[wm4bama]

Alex, I still appreciate your help in solving this problem.

I can borrow a USB floppy. Will that work with the "writelog" command? I will not open up my computer to install an internal floppy.

You said the USB stick must be formatted as FAT16 or FAT32. Even though I don't have a stick it reminds me of my original stated problem. HDCLONE (booted cd version) recognized mu USB drive when first used. Only later after I formatted the USB drive from FAT32 to NTFS did HDCLONE (booted version) not be able to "find" the USB HD.

Could this be a clue?

[Alex]

Any USB Floppy will work.

As for the USB stick: the requirement for FAT is simple that writelog cannot write to NTFS partitioned drives. As I mentioned earlier, finding a drive has nothing to do with the filesystem on the drive itself, so this cannot be the reason.

Regarding borrowing an USB floppy: in my opinion it's easier finding an usb flash drive to borrow instead of an USB floppy, and the writing to it is also much faster.

[wm4bama]

Thanks Alex, here is some more data about my computer environment:

Computer: Dell Dimension B110, XP Home SP3, Intel Celeron 2.53GHz CPU, 512MB RAM

No floppy drives (No A or B)
Internal IDE 80GB Western Digital HD as C & D
Internal Sony CD/DVD burner as E

USB Controller is Intel 82801EB and I have 6 USB ports on the computer as:

1) Keyboard always connected
2) Mouse always connected
3) HP 4750c ScanJet always connected
4) Sony CD/DVD burner as F always connected
5) Seagate 1.5TB HD as G & H always connected
6) Unused

Windows-assigned drive letters G & H are always found when HDCLONE runs from Windows and I get them as options for source or destination drives, as well as the internal C/D drive.

When HDCLONE runs from the booted CD, after the scan it only finds the internal C/D drive.

[Alex]

With such a problem you'd be probably better off writing to the support (http://www.miray.de/support), but I'll give it a try anyway.

You can try (with the Boot version) to press the 'E' key during bootup (when the progress bar is show). After reading 100%, it should display something like EHCI disabled. Then only the USB 1.1 drivers are loaded, but you might be able to see your disk. Is this the case?

[wm4bama]

Thanks Alex,

I booted the CD with the E option and it displayed EHCI disabled. Still no dice, after the scan HDCLONE did not "find" my USB HD.

I'll pick up a USB stick tomorrow and try the writelog sequence with it.

[wm4bama]

Hi Alex, thanks for the suggestion of using a USB memory stick. I bought one this morning and plugged it in...the good thing is it has a light on it that indicates when the USB bus has power, and that may lead to a fix..

I got email from Customer Support with things to try. I attach it below with my response to them. If we can find a way to keep HDCLONE from turning OFF my USB bus power when the CD boots I think we'll fix the problem. Now we know why HDCLONE works when run from Windows and doesn't work when run from the booted CD.

If you have any ideas let's explore them, or we'll have to wait on Customer Service to respond...thanks again

My response to Cusomer Support:
Thanks for the suggestions, here are the results:

I changed my BIOS setting for PS/2 to OFF, no difference, HDCLONE did not detect the USB HD.

Booting CD with options:

U - Could not use mouse or keyboard after it booted...USB power bus is turned OFF
O - Mouse and keyboard works but no USB HD detected..USB power bus is turned OFF
E - Mouse and keyboard works but no USB HD detected...USB power bus flickers ON and
OFF...about 1 cycle-per-second
U&O - Can't use mouse or keyboard but USB power bus is turned ON and stays ON.

I just bought a USB memory stick and had it plugged in...it has an indicator light that is ON when the USB bus has power. The only time the USB bus is powered ON by HDCLONE is when the U&O boot option is used. However, I can't use the mouse of keyboard to select HDCLONE options or continue for HDCLONE to scan for devices.

Summary, if you determine why HDCLONE is turning my USB power bus OFF when it boots up I think we will have solved the problem...we now know that if the USB bus is not powered ON then HDCLONE certainly can't detect any USB devices.

I hope one of your software engineers can come up with a fix for this problem..

Thanks again

----- Original Message -----
From: Miray Customer Service
To: wm4bama
Sent: Friday, March 06, 2009 7:43 AM
Subject: Your support request (Case: #1099336)


Important: To reply to this message, please use the following link:
http://www.miray.de/support/index.php?request=56654706


Dear Mr wm4bama (had my real name here)

there are several possible solutions and I hope one of them works.
First, the support for USB mouse and keyboard as PS/2 device in your
BIOS setup could be a problem. This option is usually to be found under
"Legacy USB support" (or similar) at the USB settings. Set the
respective switch to "off" or "deactivate" or
similar. If HDClone still doesn't detect the USB drive, it seems that
one of the USB drivers of HDClone is not working properly with your
hardware. To find out which one it is, please press one or more of the
keys listed below, each once during HDClone is loading, i.e. DURING the
blue progress indicator is moving and has not yet reached the 100%
mark:

- = no USB 1.1 (UHCI)
- = no USB 1.1 (OHCI)
- = no USB 2.0 (EHCI)
- and = no USB 1.1 at all

Does any of these Safe Modes lead to a successful detection of the USB
device?

[wm4bama]

This will be my final update on this subject until an updated version of HDCLONE is released.

After exchanging email over several days with Miray Customer Support personnel and trying all their suggestions for setting my various BIOS options and trying to boot the HDCLONE CD with various boot options, it turned out none worked.

HDCLONE, when booted from CD, turns OFF my Intel USB bus controller, which prevents the HDCLONE "scanning for devices" from "finding" my USB HD's.

Customer Support then recommended I download and use BartPE to make a bootable WINXP CD of my operating system and include HDCLONE on the CD.

I did that and it works perfectly. When I run WINXP from the BartPE CD, then execute HDCLONE it scans for devices and "finds" my USB HD's, then normal HDCLONE options for backup can be performed.

I recommend this method to anyone that may have trouble with HDCLONE and USB HD's.

Miray Customer Support is highly commended for helping troubleshoot my problem with HDCLONE. They were very responsive and determined to find a solution.

I think the next updated release of HDCLONE will have a fix for my Intel USB controller problem that only occurred when running from the HDCLONE bootable CD.

Also, Alex, thank you so much for supporting this problem.