How to backup a system image to a caddy drive on W520

Hello all,

I am trying to save a system image (Win 7) to a caddy/ultrabay drive on my W520, but the windows backup doesn't see the 2nd drive - only the primary drive. At the same time I can save it to an external drive via USB port.

The 2nd ultrabay drive works perfectly fine and visible in explorer and all applications - it is only win backup that cannot see it.

Any suggestions?

Thanks

 

Yes. Complete hard disk recovery solution, backup, drive copy, clone and image computer software

 

I have Acronis TI 2011 and use it all the time. Still, sometimes i think it is a good idea to get a double protection and save a system image with other tools. Though Acronis is a great application and saved my day a few times, I had two cases, when it could not restore an image due to some reasons.

 

The downside to using the Windows tool is that you can't use it with a different sized drive. The upside is being able to mount the resulting .VHD if needed.

TrueImage 2011 is buggy. 2010 and 2012 are good. 2012 seems to be the best of the three.

 

Win backup not seeing the 2nd drive seems to be a common problem, and ppl seem to have found multiple solutions for it. Check out this thread on the Microsoft technet forums: Windows 7 backup setup does not 'see' local hard drives

Also see this thread to check if you share the same problem:
Solved Can't see second Hard drive after using System Image Recovery - Windows 7 Forums

Finally or more accurately, first look under disk management and make sure that the utlrabay drive is not listed as a system drive. It should be designated as a primary partition. Then look at the two links above.

 

Thank you it makes sense, because win backup actually offers an option ov saving both disks to a network drive, while i cannot deselect the 2nd ultrabay drive.

Still, my 2nd drive is not marked as a system drive - see the screenshot:


The question remains - why does win backup see the ultrabay drive as a system drive?

 

The recovery partition and its attributes.

 

What attributes? There is only one - Primary Partition, no system, no boot. Do you mean that win backup treats the name Lenovo_Recovery as a default system drive?

 

Is the partition type 0x27?

 

Perhaps yes, because I was cloning it from a system drive. How can I check it and change to another type?

Thanks!

 

Looks like you left the recovery partition created by Lenovo on the spindle (i.e. your Ultrabay drive) intact. That is the 0x27 type partition that ThorsHammer is referring to. It is possible that Win 7 backup and restore wants to include that in the System Image, and if so, it will force you to save system images it to another drive such as a network drive, external or optical disk.

If you have created recovery DVDs, then you could delete the recovery partition (Lenovo_Recovery I) and then expand Data D to use that space. After doing that give Win backup a try and see if it works. You can use the Disk Management console in Win 7 to do the deleting and expanding.