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ABOUT ME - I have done a few fresh install, i'm not an engineer or comp sci graduate, i understand a little technical stuff. I would love answers that would be understood by a 7 year old - I often do the chat gpt thing, copy paste -> "answer this so year old will understand - if that helps lol

Any way:

I had a Lenova y700i (https://www.lenovo.com/il/en/laptops/ideapad/y700-series/Ideapad-Y700-15/p/88IPY700618?orgRef=https%253A%252F%252Fwww.google.com%252F). i backed it up with windows built in back up (regretfully, I should have used another tool)

For several years now i have been trying, on and off to restore the image to different machines with no joy.

I recently got my hands on a lenova y50 (https://laptopaz.vn/laptop-lenovo-gaming-y50-70-core-i7-4710hq-ram-8gb-hdd-1tb-vga-2gb-nvidia-gtx-860m-156-inch-full-hd.html) (this is a Vietnamese site but you can scroll down for specs)

although they look the same the are very different - when i try run BACKUP using the image through the adv options (the blue screen option you get to through settings), when i select the image to back up from, it tells me i need a recovery disk, but i can't make one through windows as the machine done support an optical drive.

i thought about making a recover image by dong a clean install and updating drivers, (i have made a boot-usb with a win 10 clean os and rufus)

looking forwardto answers

Thx for reading, hope to get a reply.

P.S. Background - In fact the original computer was stolen, when i took it for repairs to the mother board, and the guy closed shop and opsconded with my machine!!! i removed the old HDD and ram - I had a 'clean installed' windows on the machines HDD/ The back up i am trying to restore is from before that clean install.

Mike Roberts
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  • i thought about making a recover image by doing a clean install and updating drivers, (i have made a boot-usb with a win 10 clean os and rufus), the make a recovery disk in the control panel -> backup restore -> create recovery disk option!?! – Mike Roberts Mar 14 '24 at 12:08
  • Please edit the question to limit it to a specific problem with enough detail to identify an adequate answer. – Community Mar 14 '24 at 12:32
  • A recovery disk is usually on USB. – harrymc Mar 14 '24 at 13:13
  • Windows Image Backup [WIB] relies on a myriad of external files to make the VHD backup restore correctly. A far more efficient way to backup Windows natively is capturing a WIM from WinRE [Windows REcovery], as it's a self-contained backup image file that relies on no external files, as well as has compression and parity built-in. WIB is often used because backups can be taken via VSS while booted to the OS, whereas capturing a WIM requires booting to WinPE/WinRE first, however it is a far more efficient, foolproof way to backup Windows – JW0914 Mar 14 '24 at 13:13
  • Thanks you both , not sure how to reply directly yet.....Harrymc no recovery media came with the current (y50 70) machine or my old (y700i) machine. @JW0914, thanks for the info i will use these tools next time, but it doesn;t help me now. – Mike Roberts Mar 14 '24 at 14:40
  • @MikeRoberts What is the bluescreen you receive? Problem with WIB is if the multiple XML and catalog files it creates and relies upon are corrupted, deleted, renamed, moved, etc. the entire backup won't work (this is why I always recommend WIMs over it). In order to determine what the issue may be and if it can be fixed, the bluescreen details and the output of this PowerShell command placed inside of a code box will be needed: ls "D:\Path\to\BackupFolder" -recurse -force. Note: Backup images can't be restored to machines with different hardware configurations (WIMs can if SysPrep'ed) – JW0914 Mar 15 '24 at 11:56
  • Hey Thanks for your input. I tried various approaches, in the end i just stated form scratch and fully cleaned and rufus-ed a clean winx image from Microsoft onto the cleaned SSD. All went well, with no hickups.
    NOW, when i tried to restore my back, WIB asked me to insert the recovery media for this machine, but as it didn't come with any. I need to create and recovery disk, however i dont have an optical drive. Surely, there is provision for this? Any help beyond buy a USB optical drive would be received with thanx.     – Mike Roberts Mar 27 '24 at 11:17

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