Retro 6.0 and 5.6 DR and expansion IDEs

[awnews]

I'm running Retrospect Desktop Backup 5.6 on my main W2K SP3 PC and have temporarily installed a full purchased Retrospect Pro 6.0 on a WXP system, instead of overwriting my W2K's Retrospect, so I can eval it.

 

 

 

Regarding the Disaster Recovery features in Retro 6.0 and 5.6:

 

 

 

My W2K SP3 system uses an ASUS CUBX motherboard with an integrated CSU-648 CMD IDE expansion system (similar to a Promise/Maxtor/SIIG PCI IDE expansion card) to give me four IDE connectors rather than the standard two (two ATA33 on the mb, two ATA66 for the expansion). The main C: HD is running off of one of these expansion IDE ports to get ATA66 performance. To boot from here, the C: drive has to have a driver installed--if not, the system will blue-screen during a W2K boot due to the lack of a driver. If booting from a "regular" IDE port on the motherboard, the system will boot but won't recognize devices on the CMD648 IDE expansion ports until the driver is installed. You have to do the later during an OS install to first install the needed driver.

 

 

 

According to the RDB5.6 Disaster Recover notes on the DR ISO-->CD "Any third-party hardware drivers that were present at the time the Retrospect Disaster Recovery CD was created will be automatically installed to the temporary system." However, despite this claim, I don't believe that these third party drivers, including the CMD648 driver, *are* installed on the Retro DR ISO CD. When I attempt to boot from the DR ISO-->CD, the boot setup tells me "Setup has determined that your computer's startup harddisk isn't new or has been erased, or that your computer is running an operating system that is incompatible with Windows 2000"--it can't see or doesn't like my W2K drive. But this is clearly incorrect since my C: drive is present and working and runs fine on boot even though it's hung off the CMD648 port--the system just needs a driver that enables it and works with the CMD648 expansion feature. There is a "Driver" folder on the DR CD and I see some standard drivers installed by the W2K Setup CD but not the CMD648 one I need that *was/is* present during ISO creation.

 

 

 

That brings me to Retrospect Pro 6.0. The DR notes generated when I create a DR ISO-->CD are essentially the same as when create a DR ISO-->CD with 5.6, telling me that any drivers present will be included with the DR6.0 CD. However, since this doesn't seem to be correct with RDB5.6, I don't have faith that it will be true with RP6.0. Has RP6.0 done anything to improve DR and *really* install "any third-party hardware drivers that were present at the time the Retrospect Disaster Recovery CD was created?"

 

 

 

I'll admit that my CUBX motherboard is a bit odd, with the integrated CMD648 IDE expansion system. However, I have other systems that use Promise, Maxtor or SIIG PCI IDE expansion cards and I do boot some of these off of a C: drive connected to an expansion IDE port (to get ATA100 or ATA133 performance) rather than an IDE port on the motherboard--with W2K, I have to preinstall the drivers for these before installing the expansion card or booting from an expansion IDE port (if not-->blue-screen). Does RDB5.6 or RP6.0 DR work any better with these "standard" PCI cards?

[awnews]

A clarification:

 

 

 

My WXP RP6.0 system has a SIIG ATA133 PCI IDE card. The driver for this, CN2487.sys, *is* present on the DR6.0 CD created by RP6.0.

 

 

 

My W2K RDB5.6 system has a driver for both the CMD648 IDE expansion device and a Maxtor ATA100 PCI IDE card (the later card isn't installed but the driver is still on the system). The DR5.6 ISO-->CD has a driver for the Maxtor card, Ultra.sys, but *not* for the CMD648 device, cmdide.sys.

 

 

 

This leads me to believe that RDB5.6 is *selectively* copying drivers to the DR5.6 ISO-->CD rather than copying *all* drivers to the DR5.6 ISO-->CD. Does DR6.0 do the same or does it copy *all* drivers. If not, how is it deciding which ones to copy? Is there a way to force it to include other drivers?

