I usually boot from the rescue CD to image drives. I dothis to ensure that no malware is running during the backup, that malware nevergets to see the backup disks, and to avoid dependency on Windows Shadow Copy. Ihave been doing this with Macrium Reflect v5 for years with no problems.

I've just purchase a new licence to Reflect v6 for use onanother computer. (Macrium Reflect 6.1.1366).

I created a rescue CD on that machine (default settings),booted off it, and attempted to image the C and D partitions to a SeagateGoFlex USB external drive. This failed with the messages:
  Backup aborted! Write operation failed - The handle isinvalid.

 I tried running Reflect in Windows (windows 7) and was ableto image the C and D partitions to the same external drive.

I created a new rescue CD, booted off it, and tried to imagethe C partition to the external drive again. It failed with the same error asbefore. I tried a different external drive (Western Digital this time) and adifferent USB socket - same result. I rebuilt the rescue environment with theoptional components - same result.

 I could image the C and D partitions to a second internaldrive after booting off the rescue disk. I could verify an image on the external drive after booting off the rescue CD. I could also usethe command prompt after booting off the rescue CD to copy files to theexternal drive.

So I've established that, while booted from the rescue CD:

- I can create an image (to an internal drive)

- Reflect can verify an image on the external drive

- I can write to the external drive (using the Windows PEcommand line).

It just fails when I try to image a partition to an externaldrive after booting off the rescue CD.

How can I get this to work?

Hello urtlet,

Thanks for posting.

Please can you submit a ticket so we can request more information.

http://www.macrium.com/support.aspx#tickets

Kind Regards

Stephen

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I was trying to create an image and save it to an external drive plugged directly into a USB3 port on the back panel on a Gigabyte GA-H55M-USB3 motherboard.
It completed analysing the file system, then got stuck with current progress = 0% for about a minute, then the error message came up and progress showed 100%.

Support were very helpful and were able to find a solution after a few emails back and forth.
The solution was to create a rescue disk based on PE10. This has native USB3 support.

If your previous rescue media was created using PE 3.1 as the base, it does not provide "built-in" support for USB3.  In that case, if the external drive is attached while the rescue media build is being created, the Reflect "wizard" will usually pick up the necessary USB3 drivers from your Windows 7 operating system.  I suspect that you may not have had that external backup destination drive attached on the USB3 port during your original rescue media creation process and so no USB3 support was included in that WinPE build.  In any case, as you say, PE 10 includes its own USB3 support and so does PE 5.

For the benefit of anyone searching here who may encounter similar PE version issues, they are dealt with in greater detail in this KB article.


Regards, Richard V. ("Arvy")

Hi Richard / Arvy
Thanks for your comments.
I was using PE 3.1 as the base.
But I did actually have the external drive attached while I created the rescue media (at least for the 2nd, 3rd and 4th disks that I created before I first posted on this forum).
So in this case, this doesn't explain why the image didn't work.
And the curious thing was that I could write to the external drive (using a copy from the command prompt) while running from the rescue media.
(I also checked that the USB3 drivers were up to date in Windows 7).
Regards John / urtlet

Hi John.  That is strange.  In my own experience, the Reflect "wizard" hasn't always been 100% infallible in picking up OEM USB3 drivers from Win7 for its WinPE builds even when the device is connected, but results have always been "all or nothing" for me.  Any of my OEM Win7 drivers have either worked with USB3 connections in WinPE as well as in the regular Windows environment or they haven't work at all.  I have to admit, however, that my USB3 external drive experience is limited as I switched to eSATA and swappable drive bays some time ago.  Anyhow, I guess if the PE 10 USB3 support fixed your problem, that's all that really matters.

Regards, Richard V. ("Arvy")