Please see the following thread and make discussion there:

http://windrv.net/viewthread.php?tid=311&extra=page%3D1

In fact, the procedure above could be summarized as follows:

1. run up xp in ram with the use of da virtual memory disk driver
2. wait for the "finished installing new devices" message to come up and click no so that it does not reboot
3. backup the registry of the xp system running in da virtual memory disk
4. restore the backup-registry to the boot-up-to-ram system image, be it on a partition or inside an image file

If the above 4 steps still do not work for you (usually this is when you boot your system image by selecting the memdisk raw option), you may do one more step 5 below:

5. run up da to use the Change Disk Signature Tool to get the disk signature of the system virtual memory disk in ram;
   note it down and select the .dsk image file and write this disk signature into the .dsk image file using the same
   Change Disk Signature Tool of da.

Then the above boot-up-to-ram system image could be rebooted up again and vshadow services could be used on it.


Little Angel has a Help procedure, erunt.cfg, that helps to perform Step 3 & 4 above.

To run this Help procedure, you could:

1. run up la.exe
2. in the User Option File field, select the procedure: erunt.cfg
3a. if the target to which the backup-registry is to be restored is an .dsk or .img image file, specify in the Target field : Image File, which is the default
3b. if the target to which the backup-registry is to be restored is a partition drive, specify in the Target field: the corresponding drive letter
4. then press the Help button
5a. if the target specified is an image file, la will prompt you to select the image file and it will do the rest for you
5b. if the target specified is a drive letter, it will simply do the rest for you

or another better way is to do an incremental backup of the da virtual memory system drive into your system image according to #18 at this thread:

http://windrv.net/viewthread.php ... page%3D1&page=2

You could then reboot and load up the system partition or the system image file to run in da virtual memory disk and do the vshadow backup on the da virtual memory disk.

Thanks a lot to Philip once more for sharing with us this excellent procedure!

For doing vshadow backup, actually you could use da's Copy Volume Tool or la's LiveCopy Imaging if you have the sample code downloaded from the link mentioned above in post #5. Just copy the MS sample code to the folder of \Program Files\Diskless Angel or to the folder where la is run up.

In the vshadow services SDK, there are 2 different vshadow sample codes, one for xp and one for 2k3. So find them out and use them correspondingly.

For xp, the MS sample code should be renamed to vshadow_xp.exe and for 2k3, to vshadow_2k3.exe for using with da and la.

If you do vshadow backup of a da system memory drive to a booting partition on hard disk, you may perhaps experience a booting failure when running the system on hard disk again.

Then you may have to load the booting partition or the .dsk image file and boot up the system in ram again and run up da to use the Change Disk Signature Tool to reset the hard disk signature into all zeros again. This helps make your hard disk system rebootable.

The simplest way to make a .dsk image file with vshadow hot backup capability is:

1. setup a full system with vshadow hot backup capability
2a. setup dala.zip and g4dimdiskerunt.zip as introduced in LA Tutorial 1 at here below:

http://windrv.net/viewthread.php?tid=277&extra=page%3D1

2b. get MS vshadow sample code as described below
     and rename it as vshadow_xp.exe for xp system or vshadow_2k3.exe for 2k3 system
     and put it inside the folder (dala folder) where la.exe is found
3. run up la.exe
4. select auto-building image
5a. select System Backup
or
if you want to make a smaller image file, you could try:

5bi. select Optimal System

or

5bii. select Mini System

Then after making the .dsk image file, you follow up the steps at #1 above to:

6. run up la.exe to do the erunt.cfg backup of registry into your .dsk image file
7. run up Diskless Angel gui application to change the disk signature of the .dsk image file; setting it the same as the da system virtual memory disk running in ram.

or another better way is to do an incremental backup of the da virtual memory system drive into your system image according to #18 at this thread:

http://windrv.net/viewthread.php ... page%3D1&page=2

After the above steps, you could get a .dsk image file with vshadow hot backup capability next time you run it up again.

The best way to verify if vshadow hot backup service is enabled in your system is to run up Diskless Angel gui application to perform a hot system backup of your system:

1. run up Diskless Angel
2. click on Tools --> Copy Volume
3. input box -- the system drive (default)
4. output box -- the distination of your hot backup
   (this can be a drive or a folder in a drive; but the drive should not be the same as the drive in input box)
5. press OK button

But make sure that you have the MS vshadow sample codes into your \Program Files\Diskless Angel folder so that you can use the Copy Volume Tool of Diskless Angel for doing Hot Backup (i.e. LiveImaging in Little Angel) as described below:

For the use of LiveImaging, it relies on the use of vshadow services in your system. The simplest way is to have a full xp/2k3 system installed in your computer first.

And then you download the vshadow sample codes for use with your system:

VShadow: vshadow.exe is freely available from Microsoft as part of the VSS SDK, at:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloa ... &displaylang=en

You should rename the vshadow sample codes as:

vshadow_xp.exe

for use in xp system

or

vshadow_2k3.exe

for use in 2k3 system

and put them into the \Program Files\Diskless Angel folder and the dala folder and for use with da & la.