Vista, Acronis TrueImage 11 and GRUB Error 22
By Jonathan Schlaffer
Those of you with Vista know that there can be boot problems after you have cloned your existing installation to a faster or larger hard drive (it works best when its both). And, sometimes after cloning, there can be activation issues as well which I have encountered in the past.
Some say those issues are gone due to updates to the way WGA (Windows Genuine Advantage) works in Vista but Microsoft should rename their DRM protection system to Windows Genuine Annoyance.
These problems did not exist under XP but it appears that Vista places undue importance on the hard drive when deciding whether or not to deactivate itself. I am aware that SP1 changes the way WGA works slightly but that cannot change what has happened in the past.
It’s been a while since I attempted to clone a whole hard drive to a new one and make the image bootable, pending the arrival of a new laptop which I plan to clone and use a larger and faster hard drive with, I decided I would work out any issues with my current laptop.
I do own a drive imaging utility, Apricorn EZ Upgrade, at least a few Windows XP users should be familiar with this. If you are using Windows XP, there really isn’t a better utility. The problem with this and Vista is that it simply doesn’t work and yes, the manufacturer admits it but that never stopped me from trying. Vista doesn’t like it, it had problems booting, sure, using the Recovery CD to do a startup repair works but then it wants to activate again because the hard drive changed.
As easy as the Microsoft phone activation is to use, I don’t like using it and it’s an unnecessary step when all you’ve done is swap hard drives.
The challenge was finding a utility that worked with or could be forced to work with Vista. Perhaps I found that in Acronis TrueImage version 11. Maybe. Installing it was a breeze but rebooting after the installation was not and presented me with GRUB Error 22, which means, “This error is returned if the module load command is used before loading a Multiboot kernel. It only makes sense in this case anyway, as GRUB has no idea how to communicate the presence of location of such modules to a non-Multiboot-aware kernel.”
What? Do I look like a programmer, do I look like I want to be a programmer? Didn’t think so. Whatever it is, it means you’re going to have to power off the system, power back on and at the splash screen (the manufacturer logo/startup menu) repeatedly press F8 until you either wind up in Windows Error Recovery which will allow you to do a startup repair or boot into Vista itself which was the case for me. After this, Vista will boot normally. Why Acronis needs to install GRUB is beyond me, it’s a pain and should be wiped off the face of the Earth.
Using the application itself appears to be straight forward except the imaging process is needlessly complicated and consists of no less than five steps once you have assigned what drive to image, where to image it too and how to partition it. There are two stages where it actually copies the image over and three stages that require a reboot.
I realize that it is easier to image a drive before the system is booted but I don’t feel like shelling out another $80 or $90 for a program to do so.
If Acronis actually manages to image my drive and produce a bootable copy of my existing installation without activation issues, I will be eternally impressed even if it did cause have the aforementioned issues with Vista and GRUB.
I might have done the imaging process before writing this article, if I didn’t think it would take two or more hours to complete though I will be attempting this later and writing about how that went as well.
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December 25th, 2007
I’ve been using Acronis True Image 9 Workstation w/ Universal Restore with Vista computers since Vista was released.
These are on Dell laptops and Vista activates with the Dell BIOS so I don’t have to worry about activation so I can’t really help you there.
I only ever use Acronis from the bootable CD since I don’t want to install unneeded acronis drivers on the OS that I’m imaging.
You can of course use Vista’s imaging capability but it takes forever to boot up the Vista CD and you have to type in commands and use diskpart, etc. etc. It’s just easier to use Acronis especially if you already paid the money for it.
As for the activation….sorry but that’s what you get for using an OS that requires activation. The only options are:
1. Use an OS that doesn’t require activation.
2. Use a version of Windows that activates with the BIOS.
3. Use a No activation crack. (and risk it being revoke like when SP1 for Vista comes out).
Activation issues are never going to go away. DRM has always plagued us and always will….if you buy into it of course. If you don’t then there’s no issue.
April 20th, 2008
Windows Me, Windows 2000 and Office 2000 are the last generation without activation. Use them!
August 23rd, 2008
You are aware that GRUB is primarily used with Linux, right? (Which is infinitely better than Windows anyway.)