Windows 10: Restoring my repaired/replaced Surface Pro 7 from a saved Windows Image Backup

I created a Windows Image Backup on a portable HD and a recovery drive on a USB drive before sending my Surface Pro 7 away to Microsoft for repair or replacement.


The problem is a Surface Pro 7 has only one USB port, how do I boot the Surface from the recovery drive and access the Windows Image Backup on a portable HD.


If I boot of the C Drive I get the following error



:)

 

Win 7 image restore breaks ability to see Win 10 image backups

I have a multi-boot system, XP Pro (32 bit), XP Pro X64 (64 bit), Win 7 Pro (64 bit), Win 10 Pro (64 bit). Each OS is on a separate hard drive and partition. The C: partition is boot only (no operating system on it).

I did a system image backup from Win 10 and also from Win 7. Once I do a Win 7 image restore using Win 7 repair (dvd), the Win 10 images backups no longer appear in the list of backups if I later run Win 10 repair or Win 7 repair.

The workaround for this bug is to do a system image backup from Win 7 and include the Win 10 partition in the Win 7 image backup (to Win 7, the Win 10 partition is a "data" partition). The the Win 7 repair will restore the Win 10 partition unless restore to "non-system" partitions is turned off. I confirmed this works by formatting both the Win 7 and Win 10 partitions before doing a repair / restore test.

What I don't understand is what the Win 7 restore changes to my system that prevents the Win 10 backup system images from appearing in the list of image backups. The Win 10 image folders are still present on my hard drive(s).

 

Restoring Windows 10 Image using Macrium Reflect


In addition to the above. Here's my suggestion in step by step.
I assume you have Macrium Installed in your current HD and already made a backup copy.

1. Connect your new HD via USB port and boot up.
2. Run Macrium, click on Restore tab then select the Backup Image that you made to restore
3. click on "select a different target disk" then select your new HD as destination
   
   
   
4. Proceed to restore then Shutdown and disconnect the old HD and replace with the new HD
5. Boot up with your new HD.

 

Save the Windows Image Backup

Actually, Windows System Image is not nearly as convenient and flexible as third-party imaging software. With a third-party application I can:

• define and save multiple backup jobs;
• run backup jobs on independant schedules;
• maintain a rotating history of backups;
• easily create and maintain incremental backups;
• restore a backup in minutes without needing a working copy of Windows;
• restore a backup to dissimilar hardware

among many other benefits.

Windows System Image is like other utilities included with Windows over the years, like Notepad, Windows Fax and Scan, native compression, Wordpad, Voice Reorder, etc. that were not intended to replace third-party software but instead offered a basic amount
of functionality to folks who didn't know how or were too nervous to try installing software.