Hello, all. I have a Toshiba Satellite P300 laptop that is only about 4 weeks old. The operating system is Windows Vista Home Premium for 64 bit. Three days ago is suddenly refused to run, instead launching the Startup Recovery process, which I believe is a windows vista utility.
I have attempted running my Windows Home Server restore CD, but it refuses to find my home server, reporting that "A network error has occurred. Please verify that you network connection is active and that your Windows Home Server is powered on." Well, my network is working fine and so is the Home Server ...
It appears to me that my laptop's network card is not being activated when the PC starts up using the Restore CD. I have retrieved the driver folder from the backup folder on my WHS and copied the drivers to a USB drive as instructed. Regardless, when the Restore starts up it reports that it does not see any network devices.
Any ideas on how to proceed? I do have the laptop running again by utilzing the laptop's recovery utility. It runs fine again, but I now want to restore all my programs and data from the WHS backup.
All assistance is greatly appreciated. Thank you.
Doug
JDRobinson: I then insert the USB flash drive that contains the drivers that I copied from the folder on the WHS, and it still does not report detecting the ethernet card. The activity lights on the ethernet connection never light up or flash during this process.
I then insert the USB flash drive that contains the drivers that I copied from the folder on the WHS, and it still does not report detecting the ethernet card. The activity lights on the ethernet connection never light up or flash during this process.
Did you open the latest laptop backup on your WHS and copy the SysWOW64 folder onto your USB stick to get the drivers?c:\Windows\SysWOW64 = 64-bit libraries & drivers
c:\Windows\System32 = 32-bit libraries & drivers You can find your backup and manually open it to access the filesystem:
If this is indeed how you did it? Please make sure you grab the 32-bit drivers - however, since your backup of your laptop system is x64 there may not be any drivers...Best to check your manufacturers support website for 32-bit drivers? Again the restore CD shell is 32-bit only!
Microsoft MVP - Windows Home Server
Hi Doug,
By any chance are you trying over a wireless network card? Please try via Ethernet cable from the same switch/router where your WHS is located.
If you still need drivers for your ethernet or WiFi please provide 32-bit drivers because the Windows Home Server Recovery CD itself is in 32-bit - you can however still use this 32-bit environment to restore your 64-bit Vista system.Please keep us posted
Also make sure your WHS and the laptop is on the same subnet network / workgroup.
Although the laptop does have WIFI capability I am definitely using the ethernet connection.
The problem seems to be that the driver for the ethernet is not being detected. When the restore utility reaches the point where it reports the devices it has located, it reports detectiing 0 network devices and 6 storage devices. I then insert the USB flash drive that contains the drivers that I copied from the folder on the WHS, and it still does not report detecting the ethernet card. The activity lights on the ethernet connection never light up or flash during this process. However, during normal operation the lights on the ethernet connection flash frequently.
Because I have restored the laptop to its out-of-the-box condition using the restore utility located in the seperate disk partition on the laptop itself, and since I can reboot now, is there some way to restore all my files from the WHS without needing to reboot with the WHS Restore CD?
OK, it is doing the system restore! Using your advice, I checked the NIC drivers and confirmed they are 64-bit drivers. I then went to the Toshiba website and downloaded the x86 drivers, but discovered that the files had to be installed using an install utility supplied by Toshiba. Of course, installing them was not what I wanted to do, and in fact I could not install anything in the middle of the WHS restore operation. Through deduction I was able to determine that the ethernet device in my laptop is a Marvell Yukon unit, so I did a web search to find their website, then downloaded the Vista x86 drivers from their website, transferred them to my USB flash drive, installed the flashdrive in my laptop, did the search for drivers on the flashdrive and - PRESTO - the network device was detected! So ... I am running the restore now.
Thank you for your help!
Anytime and thanks for the update - glad you got it sorted.Some manufacturers go overboard bundling and re-branding drivers. As a side note there is a handy utility called "uniextractor" which pretty much is like a serious "can opener". It is very useful to open these setup/ installers such as *.exe, *.msi to get to the contained data files.
My apologies for resurrecting an old thread and piggybacking on this. However, this seemed pretty close to what what I'm experiencing. However, I'm dealing with a Dell Mini 9 (DM9) and its Realtek RTL8101 NIC. Obviously, since the DM9 doesn't have an optical drive, I've created a bootable USB flash drive (UFD) and have placed the contents of the WHS Recovery software on it. Seven days ago, I was able to boot to the WHS Recovery software on the UFD, find my WHS, select which image I wanted to restore and was able to restore everything without any issues.
However, about 5 days ago, after some issues with RAM on the DM9, I tried to recover exactly like I did 7 days ago. Well, it boots into WHS Recovery and finds my devices, including my NIC. However, the light that indicates that the NIC is connected does not light up. I've tried multiple cables, ports, switches etc... For some reason, the light on the switches will light up; however, there is no light on the NIC. Needless to say, when I Continue, the WHS Recovery fails to find the server.
I know there is nothing wrong with the network or the WHS. I also know that the DM9's NIC works. Why? I took the time to reinstall a fresh OS and the DM9 can connect to the network and the WHS. So why isn't it working under the WHS Recovery environment? Clearly, I don't have 64-bit, 32-bit driver issues because the DM9 can only deal with 32-bit. I've racked my brains for three days now. I guess I should try to "rebuild" the WHS Recovery software on the UFD... but I hardly believe that would be the issue.
So, bottom line: Why, all of a sudden, is not my NIC working in the WHS Recovery environment?
Blah...
it was a driver issue. I must have had the correct, updated drivers on my WHS Recovery UFD the first time. I do recall deleting some folders off the UFD 7 days ago... So chalk this up to user error.
Anyhow, for the Dell Mini 9, when attempting to recover from the WHS Home Computer Restore software, make sure you go to http://www.realtek.com.tw/downloads/downloadsView.aspx?Langid=1&PNid=7&PFid=7&Level=5&Conn=4&DownTypeID=3&GetDown=false#RTL8100E/RTL8101E/RTL8102E-GR/RTL8103E%28L%29%3Cbr%3ERTL8102E%28L%29/RTL8101E/RTL8103T%3Cbr%3ERTL8401/RTL8401P and grab the latest Vista drivers, which, as of 2009-11-20 was:
SO:
Everything afterward worked for me...
Just wanted to say I had the same problem with my desktop today and Realtek network card. There must be a problem with how Windows detects these cards (or they report themselves to Windows) because there is a pending driver update on Windows Update for it, but if I install it I lose all network connectivity.
Anyway, grabbing the latest driver from the link you provided and using that during the restore process did the trick.
Cheers.
I'm having trouble with the network card that is on my motherboard. It is a Realtek RTL1869/8110 Family Gigabit Ethernet NIC. The problem is that I'm having connection problems: Some website just refuse to load such as those I use for paper writing, and I lag out at 3, 5, or 10 minute intervals on computer games. This has been a problem since I bought the computer. I need help.