I’m killing time. Right now I’m waiting for updates and downloads to complete on my office work computer, a machine that I went to great trouble to make bulletproof. For example, I run a top-end Intel SSD and have a disk image backup.
Today, my machine gave me a BSOD after uninstalling a troublesome program. Acronis Enterprise Server. So, just to help people who might have issues or are considering using this program, I though I’d write about it while I wait for the updates to complete, since Acronis forced me to install a fresh copy of Windows 7 Professional.
This is one of this cases where a program started out great, then as corporate weaslism takes hold due to the success, the program becomes more bloated, fragmented, dependent on more libraries, license tiered, and overall more difficult to manage and less rewarding in actual use.
At my office we used to love this program, because it had a great feature that allowed you to image your disk to a state where windows didn’t have anything except the generic/basic boot drivers installed, allowing you to image to another mobo/processor combination. This days are long gone and we’ve relegated Acronis to the scrap heap because it has become an enterprise level mess in more ways than one.
I still had Acronis on my main work machine, but this morning the background program for it started doing weird stuff, utilizing a lot of CPU space. My usual checks for malware/virus came up zero, and I had no explanation for why the Acronis background server program was using a lot of CPU cycles. So, I decided to uninstall it.
Big mistake, HUGE mistake.
After uninstalling Acronis, I found I was in a boot loop, and right after the Win7 animated logo, I’d get a BSOD. Safe mode – same thing, and attempts at OS repair (using Windows tools and third-party tools) came up with no success at all. I also thought it might be related to a recent bungled Microsoft patch which causes a BSOD boot loop after Windows update installs it and the user reboots for the first time, and downloaded the removal tool as a bootable ISO to burn to CD. No joy there either.
I’ve never had the de-installation of a program hose the operating system. Never.
It makes me wonder what sort of “tentacles” Acronis attached to the OS without telling me. So, needless to say, Acronis is now permanently off my list, especially since I had used it as a backup program to keep a disk image. My backup image included the Acronis program, so since trying to remove it caused the problem in the first place I was in a no choice situation – a fresh install of Windows 7 Pro was the only way forward.
I spent the entire morning on the mess Acronis created, and I’ve not got a single thing done today other than deal with that mess.
After a fresh install of Windows 7, which gets me back to the desktop, but of course I have a lot of work ahead putting programs and files back into place, along with 147 Windows updates, and likely more after that.
I know many of you will throw out the standard gloating snippets like:
- Get a Mac
- Run (pick your distro) Linux
- Run FreeBSD or CentOS or some other OS
etc…
…with tales of fantastic other-worldly levels of reliability, so let me just say in advance that until this incident, I have had wonderful reliability with Windows 7 and I have far too much invested in programs and systems to move. So, those aren’t options for me.
Thanks for killing time with me while I wait for the updates to download and install.
I have to reboot now to finish. See you in a few hours.
Another thing worth looking at is using something like Ubuntu 13.04 (or 12.04 for long term support) as a host operating system with a relatively large drive. Then install Win7 in Virtualbox within Ubuntu. I’ve done this and it is remarkable how well-behaved the Win7 virtual machine is. You can also clone the virtual machine and have a “backup”, which is just a big file on the host machine’s disk. I’ve also installed Ecomstation 2.1 on this machine (the current version of OS/2) and all 3 machines run simultaneously. Very cool and all the machines can talk to each other. The host has 4 processors and 10 Gb of RAM, so each machine is still quite spritely. A very cool thing is that you can specify an .iso file as a boot “disk”, making the installation of an operating system within Virtualbox lightning fast. You can also have Virtualbox hosted by Mac OS and Win, but I wouldn’t recommend the latter because of the frequent reboots needed for updates. Not a big problem with Ubuntu, as most updates don’t need reboots and don’t disturb the virtual machines. And with Ubuntu (or any other Linux) you have multiple desktops, so you can allocate a desktop for each machine. I know the pain of having to (occasionally) use MS software, so this fix makes it more palatable.
Run 6 Windows instances using VMWare on my MacBook (not all at once) Win 7, 8 32bit 64bit XP, Server 2008 R2. After installing and basic Windows updates, I snapshot them for a base image. From that point on use the VM and can always snapshot and go back to the base.
Just added VMWare to a hoss workstation I just bought running Win 8 64bit 32GM i7 and have instances of other Windows OS. Great way to go from one to another without worries. Love VMWare.
