New Hard Drive - Can't Load System Image

zukini98

New Member
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17
I have a Dell 17R. I sent it for repairs because it wasn't booting up. They replaced the motherboard and installed a new hard drive. I had a Samsung 840 SSD and now it's a regular hard drive. I'm trying to do a system image restore to get all of applications back, many of which I've had on there for years.

I had repair discs from the original hard drive and when I installed the SSD so I tried using both, making sure the Legacy Boot was pulling from the DVD. I received messages on both that there was no boot disc.

I tried creating a recovery USB drive, changed the boot settings to pull from the USB. I got all the way to the final screen and got a message:

"Windows cannot restore a system image to a computer that has a different firmware. The system image was created on a computer using EFI and this computer is using BIOS."

I also have the old hard drive, but I don't know whether the drive is faulty or not because I didn't receive any information from the repair facility.

I called the repair company to assist with the system image restore and they said they couldn't help. They only had my laptop for 3 weeks trying to fix it!!!!!! I've also tried setups per recommendations from other threads, but nothing is working. Can you please help?

Zukini98
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1
    Computer type
    Laptop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Dell Inspiron 17R 5721
Might be your windows was installed UEFI bios and not the regular way..

The Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI, pronounced as an initialism U-E-F-I or like "unify" without the n[SUP][a][/SUP]) is a specification that defines a software interface between an operating system and platform firmware. UEFI replaces the Basic Input/Output System (BIOS) firmware interface originally present in all IBM PC-compatible personal computers,[SUP][2][/SUP][SUP][3][/SUP] with most UEFI firmware implementations providing legacy support for BIOS services. UEFI can support remote diagnostics and repair of computers, even with no operating system installed.[SUP][4]
[/SUP]

so you'll probably have to make a UEFI recovery windows install disc and try installing/ backup that way..


what did you use to image your old drive? macrium or just regular windows system restore??


http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/15458-uefi-bootable-usb-flash-drive-create-windows.html
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    windows 8.1
    Computer type
    Laptop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Lenovo g750
    CPU
    i5
    Motherboard
    Some Chinese Crap..
    Memory
    8
    Graphics Card(s)
    Nvidia 755
    Antivirus
    Windows Defender
Thank you so much for this information. I did a system image. I'll take a look at the links you provided. Thanks again.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1
    Computer type
    Laptop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Dell Inspiron 17R 5721
Hello,

Stupid question. Am I creating the USB from my laptop - the one with the new hard drive? I only ask because option 2 screenshot shows the .is files on a backup drive. My backup is on an external hard drive.

Thanks!
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1
    Computer type
    Laptop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Dell Inspiron 17R 5721

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    windows 8.1
    Computer type
    Laptop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Lenovo g750
    CPU
    i5
    Motherboard
    Some Chinese Crap..
    Memory
    8
    Graphics Card(s)
    Nvidia 755
    Antivirus
    Windows Defender
I tried creating a recovery USB drive, changed the boot settings to pull from the USB. I got all the way to the final screen and got a message:

"Windows cannot restore a system image to a computer that has a different firmware. The system image was created on a computer using EFI and this computer is using BIOS." Zukini98

I suspect that your new placed motherboard is set to (legacy mode BIOS) and not (U)EFI mode.
Go into your UEFI(formely bios) and set it to EFI.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    windows 8.1
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    self build
    CPU
    Intel(R) Core(TM) i5 CPU 750 @ 2.67GHz
    Motherboard
    Asrock P55 Pro
    Memory
    DDR3 Team--Elite-1333 8 gb
    Graphics Card(s)
    Sapphire R9 280x
    Sound Card
    Realtek Alc 855
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Acer V233H
    Screen Resolution
    1920 x 1020
    Hard Drives
    Samsung evo 850 SSd
    Seagate ST 320 gb
    Samsung HD 750 gb
    Seagate ST 3000gb
    PSU
    OCZ Stealth 600 watt
    Case
    Antec 300
    Mouse
    Speedlink Ledos and Nexus
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