Universal Restore in Windows

Preparation

Prepare drivers

Before applying Universal Restore to a Windows operating system, make sure that you have the drivers for the new HDD controller and the chipset. These drivers are critical to start the operating system. Use the CD or DVD supplied by the hardware vendor or download the drivers from the vendor’s Web site. The driver files should have the *.inf, *.sys or *.oem extensions. If you download the drivers in the *.exe, *.cab or *.zip format, extract them using a third-party application.

The best practice is to store drivers for all the hardware used in your organization in a single repository sorted by device type or by the hardware configurations. You can keep a copy of the repository on a DVD or a flash drive; pick some drivers and add them to the bootable media; create the custom bootable media with the necessary drivers (and the necessary network configuration) for each of your servers. Or you can simply specify the path to the repository every time Universal Restore is used.

Check access to the drivers in bootable environment

Make sure you have access to the device with drivers when working under bootable media. Even if you configure system disk recovery in a Windows environment, the machine will reboot and recovery will proceed in the Linux-based environment. Use WinPE-based media if the device is available in Windows but Linux-based media does not detect it.

What if you do not have drivers

Windows 7 includes more drivers than the older Windows operating systems. There is a great chance that Universal Restore finds all necessary drivers in the Windows 7 driver folder. So, you may not necessarily have to specify the external path to the drivers. Nevertheless, performing Universal Restore is critical so the system uses the correct drivers.

The Windows default driver storage folder is determined in the registry value DevicePath, which can be found in the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion. This storage folder is usually WINDOWS/inf.

Universal Restore settings

Automatic driver search

Specify where the program will search for the Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL), HDD controller driver and network adapter driver(s):

• If the drivers are on a vendor's disc or other removable media, turn on the Search removable media.
• If the drivers are located in a networked folder or on the bootable media, specify the path to the folder by clicking Add folder.

During recovery, Universal Restore will perform the recursive search in all the sub-folders of the specified folder, find the most suitable HAL and HDD controller drivers of all those available, and install them into the recovered system. Universal Restore also searches for the network adapter driver; the path to the found driver is then transmitted by Universal Restore to the operating system. If the hardware has multiple network interface cards, Universal Restore will try to configure all the cards' drivers.

Mass storage drivers to install anyway

To access this setting, expand Show mass storage drivers to install anyway.

You need this setting if:

• The target hardware has a specific mass storage controller such as RAID (especially NVIDIA RAID) or a fibre channel adapter.
• You recover a system to a virtual machine that uses a SCSI hard drive controller and is booted into bootable media. Use SCSI drivers bundled with your virtualization software or download the latest drivers versions from the software manufacturer Web site.
• If the automatic drivers search does not help to boot the system.

Specify the appropriate drivers by clicking Add driver. The drivers defined here will be installed, with appropriate warnings, even if the program finds a better driver.

The recovery process

If Universal Restore cannot find a compatible driver in the specified locations, it will display a prompt with the problem device. Do any of the following:

• Add the driver to any of the previously specified locations and click Retry.
• If you do not remember the location, continue the recovery. If the result is not satisfactory, start Universal Restore without recovery by clicking Apply Universal Restore in the media welcome screen. When configuring the operation, specify the necessary driver.

Once Windows boots, it will initialize the standard procedure for installing new hardware. The network adapter driver will be installed silently if the driver has the Microsoft Windows signature. Otherwise, Windows will ask for confirmation on whether to install the unsigned driver.

After that, you will be able to configure the network connection and specify drivers for the video adapter, USB and other devices.