 

 

 

I took a look at trying to add additional files (e.g. the cmdide.sys driver) to the /Drivers folder as a multi-session CDR. But even though I didn't explicitly Finalize the CD when I burned it with Nero, I don't seem to be able to add files--perhaps since it was created from a complete ISO??

 

 

 

Is there any way to add files to an DR ISO or the CD so I could add additional drivers? It would be easier if Retro would do what it claimed ==> "**Any** third-party hardware drivers that were present at the time the Retrospect Disaster Recovery CD was created will be automatically installed to the temporary system.

[lv2ski]

One explanation is that the driver that was not included on the DR CD's

 

ISO image is a Microsoft driver, rather than a third-party driver. We do not include Microsoft's base drivers because we install a temp sytem that will include these during DR.

 

 

 

The only 'selection' process that Retrospect utilizes is whether or not

 

the device's driver has native support (i.e. has a Microsoft driver) within

 

the OS or is a third-party driver.

 

 

 

Hope this helps!

 

Melissa

 

 

[awnews]

The CMD648 "cmdide.sys" is *not* a Microsoft driver. Since it's in my C:\WINNT\system32\drivers\ folder but *not* on the DR5.6 ISO-->CD, Retrospect 5.6 is obviously not copying it to the ISO. I haven't tried RP6.0 on this system (I'm not willing to overwrite a working RDB5.6 at the moment) so I don't know if RP6.0 will behave differently and copy this file. As I noted, RP6.0 *did* copy the SIIG driver on the XP system it's installed on.

[lv2ski]

I gotcha. That is correct.

 

5.6 didn't copy ALL 3rd party drivers. That was a problem with the 5.6 DR. BUT 6.0 does. That was what I was going off of in my earlier writings.

[awnews]

Thanks for the clarification.

 

 

 

My plan is to install RP6.0 (over RDB5.6) on the system with the CMD648 card and run it as the main Retro, with clients on my other PCs. So it's good to know that it *should* work and hopefully will allow me to boot with the DR6.0 CD even though my C: and other harddrives (with Retro backup files) are on an expansion IDE card/connector.

 

 

 

I just finished imaging (PowerQuest DriveImage6) my PCs onto their backup drives so I'm in a pretty good position to try this when I find some time. It's interesting to note that DriveImage6 was able to reboot into its DOS shell but still see the drives on the expansion PCI IDEs--Maxtor, Promise, SIIG and CMD648 in my assorted PCs. This was true whether I ran DI6 from Windows (installs temp boot driver and reboots into DOS shell) *or* if I booted DI6 from the emergency (Caldera) DOS floppies (similar to the DR CD). And it was also true even on the systems with the C: drive on an expansion IDE card/connector (most significantly, the unusual motherboard CMD648). So it gives me hope that Retrospect could/should work, either from the getgo or after I complain a bit... :-)

[Mayoff]

Please keep us updated on how things go with 6.0 and your configuration with DR.

[awnews]

Well, I have to say I'm disappointed. I just went to the effort to upgrade my working RDB5.6 installation to RP6.0 [base install, update over old installation, no RDU updates] on the system with the "odd" ASUS CUBX motherboard (w/ integrated CMD648 IDE controller expansion).

 

 

 

After installing the new RP6, I went ahead and created a Disaster Recovery 6 CD via the .ISO image process (note: using the original W2K install CD, not the HD's \386 folder). And, *YET AGAIN* after burning the ISO to a CD, the CD (\Drivers folder or anywhere else) does *NOT* contain the "cmdide.sys" driver required for the CMD648 IDE feature of my motherboard.

 

 

 

The DRCD *does* contain the "Ultra.sys" driver required for Promise cards, so it's copying *some* third party drivers. Both the cmdide.sys and ultra.sys are non-Windows drivers that are in the same C:\WINNT\system32\drivers folder on my boot C: drive and neither of them is on the W2K install CD. This proves that RP6 is pulling drivers from the HD and not from the CD, just not *all* of them.

