Cant backup 8.1 using system image backup! Error 0x80780119, Cant optimise system partition, (this is why i cant backup) please read. . .

Anonymous
2013-10-19T14:16:48+00:00

I am having this issue, cant optimise the system partition 350mb. 8.1 official release,

This is also causing a huge problem, the optimise option in windows 8.1 allows me to optimise the c: drive but not the system partition this prevents a system image backup...!!

Due to the system partition being out of space for a shadow copy to be placed onto it the backup fails every time with this error code, -- 0x80780119 --.

Backups are a huge factor in operating systems and since upgrading I cant backup my system using windows image backup, if I could optimise the system partition and straighten out the file structure within it (free up some space) for the shadow copy then the volume shadow copy could be placed onto the drive but it cant...

This all worked fine in 8.0 but not now...please fix this problem!?

Not being able to backup your system is not good enough...

here is my my issue again in pictures...

1.system volume needs optimising

but pressing the optimise for this does nothing at all.. current status remains "Needs optimisation".

The way an ssd reclaims drive space is to use the optimise function, this not working prevents the reclaim for files/data to be written to space where files have been deleted previously. Giving the impression the drive/partition is full when really its not full just needs optimising/trimmed.

 

  1. initiate the system image backup

  1. both volumes to be backed up

  1. error message due to insufficient space on the system partition for shadow copy. 

 

  1. finally here is a capture of the current disk setup on my system, notice the system partition only has 17mb free space and according to the above error message I need atleast 50mb free for the volume shadow copy !? Due to this I cant create a backup of my system using windows 8.1 !

(system partition has no drive letter assigned to it 350mb)

PLEASE HELP !! Thanks for reading.

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Windows update

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Anonymous
2013-10-20T20:19:10+00:00

I have found a way around this getting Windows System Image Backup working again. I did this on my laptop and desktop confirming that I could recover from the images. It is actually pretty easy but should not be necessary. The reason that the backup would not work was because the recovery partition was using 284MB of the 300MB available. There was not 50MB available for shadow copy. Here are the steps I took on an EUFI GPT disk:

Note: All commands are without quotes. 

Disclaimer: I would recommend backing up all of you important data as any time you mess with partitions, there is the possibility to lose data. This process was done one both my laptop (Win8.1 Home) and desktop (Win8.1 Pro). I cannot take responsibility if this causes any damage. With that being said, I hope this helps.

Download and install MiniTool Partition Wizard http://www.partitionwizard.com/free-partition-manager.html Note that none of the changes will take effect until you hit apply. I am sure others may work but this is the one that I used and it is free. 

You should have 3 Windows partitions; Recovery - 300 MB, EFI System - 100 MB, and your system Volume to start off with. 

  1. Once installed, Open Partition Wizard and Shrink your system volume, C: in my case, by 101MB at the beginning of the partition. (I had to put 101MB as when I tried 100 it said that the space was too small when doing the next step) To do this, Right Click the C: Drive, select, Move/Resize, and the put 101 in box named "Unallocated Space Before:" and click OK.
  2. Copy the EFI System partition (100 MB FAT32) to this new Free Space by right clicking, selecting copy, and then selecting the unallocated space. Then next the OK.
  3. Delete the 100MB EFI System Partition after the Recovery Partition. 

After this is done, you will see 100MB unallocated space after the Recovery Partition. 

  1. Right click on Recovery partition and select Extend. Drag the bar to take up all of the extra free space. This will change the recovery partition from 300MB to 400MB allowing for enough space (50MB) for the shadow copy. Click OK. 
  2. Next Click Apply. I received an error stating that it could not make changes due to C: being in use. I clicked restart. 

When the computer restarts, Partition Wizard will do its thing. Once it is done you should boot into Windows again.

