Asus N56VZ-RH71 backup/restore problrms.

Hi All,
I have purchased the N56VZ-RH71 this month from Sam’s club, and could not backup partitions and/or create an image of HDD to restore to new HDD, or when system becomes heavily infected with viruses. Asus Tech. advised to use Windows 7 File Recovery, accessible through search. After spending hours with Asus support I have found that it does not work. Here is details:
1.Creating system repair disk.
From W7 File Recovery>click Create a system repair disk>system reports that DVD was created successfully. Go to UEFI (Bios), disable Secure Boot, Enable CSM (compatibility module support)>Select Boot Option #1= P2…Name of DVD drive>Save and Exit. System reboots and failed to detect DVD asking to select bootable device.
2. Creating a system image.
With newly formatted 1TB USB3 HD connected>Click “Create a system image”>System starts to write files to USB drive than stops in a few seconds with Msg. ”Win. Backup skipped backing up system…not enough free space…Free up space…. My USB drive have had 930GB of free space, Sys. HD is 750GB.
After discussion issue with Asus upper management, I was told that all N56VZ made a few month back (mine is Nov./2012) has W8 version where MS disabled W7 File Recovery. The only solution is to send laptop back so the new system image will be created.
I was trying EasyUS Todo V-5.8 to create bootable DVD and system HD image on External USB drive. It creates both, and seem to be able to restore image back if recovery started from Easy Todo from inside system. It also boots Easy Todo recovery screen from bootable DVD, and you can select your back up source file. However, after clicking on it the next screen comes empty, nothing is happening. I did not try Acronis 2013, I hate it! Easy Todo is much better if will work with N56VZ.
The bottom line is that N56VZ is an excellent piece of hardware with unmanageable backup/restore. What is your experience? Did you try 3rd party backup software and was able validate recovery from bootable disk and USB drive or set of DVDs? Thanks in advance.

 

You don't need to enable CSM, just disable Secure Boot. Enabling CSM is for emulating legacy BIOS and you (presumably) want to run under UEFI still.

Is your external hard drive formatted for NTFS? If formatted for otherwise, this could be the problem.

If Asus told you it's a Windows related issue, then they must be under the impression you're trying to use the Windows recovery options. Aren't you trying to back up the Asus recovery image? That procedure is proprietary per their software from factory.

 

Enabling CSM allows three additional boot options including booting from DVD I used to validate EasyUS Todo restoration from bootable DVD. W/out enabling CSM there is only one boot option #1-Windows Boot Mgr. My external HD was NTFS formatted. Asus Tech. told me on how to access Windows 7 File Recovery used specifically to backup Windows 8. All steps were done with Asus Tech. on phone. Any other impressions absolutely excluded. Procedure described on page A16 User Manual, allows to "Reset your PC" and "Refresh your PC" . Page A17 describes creation of Recovery DVD with AI Recovery Burner, which is not installed on my N56VZRH71. I was told that Asus is consulting with MS and working on own backup software which is not available yet.

 

Did you disable Secure Boot and leave CSM disabled?

That is the proprietary software I hinted at previously. But this is not a "file backup". It is a backup of the recovery image to restore the system to factory settings. You can download AI Recovery from here, but as it is for Windows 7, it may or may not work (try installing it in compatibility mode for Windows 7).

 

As I described in my 1st post, I have DISABLED Secure Boot and ENABLED CSM. The main question here is how to backup Asus N56VZ ,UEFI BIOS and GPT Hard Drive? Asus Tech. Support advised to use Windows 7 File Backup, which did not work. Acronis 2013 is out of consideration at its present condition. The EasyUS ToDo V-5.8 is promising but did not pass validation to restore with bootable DVD. As per EasyUS we have to wait for a new version (not V5.8) to allow backup of UEFI/GPT system. The bottom line is how to recover hours and hours of new software installation if hard drive has failed? If anyone has a practical experience doing that with Asus N56VZ-please share with us.

 

Yes, I recall. I wanted to know if you had the same results firsthand while still under UEFI. My point is that additional boot options should become available via disabling Secure Boot, regardless of CSM. My apologies if I didn't elucidate well enough in my previous post.

Other than cloning, you can't preserve or backup programs, only your user data. The Windows backup and the Asus AI Recovery burner do two different things; neither of which are cloning. EasyUS really would have been ideal for you had it worked, as it has fairly good cloning/imaging capabilities. I'm sorry to hear that Asus support hasn't been able to resolve this for you either.

 

Well.., cloning is when you copying one disk to another. It can be done between computers straight. This not what most people do when they want to restore the exact copy of disk, partition or file to a new media from archive? We create a virus free image on separate media, and keep it as archive. Than, we restore an image to a new HD. Therefore, an image file is an intermediate step when new disk is loaded with contents of an image. Clicking “Create a system image” in W7 File Recovery was intended to do exactly that (unfortunately is doesn’t). I expect my new N56VZ back from Asus. They promised to fix this. The Asus Recovery Burner is to create a bootable recovery disk, and was never intended to create an image.
Anyway, Acronis 2013 is the same B.S. as before and out of my book. The EasyUS Todo V5.8 has problem to restore from disk, hopefully next version will fix it. Read: EaseUS Software • View topic - Windows 8 - problem creating WinPE Recovery disk - Help!
The Macrium -Reflect seems to be the most of today: Feature List - Macrium Software Forum: Macrium Support Forum
I’m waiting for posts from people who successfully basked up/restored N56VZ ,UEFI/GPT boot, from rescue boot disk.