My Weekend of *ell.

[coffee]

I finally convinced my business client to upgrade their dell computers (11) to windows 10. I also sold them 1tb SSD drives as a replacement. My plan was to use Macrium Reflect (MR) to clone the old spinners to the new SSD drives (windows 7) then do an upgrade. This is going to save alot of time because I will not have to re-install all their office software.

I got there early on last Saturday and installed the new SSD drives and started the cloning process. No hitches. Since MR only copies the used sectors it took about little over an hour compared to if I used DD (8 hours). I was pretty happy. I figure if it doesnt boot I will just put the old spinners back in and figure out the issues with the new SSD drives/cloning.

Then things went terribly wrong!

Of course, The first 4 I did would boot to the login screen, Sit for a few seconds and then give me a BSOD error 1e. I did have a bootable MR rescue usb and tried to fix the boot area. Then determined its not the boot area thats causing the issue. Has to be something else like drivers?

No problem. I just put the old spinner back in and booted up. The computers came up to a light blue solid color screen and said "This license is not genuine". NO! Now Im really getting scared. I could feel that feeling you get when something really goes wrong - crawl right up my neck! Kinda like on the movie "Jaws" when the Sheriff sees the shark get the little boy. I have to have these computers up and running for Monday or Im in a world of hurt! How can the source drive develop an issue when its only reading from it to the target drive????

Sunday - Im still there. I went thru a boot disk and looked for filesystem damage. Nope. None found. Everythings just peachy (???). I had done one other one and it actually did fine. These are all the same make and model that were purchased at the same time. Perhaps the hard drives have some bad sectors?? I didnt see any when I checked.

Finally, I booted up Linux Mint live via a usb. I mounted both drives. I wiped out the windows partition on the spinner put new partition on it. Just did a straight copy from the same partition on the new drive. I rebooted. ..... Everything came back up fine.

I was sitting in one of the lawyers offices staring at his computer late on Sunday thinking "What else could go so wrong?". As I stood there his monitor screen went all grey. I looked and the monitor actually failed! I cant believe this!! Luckly I had a spare in the back room. Got that in and had it back up.

Also on Saturday I did a DD on one of the computers of the secretaries. I figure I was going to let it run all nite and clone. Would help in troubleshooting the cloning issue. I got a phone call while I was typing - from some residential customer wanting to discuss why his new i7 chip would not fit or work in his i5 motherboard. While distracted I reversed the drive devices and wiped the secretaries hard drive clean. So, I just thought, This will be a install now. (Insert feeling of pure shock!).

The install went fine. Computer loves the SSD. I got TV on it and re installed Office for her. Early Monday morning (yesterday) I started installing all the other software she needed at about 4:00AM. Finished everything by the time she got to work and told her about some possible missing files. She said "Thats ok. I didnt have anything on it to save really. I save all my work on the server".

So, I guess I will just remove the old spinners and do complete reinstalls after I backup their home directories and such. Now today I am so tired! My GF wants to go out tonite of course.

Gets better............

Office starts emailing me today. Lawyers are talking to RingCentral to move to cloud VOIP. They want me to install it and want it done by Jan 10 - The end of their ATT contract. WHAT??? I told them that they were cutting things really short and this should have been planned at least a month ago. The only system I have ever installed or worked with was the old Nortel systems of like 20 years ago! They reply "Oh. Well, We have what? 10 days?.. You can do it."

................................... Shi*.

 

[Mike McCall]

Well, they seem to have good confidence in you!

 

[Porthos]

My plan was to use Macrium Reflect (MR) to clone

I NEVER use the clone feature. I always image then restore to the SSD.
For a while now, I pull the original drive and image with my computer with my front dock (not USB) it to my storage drive on my main machine (I7 32gig ram).
Pop the unaltered original drive out toss the SSD in the dock and image it back adjusting partitions as needed.
Put the SSD in the computer make sure bios is up to date and do the upgrade.
If the PC has enough physical room and power plugs I wipe and put the old drive back in and set up automatic image backup with Macrium usually monthly.

 

[coffee]

Well, they seem to have good confidence in you!

Yes, They think Im the shi*'s. I have been taking care of their network and systems for about 6 years now. I have to tell you, Ive done more cloning then I can count. I have never had something go so wrong.

Im going to log in to one of their computers now and look at the hard drive a bit closer. I bet there is something wrong with them. They are getting old. Thats why I told them to move to the SSD drives.