The point made about running backup or imaging software from a
removable disc (whether DVD/CD or USB pen-drive) is a valuable one.
That way the software is not “put into irons” or locked onto the system
by system software updates. It keeps removals trivial and non destructive.
Trouble is, it can’t reasonably be done for all software on a system.
There comes a point where convenience for the user is the over-
riding factor.
ShadowProtect by StorageCraft is a far superior product to Acronis. We mainly use on servers, but have several of the desktop versions to – very powerful software.
Acronis is also unable to market well – difficult to find good info on their web site, too many advertising emails, and no link in customer profile to unsubscribe.
I have True Image Home 2013, haven’t identified any big problems but have to look into curbing some reporting routine as it crashes itself occasionally.
Meanwhile ESET security suite have made their UI worse, won’t obey command to turn off automatic updates – its attempts to update slow the computer down when not connected to the Internet.
Just like climate science, this computer stuff lacks quality.
I should add- please don’t install ShadowProtect on a machine that has had Acronis installed previously, or you will have the same issue as the OP. I believe the issue you have Anthony, is related to a file called snapman.sys – by Acronis which does exactly what you are describing.
I had serious issues with Acronis and then their support personnel on the Acronis forum. Ironically, another sys admin read my posting on the Acronis forum and suggested I use Casper instead. Can’t praise Casper enough, it has never let me down…
@rbabcock
“Love VMWare.”
VMWare, now that is a company that know how to run support services for their product. Respect!
“Matthew W says: I’ll never go MAC, they’ll have to pry my XP out of my cold ,dead hands:”
Well this may be true but you will not be able to get security updates after April 8, 2014 so I would recommend looking at using Windows 7 before that time arrives,
http://www.populartechnology.net/2009/05/windows-xp-supported-until-2014.html
Anthony, what was the Stop Error you were getting? Also were you using a Beta build of Acronis? As this is the only Stop Error I could locate on their site and it is coincidentally associated with uninstalling;
http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/products/trueimage/beta/atih2013_release-notes_u1.html
“ATIHXOXIII-3704 Computer went to BSOD with a stop error of 0x0000008E after removing Beta build”
If you were I recommend NEVER using Beta builds of anything. I am very interested why this would even happen as backup software should not be messing with lower levels of the operating system or drivers.
As gareth , peterhodges and MarkinChuico says:
May 9, 2013 at 4:42 pm
“ditto on the Clonezilla says:
If you want to clone your drive try Clonezilla. Runs stand-alone from a CD or bootable USB stick (see Pendrive Linux) so not dependent on the OS on the drive and produces a clone image that you can load into another drive or back into the existing.”
Ghost and Acronis, I have had problems with both, but clonzilla is rock solid for making images of drives or partitions, and restoring them. It’s free and opensource.
It’s tough to beat.
There is really no need to use a third party backup program with Windows 7 as you can make images using the built-in Windows 7 backup program,
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/back-up-your-programs-system-settings-and-files
“Matt in Houston says: Are you certain some of the other windows updates aren’t adding to the fouling of your system? I have spent about 12 hours (6 last Wednesday and about 6 today, weekend in Atlanta in between) attempting to get my laptop to update properly- nothing gives so far and managed to wreck my system 3 times today and finally had to restore to an earlier image after the last run wouldn’t let me even get into a bootable config. I have run registry cleaners, chkdsks, memory tests, malware scans, yada yada yada, no joy.”
Third party security software can conflict with Windows updates. I recommend disabling or uninstalling any security software and seeing if it lets you install the updates.
Registry cleaners will not fix any problems, do not improve system performance and are more likely to induce problems.
Chkdsk only needs to be run once.
Not all memory tests are equal; http://www.memtest86.com/
Not all malware scans are equal; http://home.comcast.net/~supportcd/MalwareRemoval.html#Scan
Otherwise you should be getting a Windows Update error code that you can reference with Microsoft.
Using a program running inside the OS to back up data is OK. Using a program running inside the OS to back up the OS is begging for trouble. It’s like a doctor performing brain surgery on himself. Disk imaging is best performed from an external device (i.e. CD/DVD or USB stick). I don’t care what OS the external media boots (linux/Windows/whatever) it’s a lot safer. In a worst-case scenario, make a track+sector copy of your disk. To restore, plop it back on.
“_Jim says: What’s an “update”? (I think I turned off updates on all but one computer here. Running the latest Service Packs, but that is all.)”
