Windows 10: Can't restore Win10 - can't 'see' <windowsimagebackup>.

Hello everyone- Having a problem restoring a Win10 "backup and restore" save. W10 won't see it, and I think possibly there are some files missing. I'm super frustrated and hopefully someone here can help! Thanks in advance!

Basic details:

Lenovo 720s Laptop
Win 10 Home
I used 'backup and restore (system 7)'
I can't get Windows to see the <windowsimagebackup> folder (<wib> from now on)
There might be some files missing. I only have the <wib> folder, not the other two files, mediaID and <machinename>. <wib> is untouched and intact. No missing files inside that.
Have tried 'everything'
<wib> is on the root drive of USB

Long Version (As briefly as I can, lol...):

Ok, so last November I made a backup using the System 7 "backup and restore" functionality that's in Windows 10. I see now that people don't like it, but, it's always worked for me. Although I haven't had to actually use it for a couple years.

Yesterday, my computer started glitching and booting to diagnosis/recovery. I think the drive is fine, I was playing around with a USB dock and a Keyboard/Mouse switch (KBM switch), two monitors and a bunch of hard drives. I think that I got some cables crossed and had both ports from the KBM switch going into the laptop, and was just plugging and unplugging lots of stuff. Laptop started to glitch. I ran a CrystalDiskInfo and the drive is 94% all green (blue?).

Tried various recovery things and couldn't get them to work. Hiren, HirenPE, "AllinOne", etc. I changed the bios to legacy and got them to mount, just... either didn't see what I was looking for (chkdsk, scan, etc.), couldn't find anything useful, or couldn't get to the C: drive. At any rate, I gave that up and figured I'd just bite the bullet and restore. So I reinstalled 10, fresh.

But now I can't get backup and restore to 'see' the backup I made in November. Here are, I think, the relevant details:

- After I made the backup last November, I did move the <windowsimagebackup> folder from it's original location. I had it stored on a usb external drive. I have moved it to the root directory of that external drive.

- I only have the <wib> folder. I notice that with older system/restore backups there are two additional files. A folder <machine name> and a file "MediaID". For whatever reason I don't have those for this most recent backup. There are similar folders inside the <wib> folder, but I don't know if they are the same or not. It's unlikely that I moved them there, but possible. I try to keep these files as original and 'untouched' as possible.

- I do not know the windows version number. I know it was at least 1903, and I'm pretty sure it is not the most recent one that's available now. I tend to wait until Windows forces me to update, and I believe there was one new available than the one that I had.

-I did try to 'fool' the system into seeing the folder. I created a new backup with my newly installed system, and then swapped out the <wib> folder. For the other two files, <machinename> and MediaID, I tried using the ones that were created with the new backup, and also tried copying some of the files from within the <wib> saved folder from a couple months ago. Neither worked.

- I copied the november <wib> folder over to a different drive that has no other backups stored on it at all. This didn't work. The backups were all stored several folders deep, but either way, didn't work.

My questions -

1- What do? Any way around this?
2- I saw there are two .vhdx files in the <wib> folder. Is there any way to... dunno. Turn them into .isos, image or mount them and then clone that over to my C drive?

I'm mostly concerned about my installed applications and windows settings. And the settings for my installed applications, lol. I tweak my settings heavily and do NOT look forward to doing that again. I am not missing any actual files. docs, media, etc. are all saved. It's only the system stuff I'm worried about.

Any help?

Thanks in advance!

:)

 

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Restore from WindowsImageBackup

You could try the free (unregistered) version of diskgenius. It will tell you if there is somethimg wrong the virtual disk, otherwise, it will open and you can copy stuff out.

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