked before the drive died.
 
To be honest it's probably going to be quicker and simpler to re-configure it.
Though in future I'd recommend proper backup software or something that'll take a full image of the drive. Windows backup isn't fantastic, especially for bare metal recovery.
 
Yeh thats what ill probably end up doing. Abit confused why Microsoft cant get a basic backup utility to work.

Can anyone recommend a good free backup software? (This server is only used at home)
 
I've dabbled a bit with GFI Backup. Which is fairly good though no bare metal recovery option. Depends what you've got on there, if you've shelled out to the level of putting 2008R2 on there then it's probably worth investing a small amount on something decent.

I'd recommend Symantec Backupexec but it's a bit overkill in both spec and price for what you're doing.

You could probably get away with something like acronis trueimage. Which is like £40 and integrates into windows 7 front end (aka. 2008R2 front end)
 
Thanks very much for your help.

I will try Acronis as I have some licenses for that. The new set up will use RAID 1 so at least ive covered against mechanical failure.
 
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