This next part is essential, because, windows now does not recognize the partition that was moved before as an EFI System Partition. If you try and do a backup image now, only the system partition will show and not the Recovery or EFI System

  1. Open a cmd prompt with administrator privileges. Press Start Key, Type cmd, right click, select run as administrator. 
  2. Type diskpart to start windows command line disk manager. 
  3. Find the disk that Windows is installed on by typing List disk. This will be different on each machine but for illustration mine was disk 0
  4. Select that disk by typing the command "select disk" and the disk number.
  5. Next, determine the EFI partition that was moved earlier. This is the partition that was moved earlier and should be 100MB. Type in the command "list part" to see a list of the partitions on the disk. Mine was Partition 3. This may be different on your system. 
  6. Once you have determined the partition number, type "select partition " and your partition number
  7. Next you have to set this partition as an EFI System volume. Type in this command - "set id = c12a7328-f81f-11d2-ba4b-00a0c93ec93b" This changes the partition type to an EFI system volume.
  8. After all of this is done, restart your computer and you should now be able to back up you system using the System Image Backup in File History.

I know some of this may seem a little elementary to some but you never know who needs help and their technical knowledge. 

I hope that this helps and let me know if you have any questions.

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  1. Anonymous
    2013-11-18T12:54:34+00:00

    I apologize but I have been away for a bit. You are correct that it should create an MSR partition in the first available free space, but with my setup for some reason the MSR partition kept getting created at the end of the drive (where I had about 50GB allocate for a Linux installation), so I had to manually set the offset location and the size. After doing this it created the MSR partition in the right location. 

    I would not recommend rebooting without the EFI parition. If you copy the EFI partition to another location, then make sure that the partition is set back to an EFI partition before rebooting. What I did was resize, C: drive first, let Partwiz reboot computer and do its operations, then after the computer rebooted, I manipulated the other partitions. This way, it did not require a reboot for everything to work.

    You could most likely just delete the MSR partition and recreate it in the newly created space that was allocated. I don't know the setup you have but it most instances the MSR partition is not used. Here is a site that covers MSR Partitions http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd799232(v=ws.10).aspx#MicrosoftRecoveryPartitions . I would recommend this, because now the only thing that you must do is "shift" everything to the right. This will still maintain the Microsoft recommended partition layout as well.

    Most importantly though, resize the C: drive first, reboot and let PartWiz do its operation, and then configure the EFI and MSR partitions. This way you don't chance having to reboot without an EFI partition.

    No worries, thanks for checking back in.  I actually ended up doing it that way, and found out that it didn't reboot when working with the small partitions.  After making the 128MB space for the MSR (this needed a reboot as I was resizing C:) I used DISKPART to create a new MSR in the empty space (I didn't have to specify where to put it, as it was the only free space on the drive).  Then I deleted the first MSR, and copied the EFI drive to it.  I then set it as EFI using the command you gave on page one, and deleted the original EFI and added the space to my recovery drive.  And I can backup again!

    As an aside, the custom recovery image thing that people have been talking about recently doesn't work for me, or rather I can create it but I can't register it.  Not sure why not.  Anyways, moot point as I have a system image instead.

    Thanks again for the help with this very annoying bug...(noticed on my wifes laptop that last week got a new windows 8 install that the 300mb partition was actually made at 350mb so that they seem to have changed something, but I guess don't want to talk about it as it doesn't help anyone who has already installed)

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  3. Anonymous
    2013-11-19T05:25:07+00:00

    It worked for me too! No need external drive.

    However, I can only see one file 'CustomResfresh.wim'. Not sure whether can this file be used to restore the image.

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  4. Anonymous
    2013-11-19T12:24:03+00:00

    what happens if your C drive fails?? The whole idea of having a backup image is incase your HDD or SSD fails, how can you restore from an image on the same drive its backed up on if the drive fails, does not make sense.

    I am pretty sure this process is not the same as restoring from a system image. A recovery image and a system image backup are 2 different things.

    Has anyone even restored using this recovery image?? and if so what state is the computer in?? ie-is this just the same as a clean install?

    Thanks.

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