Thanks,

 

[coffee]

I NEVER use the clone feature. I always image then restore to the SSD.
For a while now, I pull the original drive and image with my computer with my front dock (not USB) it to my storage drive on my main machine (I7 32gig ram).
Pop the unaltered original drive out toss the SSD in the dock and image it back adjusting partitions as needed.
Put the SSD in the computer make sure bios is up to date and do the upgrade.
If the PC has enough physical room and power plugs I wipe and put the old drive back in and set up automatic image backup with Macrium usually monthly.

On one of the computers I did do an image. I restored it and got the same outcome. DD on linux caused the same thing. Im sure its probably some hard drive problem because another one I did ran fine. So, There has to be some type of issue going on.

Thanks,

 

[Porthos]

On one of the computers I did do an image. I restored it and got the same outcome. DD on linux caused the same thing. Im sure its probably some hard drive problem because another one I did ran fine. So, There has to be some type of issue going on.

Thanks,

I usually do a little cleanup and maintenance to a computer I start the process. Of course, test the original drive at least a quick test.
Of course, my way takes a little longer but, No failers yet. Now that being said, I work really hard to not have to upgrade and clean install 10 (I trust the longevity more) if at all possible even if it requires me to reinstall a couple of programs and a printer or 2. Fabs deals with data.

 

[coffee]

You know, FABS is a real life saver. This time around I figured I would not need it as I have the original working hard drive. Oops.

What bugs me is that just copying the partition files back over fixed things. So, Its not file corruption that caused it. I do know the profile for the user was even corrupted. I also got the "Creating desktop..." message sometimes when I was able to actually boot them. It would eventually crash though. I tried things like turning off paging and such before cloning too. I dont know. Bios? They are new enough because Win 10 did activate. So, Must be storing the key on the MB.

Who knows.

 

[Diggs]

While distracted I reversed the drive devices and wiped the secretaries hard drive clean. So, I just thought, This will be a install now. (Insert feeling of pure shock!).

I know the feeling. Did this once with DD. I check drive assignments three times every time since then.......

BTW - Cloning with MR to the same size drive takes minutes. Any drive size change can take hours.

 

[coffee]

I know the feeling. Did this once with DD. I check drive assignments three times every time since then.......

BTW - Cloning with MR to the same size drive takes minutes. Any drive size change can take hours.

Concerning DD, I usually open up "Disks" and write down the drive assignments. Then I will pop up a term window and go to it.

Concerning MR, I think it was about an hour more or less for each one.

I just looked at the drives (remote) and one is a seagate and the other is a WD. No correlation there. Both look good.

 

[Sky-Knight]

Whenever I do this, I take my imaging system with me to do it. I learned a long time ago that when you're imaging disks, you need to be doing so on a trusted platform. There are too many things that can go wrong on the arbitrary hardware we work with in the field.

 

[Porthos]

Whenever I do this, I take my imaging system with me to do it. I learned a long time ago that when you're imaging disks, you need to be doing so on a trusted platform. There are too many things that can go wrong on the arbitrary hardware we work with in the field.

I have the benefit of not having to do anything on site. All in-shop.

 

[Sky-Knight]

I have the benefit of not having to do anything on site. All in-shop.

Typically speaking, that's me as well as far as this process is concerned. BUT, when you have an entire office full to do, it's nice to just do them there sometimes. I redid an office that was 3.5 hours away from me that way. Just took my rig down, with a USB drive full of tools.

 

[Galdorf]

I have done this before i have heard issues with MR and SSD transfers if you are not using the newest version try it.

 

[sapphirescales]

Jesus, this is why I don't do upgrades. You think you'll save a lot of time by just upgrading the OS or imaging the drive to another drive, but all you're doing is trading one set of problems for another. Yes, you're able to keep their files, programs, and settings intact, but you also inherit ALL the accumulated problems from over the years. My procedure in this type of setup would have been to:

#1 - Image the drives
#2 - Do a fresh install of Windows on a new SSD
#3 - Fabs the stuff over to the new drive
#4 - Reinstall programs and restore the settings from scratch

Yes it's a pain and yes it costs more money to do it this way, but this is the right way to do it.