This is not recommended for security updates and can be a highly dangerous practice if you connect to the Internet. Microsoft Service Packs are outdated a month after their release as far as security goes. The two most common trends I find with infected systems,
1. Latest security updates not applied.
2. Antivirus program not installed or outdated.
“Duster says: Windows captured the world market by MS arranging for the OS and previously DOS to be installed on every machine sold.”
Correction, Windows captured the world market by making their operating system work with every PC sold.
“Eric Worrall says: Windows 8 / Metro IMO will be the final straw which switches you to Mac ;-)”
No need, Windows 7 is supported by Microsoft until 2020,
http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/search/default.aspx?sort=PN&alpha=Windows+7
Best not to install Avast on Windows 7. After one of the Windows auto updates Avast caused a reboot loop for me. I was able to boot up in safe mode and then roll stuff back. I then installed Avast and then the update and confirmed that the combination didn’t work. I now use AVG again.
I have found that the best way to deal with this stuff is to sandbox things. That way, your boot disk is just another file on the host OS. It makes backups trivial and migration to a new hardware system a breeze. But, that is just me I suppose.
*
Have we been through this before too – What’s an ‘antivirus program’? /sarc
I do scan now and then with malwarebytes products, found the firewall from Zonealarm to be too resource-intensive, and found the same was true of the ‘AV’ (not Audio – Visual in this case) stuff as well … so out the window it went …
How does that saying go which is presentably in vogue – “Perfection – the enemy of good.”
BTW, I do surf with Chrome these days, and it does its own updates, and seems to ‘know’ about potentially malicious websites as well.
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* Of course not, but I’m a responsible, knowledgeable adult (and engineer and techie) and I am plotting my own course and destiny based on my assessment of my needs, wants, desires, and technical requirements and am willing to work with the trade-offs to ‘get there’, thank you very much.
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Look at the ‘trouble’ I’ve saved myself by not ‘updating’ … ummm … six, no, seven, no … eight different Xp boxes (and one Win7) on property (and I’m not counting the Win3.1 or Win85 and several Win98 boxes either) …
My operational philosophy any more is: If it ain’t broke DON’T fix it … life is just too short.
BTW, does everybody know about the Digital River URL where legit images of installable (and subsequently license-able thru the purchase of a key as from Amazon etc.) MS’s OSs reside?
Be sure to read the explanation or description twice so as not to become confused:
Win7 direct download – http://www.heidoc.net/joomla/technology-science/microsoft/14-windows-7-direct-download-links
**Not an advert, just a word to the wise.** (as I have no affiliation with the above)
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If one is at this stage, recommend getting a ‘bootable’ Ubunto CD with things like memory utilities on it, or, better yet, get “The Ultimate Boot (and diagnostic) CD”.
Description: http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/
Download: http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/download.html
“When you boot up from the CD, a text-based menu will be displayed, and you will be able to select the tool you want to run. The selected tool actually boots off a virtual floppy disk created in memory.”
This is **the** proverbial ‘Swiss Army Knife’ of PC hardware diagnostics.
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Jim, I just don’t want anyone else following such irresponsible advice by not applying security updates.
There is no such “trouble” updating on a PC with working hardware components that is malware free. Your limited experience in this area is not something to give advice on. I’ve dealt with at least over 10,000 systems (lost count a long time ago). Telling people not to apply security updates is typical Internet urban legends pushed by those who don’t work in IT or security related fields.
Malwarebytes will not catch all Rootkits infections.
You don’t need the Zonealarm firewall, Windows XP, Vista, 7 and 8 all come with one for free.
Your phrase “If it ain’t broke DON’T fix it” makes no sense since the reason there are patches is because the code is broken.
Actually the Ultimate Boot CD does not have full hardware diagnostics as it does not have anything to properly test things like your CPU, Mainboard, Video card memory ect… for these you need a commercial product (stress tests like Mersenne Prime are not the same thing). You can only test your RAM and HD with free diagnostics. The disk is also confusing as it includes redundant programs that do the same thing or are less reliable, instead of just including the best program per category.
EasyUS Todo backup is the mutt’s nuts (a free version is available, too). Acronis used to be good, wouldn’t touch it with a bargepole now.
It does not cost much to create a raid array. However, that does not mean much if your line of defence has let you down. Perhaps a system restore might have helped contain things to an earlier time and provided a path for effective corrective action?