System restore function after upgrades

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  • superbovine
    Junior Member
    • Oct 2015
    • 9

    System restore function after upgrades

    Hi everyone,


    I got bored with my Verus Pro yesterday (And fed up with only being able to find original Verus tear down pictures!) and went ahead and swapped my hard drive to a Samsung SSD.
    All went smoothly, but in the process (And thinking about keeping the "back up" drive up to date) a question occurred to me:
    When you boot up and you get the message to press S to start system restore, what happens when you do this after you have had software upgrades? For example if you had upgraded to 15.4 or whatever, then you happened to have to do the system restore afterward would the software upgrade have modified the system restore? Is the software level saved somewhere else and untouched by the restore process? Or does the system revert back to its shipped software level, and if so, how does one go about restoring the current level?

    Thanks for any thoughts, as I haven't had any luck asking a tool guy
  • Joe Rappa
    Snap-on DSD
    • Aug 2007
    • 2050

    #2
    On older software updates it would install the original version. Then you had to install you update. It would reinstall from the original jump drive.

    For quite a while now it installs your update automatically.
    I don't remember what update it changed.

    Joe
    "You don't build a reputation on what you're going to do"
    Henry Ford

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    • superbovine
      Junior Member
      • Oct 2015
      • 9

      #3
      Thanks, Joe.... so if I'm understanding right, on a Pro basically if I've had two software updates from the dealer, then later do a system restore, the unit will restore back to how it shipped then will automatically take the software updates online without needing to go on the truck?

      Comment

      • sbreland73
        Senior Member
        • Jan 2009
        • 1076

        #4
        I think around 13.4 they started saving a copy of the update on the D: drive (or partition actually). When you perform a System restore, the utility automatically applies whatever your most recent update was. However, some have reported that they have "lost" that feature when moving from the Hard Disk Drive to a larger or Solid State Drive. I believe that a disk clone is the only way to keep this, as the Restore feature has special boot in the Master Boot Record of the hard drive, and the restore image is located in un-partitioned space at the "back" of the drive. As for your sales rep, they know just enough to sell, and most are not interested in learning all about the diagnostic tools they sell. Just come here for your questions, and your will most likely get the answer you need.
        S. Breland

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        • superbovine
          Junior Member
          • Oct 2015
          • 9

          #5
          Thanks Stacey, that makes sense.


          I noticed the old hard drive was a 500gb drive for some reason... only formatted to 250gb and only using about 14gb.
          I think what I will probably do is just put the original hard drive back in for each update, then clone it again each time. That way I'll keep my back up drive up to date and don't risk losing the restore function if it is in fact stored somewhere besides on the cloned areas of the disk.

          On the off chance something did happen, have you ever had experience with that with snap on, needing to restore lost updates? It seems that since they keep record on their end of where you are/what you've paid for you would think they would be able to re-do them if that situation arose, but like you mentioned it may be far beyond the scope of the guy on the truck, and likely since the circumstances are a bit unusual theoretically, probably beyond anything tech support is trained to respond to.

          Comment

          • sbreland73
            Senior Member
            • Jan 2009
            • 1076

            #6
            I would recommend you NOT swap drives in and out, as that little ribbon cable is fragile, and each time you may risk damage. I would suggest you set up your new SSD to have two partitions, C: and D: so when you get on the truck for an update, it will do its thing and store a copy on the D: partition. The system restore is really for those who are prone to bugger the operating system files, or delete necessary files, etc. Since you have swapped drives with success, you have the smarts to avoid such disaster. I also recommend a back up software (Acronis True Image is my choice) and do weekly back-ups of the C: partition. A recovery by this method is WAY faster than what is built-in. You also get to keep you most recent settings, documents and such, whereas System Restore chunks all that and puts you back to factory fresh. And the last thing, if you do CLONE, you most likely will set the SSD alignment wrong (because the way platter drives are setup) it will be like 32KB offset, SSD need an offset of at least 1024KB to read and write at optimal speed. A google search of SSD alignment will give you insight.
            S. Breland

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            • superbovine
              Junior Member
              • Oct 2015
              • 9

              #7
              Yeah that sounds reasonable. The cable seems pretty tough (well, compared to laptop ones anyway), but I haven't the experience of how it holds up long term with repeated detachment etc.
              I have the current drive cloned to match including the data partition. It just doesn't have the ~250gb unpartitioned space... so I would assume it is going to update no differently than if the original drive were there. Perhaps doing an external back up would be a better option... then I can still keep the original drive as emergency back up, it will just be outdated and if I do have to use it I'll have the same quandary with how to get my paid-for updates restored.


              I haven't aligned the disk yet...I am likely to do that this weekend, but am undecided so far.
              From each time I have had to do an alignment in the past on 7/10 systems it has been successful but would require OS repair before the drive would boot. I'm a bit cautious about getting into this situation with the Verus on XP since I don't have an external DVD drive to run the repair disc, nor is the XP repair function terribly reliable anyway.
              I've had the best luck with AOMEI needing only a 5 second repair usually 7/10 OSs so I would probably use it for XP too, unless you have any personal experience with one that works well for XP (or even better one that can be run in the Verus rather than having to remove the drive to align it under a different OS)?

              Thanks again!

              Comment

              • superbovine
                Junior Member
                • Oct 2015
                • 9

                #8
                Well its a slow afternoon in the shop so I decided to run AOMEI today and see if I can avoid having to deal with it this weekend.
                It aligned fine for the C drive, rebooted to a confirm-bootup screen which luckily I could navigate with the arrows and guessed the correct boot selection, then finished.
                Booted to Windows fine, had an error that required reboot, then booted normally without error. On checking, C: is 4096 aligned, but D: is not; however when I try to align it again it stops me and says it is already at optimum alignment (as does *: ). I'm leaving it be

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                • Witsend
                  Banned
                  • Nov 2012
                  • 2942

                  #9
                  I know Johnnie Cash made the song " A Boy named Sue" I wonder how many Dad's named their son Shawn or Stacey just so that son of theirs would grow up to be one Bad *** Take No Names SOB? Just wondering

                  Comment

                  • sbreland73
                    Senior Member
                    • Jan 2009
                    • 1076

                    #10
                    Originally posted by superbovine
                    Well its a slow afternoon in the shop so I decided to run AOMEI today and see if I can avoid having to deal with it this weekend.
                    It aligned fine for the C drive, rebooted to a confirm-bootup screen which luckily I could navigate with the arrows and guessed the correct boot selection, then finished.
                    Booted to Windows fine, had an error that required reboot, then booted normally without error. On checking, C: is 4096 aligned, but D: is not; however when I try to align it again it stops me and says it is already at optimum alignment (as does *: ). I'm leaving it be
                    Sounds like your off and running! Happy diagnosing.
                    S. Breland

                    Comment

                    • superbovine
                      Junior Member
                      • Oct 2015
                      • 9

                      #11
                      Originally posted by sbreland73
                      Sounds like your off and running! Happy diagnosing.

                      Yep! Wish I had done this sooner; I bought it last March/April and really regretted the speed drop (traded in a Solus Ultra for it). I almost made it to the end of the warranty period before tearing it open

                      Thanks for your help with the restore stuff!

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