 

[Diggs]

Jesus, this is why I don't do upgrades. You think you'll save a lot of time by just upgrading the OS or imaging the drive to another drive, but all you're doing is trading one set of problems for another. Yes, you're able to keep their files, programs, and settings intact, but you also inherit ALL the accumulated problems from over the years. My procedure in this type of setup would have been to:

#1 - Image the drives
#2 - Do a fresh install of Windows on a new SSD
#3 - Fabs the stuff over to the new drive
#4 - Reinstall programs and restore the settings from scratch

Yes it's a pain and yes it costs more money to do it this way, but this is the right way to do it.

In a perfect world, yes. Most do not have the source disks or key codes for all the programs they own. Yes, it is their responsibility but yet they blame you because you changed the computer they used for years. Not a position I like to be in when doing an upgrade rather than re-install would have alleviated the blame game.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

We've learned to trust Acronis, or...better yet in the past 2 years...purchased that Startech drive goblin drive clone appliance. I've given Macrium a try quite a few times over the years, never been impressed with it.

Cloned over a thousands drives through that Drive Goblin in the past year, >99.9% success rate.

To further help success, before I begin the Win10 upgrade...
*Actually I update the BIOS on the rig before cloning to SSD
*SSDs are at latest firmware
*Clone to SSD...swap drives
*Use computer manufacturers tool to update drivers...(Dell Command, Lenovo System Update/Vantage, HP Support Assistant)
*Run the WIn10 media creator tool that I've downloaded..often just have on a share on the server..I copy it local and run it
*Once gone, run the driver update utility again..usually sucks down a video and USB chipset driver specific to Win10

 

[callthatgirl]

I am seeing more of these nightmares lately, as a remote tech...my work is usually easy. I remote into both computers, have the client plug in external HD and I get copying all the data. Remote into new computer, run updates and do my onboarding. Remove what the client has already done usually. Setup Outlook and Office. Wait for hours until old pc is done, then come back and transfer data. Give client an after care call a few days later and do some fine tuning. Usually about 2 hours.

My tech issues come from the external drive and Outlook PST files that are ginormous! The Outlook PST that were created back in the day, have a tendency to not work with new Office, need to make a new one.

 

[Diggs]

Startech drive goblin drive clone

Does this handle cloning down from large HDD to smaller SSD? (I've looked around and can't seem to find a definitive answer.)

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

Does this handle cloning down from large HDD to smaller SSD? (I've looked around and can't seem to find a definitive answer.)

It does not...I had a thread around here not long ago asking if anyone knew of a hardware appliance that does this. If we need to downsize...we use our "bench rig" with multiple external SATA ports and boot from an Acronis CD. That will downsize. BUT...that's a pain in the arse to take onsite to clients. The Startech Goblin is a great device...fast, small. Easy to take onsite.

Well worth the money!!!
So...we bought a couple more of 'em,..since a lot of us at the office have been busy doing clones/upgrades onsite at our clients.

2 or so years ago the ability to "downsize" was more important, as SSDs were expensive back then. So we'd often clone a lot of 500 gig spinners to 250 SSDs. But these days...500 SSD are under a hundred bucks now....so..the fact that the Goblin doesn't downsize isn't an issue. For us anyways...we deal with biz only clients, so really don't encounter drives on biz class machines above 500 gigs. I realize for those that tend to residential clients, dealing with those cheaper 1 and 2TB spinners is common thus an issue.

 

[NETWizz]

I sill use ImageX the Microsoft tool, and it has never let me down. It does a file-based image.

Yeah, you need to format the volume first before you restore, and you need to deal with making it bootable, but it is what I trust.

If I were doing the job, I would bring a couple very large/fast USB Flash drives, and some small ones with my bootable tools like ImageX, Diskpart, etc.

***

I would:

1. Make my backup image of the spinner on a Flash Stick. It makes a .WIM
2. I would shut everything down and pull the spinner and put in an SSD
3. I would Partition, Format, Name the Volume etc. and restore the .WIM
4. Make bootable
5. Boot back into Windows 7 (on the same system). If it is de-activated, I would active it. If I need to call Microsoft, so be it, but the only change would be the drive, and DELL OEM Windows 7 should activate just fine.

6. I would uninstall anything they don't need and run Windows Update to the fullest extent possible.
7. I would run the latest Windows 10 installer from within windows 7
8. It would come up already activated at this point.
9. Run Windows Update... Check drivers etc. Make sure programs work... then let client mess with the computer a week.

If no problems, bring in about 5 flash drives and do two large batches and Get Out. Leave the spinners with the client and run something like DBAN on the flash sticks.

Make it clear in the contract the only back-up is on the original spinners client is keeping.