 

 

 

So I don't understand why the Retrospect docs say "Any third-party hardware drivers that were present at the time the Retrospect Disaster Recovery CD was created will be automatically installed to the temporary system" (for both 5.6 and 6.0). This is obviously not true and has either not been tested or implemented properly. If you're not going to actually grab all 3rd party drivers (and *why* are you filtering them?), perhaps you could *ask* the user for drivers he wishes to install.

 

 

 

As it stands now, the Retro (5.6, 6.0) Disaster Recovery CD will not allow me to boot and restore my system.

[Mayoff]

Did you perform an incremental backup using 6.0 before

 

creating this DR ISO image? That would be a necessary step.

 

 

 

Is your boot device connected to this IDE expansion card? What special steps do you to take to perform a system install (bare metal W2K install)?

 

 

 

When doing the ISO creation have you tried hitting F8 when prompted for third party drivers (which shouldn't be necessary, but a possible workaround)?

 

 

 

At what point does this failure occur? Does the CD simply fail to

 

boot the system? Can you boot his system with a W2K install CD? Does the DR CD perform the initial data-copying phase before the failure occurs? Is your W2K install CD a standard-issue MS disk or a special one?

 

 

 

As a final point, not all drivers that DR copies to a DR ISO will be located in the /Drivers directory, and not all drivers copied to the DR ISO will retain the original name -- "cmdide.sys" could be copied with a different name like "OEM1" or even "cmdide.sy_" (DOS compressed).

[awnews]

> Did you perform an incremental backup using 6.0 before

 

creating this DR ISO image? That would be a necessary step.

 

 

 

Yes, I have a full backup of the entire C: drive. RP6 finds it and uses it for the DR backup step.

 

 

 

 

 

> Is your boot device connected to this IDE expansion card? What special steps do you to take to perform a system install (bare metal W2K install)?

 

 

 

Yes, the C: drive is connected to the IDE expansion port. The MB has two ATA33 IDE ports and then the two CMD648 IDE expansion ports at ATA66, so I get a lot better performance if I connect the boot drive there. But I have to pre-install the "cmdide.sys" driver (with the boot C: connected to one of the primary ATA33 IDEs) or W2K blue-screens during boot. The CD drive is connected to the other ATA33. DR6CD isn't blue-screening (possibly because only the setup program is running and true W2K isn't booting) but it doesn't see my HD.

 

 

 

 

 

> When doing the ISO creation have you tried hitting F8 when prompted for third party drivers (which shouldn't be necessary, but a possible workaround)?

 

 

 

I realize that I could manually try to do this. But I think the driver should be available on the DR CD.

 

 

 

 

 

> At what point does this failure occur? Does the CD simply fail to

 

boot the system? Can you boot his system with a W2K install CD? Does the DR CD perform the initial data-copying phase before the failure occurs? Is your W2K install CD a standard-issue MS disk or a special one?

 

 

 

The DRCD boots. It boots the same way the W2K install CD (standard off-the shelf MS CD so it also doesn't have any special drivers) does, with the setup program (no F8 drivers loaded) not seeing my C: drive on the CMD648 IDE port ("drive is not formatted or not present" message). My previous workaround has been two swap IDE cables around during W2K formatting (and probably during DR boot) so that the C: drive is on a primary ATA33 IDE port.

 

 

 

 

 

> As a final point, not all drivers that DR copies to a DR ISO will be located in the /Drivers directory, and not all drivers copied to the DR ISO will retain the original name -- "cmdide.sys" could be copied with a different name like "OEM1" or even "cmdide.sy_" (DOS compressed).

