Why did wbadmin produce a VHD I can't mount?

Question

I used the wbadmin tool in Windows 7 to produce an image of my laptop's C: drive, saving it to a network location (call it \\server\backup\user\currentimage) and when it completed, I was unable to mount the VHD. I pointed Disk Management to \\server\backup\user\currentimage\WindowsImageBackup\pcname\Backup Date\vhdfile.vhd and it said that the version of the tool couldn't read the version of the VHD. I tried running the backup and mounting again and I got the same message. So I copied the VHD file down, mounted it locally and it mounted, but the volume showed up as RAW.

What I'm really after is a (free) way to image the laptop on a schedule. Or even a way to put a backup of files into a container that I can store on the server (like a zip for example). The main problem I'm trying to get around is that Windows complains that some files are too long when copied straight up to the server, so I thought that a whole PC image would get around that and give me the added convenience of being able to just restore from an image. What a headache. Does anyone have any solutions?

Answer 1

I've been using Windows 7 RC, and I think I can safely say there is some sort of bug in the Windows 7 version of WBadmin or WBengine, or some other process.

My issues came when I tried to burn a backup DVD using WBadmin. So far not a single DVD can be read. However, using the UI or making a backup using WBadmin in Windows Vista does work.

I am currently trying to copy the Windows Vista version of WBadmin with all it's components into Windows 7. So far I haven't had much luck. Hopefully this will be fixed when Windows 7 Release to Manufacturing (RTM) comes out.

Answer 2

I have a wbadmin backup from Vista. Windows 7 doesn't recognize the vhd content. It's mounted as a drive without any partition on it. WinImage can open/read/extract the files and directories.