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I'd like to be able to do a system image backup of the Windows side of Boot Camp from within Windows that can be restored to a newly created Boot Camp partition (of the same or larger size).

I tried using the Windows 7 system image backup and restore, but after restoring, the Mac side can no longer read the Boot Camp partition. I also tried norton ghost (not compatible with Windows 7) and paragon disk backup (restore portion doesn't "see" the Boot Camp partition).

Can anyone recommend a backup solution for me? I know I could use WinClone from the Mac side, but I spend most of my time in Windows these days...

3 Answers 3

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I'd like to be able to do a system image backup of the windows side of boot camp from within windows that can be restored to a newly created boot camp partition (of the same or larger size).

The issue here is that you can't safely backup a running system when you are booted from that partition.

If you expect to use bootcamp, then you will need to back up the partition with an utility that is bootcamp aware. Ghost, and Windows System restore expect a stock Windows configuration, which doesn't include the EFI boot partition that is necessary for bootcamp.

Winclone is typically faster, and easier to use then most of the Windows tools I have used in the past...

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  • Thanks - guess there's no way to do this from Windows :)
    – Dan
    Nov 7, 2009 at 20:17
  • There maybe, once software is updated to support it... But I suspect the open source community will be faster than symantec, and other corporations... Nov 8, 2009 at 5:33
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winclone is good, i been messing around with this idea of up backing up my bootcamp partition with mixed results, i really want to have a program running under windows like time machine backing up a system image and being able to restore it but nothing works other than doing a manual image with winclone every week, also winclone can only save to a osx partition so make sure you have a external formated that way. one good thing is you can extend your partition (bootcamp) if its running out of room by making an image and then creating an new partition with desired space and restore the image to said partition... but if anyone has a better solution to backing up your bootcamp partition under windows that safe and easy please share :)

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I figured out a backup/restore solution for the Boot Camp partition. I'm running on Macbook Pro 13" w/ Mac OS X 10.7.3. Within my Boot Camp partition, I'm running Windows 7 SP1 [x64]. Acronis True Image Home 2012 installed and runs fine from within Windows. I setup a scheduled backup, and it's working. For the restore process I discovered that I can't boot my Mac directly from the Acronis recovery CD. But using VMware Fusion (version 4), I was able to attach the Acronis CD to my Boot Camp virtual machine and boot from it. I just did a restore this way and it worked. I restarted and went directly back into Boot Camp, and Windows 7 was restored perfectly.

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