Windows Image Backup - renamed folder now restore cannot find any backups

Question

A while back I decide to create a couple of Windows Image Backups of my workstation at various points during installation from clean.

While doing this I decided to rename the folders containing the VHDs from 'Backup <Date>' to something else of my choosing.

I didn't bother testing at the time that the restore still worked.

Now I come to use these backups for doing a bare metal restore to a different computer.

The problem is restore cannot 'see' any of the backups.

So I have deduced that maybe I need to rename them back to the 'Backup <Date>' pattern unfortunately I cannot determine the exact values that would have originally been used here. I have tried by best guest but the images still cannot be found. I have tried doing both a network and a usb hdd restore. No luck on either.

P.S. I know I can retrieve files from within the VHDs, the problem is I am trying to save myself time of reinstalling lots of big applications... not trying to recover data.

Answer 1

Not sure exactly what is going on so forgive me if I ill advise; I use Acronis for back-up not windows; that said it would be my understanding that the would just be a system date for GUI perposes so that you can choose which one from the list any date should work in the proper format if this is correct;

In order to get an idea of the format you could creat a new back-up and copy that formatting over to the old back-ups with a reasonably correct date; there maybe some reg key changes also so you may want to check that.

If that doesn't work there is a slim chance you could use proprietery back-up software like Acronis (no plug intended) which might be able to 'read' your files: Acronis allows a conversion between Acronis to Windows and back again.

Hope this helps?!

Answer 2

This is what I have discovered so far:

The following changes will cause the backup not to be recognised (I am testing using wbadmin get versions -backupTarget:D: )

• If you delete or modify the MediaId file from the root
• Delete or modify the Catalog/GlobalCatalog file (deleting the BackupGlobalCatalog seems to have no effect)
• Rename the Backup <Date> folder to anything else (I tried changing it by 1 second)
• If its not inside D:\WindowsImageBackup\<PC-NAME>\ folder (in my example)

You can delete the SPPMetadataCache directory and it appears to have no effect - backup is still recognised.

So, the essential parts so far are MediaId, GlobalCatalog, the dated folder and presumably its contents.

To be continued...

Update: MediaId contains a reference into the GlobalCatalog file...

Update 2: I am going to try brute forcing this using a powershell script...

Update 3: Well I found the correct folder name using a painfully slow powershell script:

#must match the starting date of the folder
$date = Get-Date '15/10/2010 00:34:24 AM' 
$nextDate = $date.AddDays(1)
cd "D:\WindowsImageBackup\My-PC\"

$dateString = Get-Date $date -format "yyyy-MM-dd HHmmss"
$nextFolder = "Backup $dateString"
while ($date -le $nextDate)
{
    $nextFolder >> out.txt
    wbadmin get versions -backupTarget:d: >> out.txt

    $folder = $nextFolder

    $date = $date.AddSeconds(1)
    $dateString = Get-Date $date -format "yyyy-MM-dd HHmmss"
    $nextFolder = "Backup $dateString"

    ren $folder $nextFolder
}

Just search inside the out.txt file until you see the word 'target'.