 

 

 

Now that's a weird idea. Why in the world would your guys change it, esp. in a case like this where the original name does fit the 8.3 dos format? In any case, the "cmdide.sys" file on my main C: is 7KB. There's no 7KB file in the DR \Drivers folder (although there are some OEM*.INF files in there. I also looked in the \386 folder and there are a lot of 7KB files but none of the 7KB files start with "CMD*" or "OEM*". I also again note that the "ultra.sys" file came across as-is (from C:..\Drivers to DRCD:\Drivers) so it would seem like the "cmdide.sys" should have done the same if things were working.

 

 

 

Can I send you any more info? A directory dump, screen shots, a copy of my DR6 CD, etc.? I notice that Dantz is in Orinda near the BART line and I'm near another BART station--should I load up my PC and bring it in so your developers could take a look at my unusual PC configuration?

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Mayoff]

We provide the option for F8 for situations like this. Retrospect 5.6 was not allowing users to correctly add drivers via F8. 6.0 should do this correctly.

 

 

 

Please try again, using the F8 option to add these drivers.

 

--------------------

 

 

 

 

 

>> When doing the ISO creation have you tried hitting F8 when >>prompted for third party drivers (which shouldn't be necessary, >>but a possible workaround)?

 

 

 

>I realize that I could manually try to do this. But I think the driver >should be available on the DR CD.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[awnews]

OK, so I gave the manual driver load a try and it worked (with some effort).

 

 

 

While booting with the PR6.0 Disaster Recovery 6.0 CD, I hit "F6" (BTW, it's F6 not F8) when the W2K Setup message came up on the screen. I then inserted a special floppy I had prepared and loaded the driver.

 

 

 

==> COMMENT: When the driver is requested by the W2K Setup, it demands a "txtsetup.oem" file. My driver floppy didn't have this at the root level of the floppy but I found it inside a directory on the floppy. So I created a new floppy with the "txtsetup.oem" at the root level along with W98, WINNT and W2K driver directories. When I'm manually loading the driver I use the driver in the W2K directory but I suspect (based on the contents of the "txtsetup.oem" [text] file) that W2K setup will end up using the driver in the WINNT directory. Based on the format of the .oem file I could probably figure out how to write a new one pointing at the W2K directory but it looks like the WINNT driver is good enough for the W2K Setup boot.

 

 

 

The W2K Setup found the "txtsetup.ome" file, installed the needed driver and was then able to continue and find my NTFS boot C: drive connected to the CMD648 Expansion port and find my current Windows install. I stopped the process there but think/hope that if I got this far I could continue and do a reformat, rebuild and restore.

 

 

 

So, for now, things seem to be working.

 

 

 

BUT--you owe me a fix that places the driver on the DR CD so I don't have to go thru this! I ran into this same problem when I upgraded from RDB5.0 to 5.5 & 5.6. RP6.0 was supposed fix this problem--"Any third-party hardware drivers that were present at the time the Retrospect Disaster Recovery CD was created will be automatically installed to the temporary system." It doesn't work as advertised. We don't know why it doesn't work since the correct cmdide.sys file *is* in the C: ... \Drivers folder and correctly associated with the CMD648 hardware in Windows. Is RP6.0 looking for a .inf, would it need this txtsetup.oem, ???.

 

 

 

I would request that you submit this as a bug report so that RP can be "improved" (fixed) in a future release--the F6 process should only be needed if new hardware was added since the DR6.0 CD was created, not for already present hardware and drivers. And I think you should stop claiming that PR6.0 place all 3rd party drivers on the DR CD, although it is able to load them during boot *if* you have the needed drivers *and* this "txtsetup.oem" file.

 

 

 

I did look into modifying the DR ISO file (to slip the cmdide.sys file in) before burning the CD and came to the conclusion that it can't be done based on the ISO spec. I also looked into modifying the CD post-burn but for whatever reason (the nature of ISOs, a flag on RP6.0's DR ISO, my Nero burning software?) it appears to be finalized and I can't update the CDR to add the needed driver.