Restoring Server Backups

[RobertoIsRad]

Hi I'm having trouble restoring a backup of windows server 2012 essentials. My setup is:

1 -160gb hard drive with the operating system on it

2 - 2tb hard drives with raid 0 to hold all of my data

1 - 4tb hard drive that is only used for backing up everything

I ran into trouble when the 160gb hard drive died. I replaced the hard drive and re installed the operating system but somehow installing the new hard drive broke my raid causing me to lose all of my data. "No worries" I thought to myself I have been doing twice daily backups of everything since I put this server together.... My problem is restoring the backups. I have two backups listed in the windows backup software from the day before all of this went down, they both say completed successfully and have no errors listed. If I go to the folder I have vhdx image files of the three partitions that get backed up every day. When I go to restore one of three things happens.

1. If I try and restore the entire volume using the recovery wizard I get the error "Windows Backup cannot find a shadow copy of the backup set on the storage location"

2. If I try and restore just "files and folders" I can't expand any folders to see the files/folders. All of my folders say "Unable to browse *foldername*. Windows backup cannot find a shadow copy of the backup set on the storage location."

3. If I restart and try a recovery from the instillation disk I'm not able to see the recovery files at all.

I'm able to mount the hard drive images and two of the images work just fine but not the third (The one I really want with all of my data on it). When I mount the third it tells me the file system is RAW and would I like to format (Always chose no). I have scanned the image file when it was mounted as RAW with R-Studio. R-Studio finds all of my files but is only able to give me back less than a third of them. Scanning the broken raid doesn't give me any files.

If anyone could help me out I would be eternally grateful. I stand to lose a ton of data including almost all of the videos and pictures of my kids. I thought I was doing everything right but for some reason my back ups wont go....

Thank You!

 

[bigdogchris]

Install the new hard drive. Boot to the Windows 2012 media. At the install screen, choose Repair. Choose the backup and restore option (can't remember what it's called). Then select the system image from another location and select the 4TB drive. Hopefully you made a bare-metal recovery.

If not and you have to reinstall Windows, you will have to recover from within Windows backup by choosing "Select another backup to restore files from". Also make sure your raid array is recreated and has the same drive letter.

 

[RobertoIsRad]

When I boot into the windows 2012 media I selected the 4TB drive (where my windows backup images are) and it gives me the error "The backup location specified does not contain any backup. Specify another backup location."

When I try from within windows I get the same error... Is there a specific folder structure the backups need? I could copy my backup files to a different drive if need be.

When I choose "This Server" as the location where my backups are stored it has no trouble seeing my backups (and I get the shadow copy errors). But the "This server" option isn't available when trying to restore from the installation media.

 

[RobertoIsRad]

I have read about other people having shadow copy problems and it was usually related to having virus protection enabled when you were trying to read the back up. The only thing is I have never installed an antivirus unless Microsoft includes it which I've heard for server 2012 it does not.

Does any one think it my be related to security and permissions issues? Is there a good way to take ownership of the folders/image files/drive?