Windows 8’s Secure Boot Makes Acronis True Image Useless

[tezza]

Another day, another Windows 8 issue. This time, it appears that Microsoft’s latest operating system is blocking Linux-based recovery environments, including Acronis’ very popular True Image software.

Consumers who try to boot from a recovery image are blocked by Microsoft’s anti-rootkit option and provided with an error that says, “Selected boot image did not authenticate. Press ‘Enter’ to continue.”

According to PCPro, Acronis has already submitted an answer to one of the affected users, saying that it’s all because of Windows’s Secure Boot and disabling this option is the only way to make True Image work.

But another problem is that Acronis True Image is marked as Windows 8-compatible on the official website of the company, with customers allowed to spend as much as $49.99 (€37.2) for a software that doesn’t work very well on Microsoft’s new operating system.

“True Image 2013 is compatible with Windows 8. Just like with all the other versions down to XP,” the website reads.

Official comments from either Microsoft or Acronis are yet to be released at the time of writing this article.

http://news.softpedia.com/news/Windows-8-s-Secure-Boot-Makes-Acronis-True-Image-Useless-321224.shtml

[DKT27]

Thing is, anyone who wants to be allowed to run at boot like this needs to pay that money whore Microsoft for a certificate. Being compatible with Windows 8, in this case, means absolutely nothing.

I believe Acronis has three options to solve this problem:

1. Make the installer in a way, that only installs Acronis when a person disables secure boot. The installer should auto-start after disabling secure boot and booting.
2. Pay M$ for a certificate.
3. I have heard those linux guys are working on something certificate making thing, they can ask them to get one at lesser price.

[0veR]

Thing is, anyone who wants to be allowed to run at boot like this needs to pay that money whore Microsoft for a certificate. Being compatible with Windows 8, in this case, means absolutely nothing.

I believe Acronis has three options to solve this problem:

1. Make the installer in a way, that only installs Acronis when a person disables secure boot. The installer should auto-start after disabling secure boot and booting.
2. Pay M$ for a certificate.
3. I have heard those linux guys are working on something certificate making thing, they can ask them to get one at lesser price.

In one word Windows 8 is SHIT :P

[Trancer]

Thing is, anyone who wants to be allowed to run at boot like this needs to pay that money whore Microsoft for a certificate. Being compatible with Windows 8, in this case, means absolutely nothing.

I believe Acronis has three options to solve this problem:

1. Make the installer in a way, that only installs Acronis when a person disables secure boot. The installer should auto-start after disabling secure boot and booting.
2. Pay M$ for a certificate.
3. I have heard those linux guys are working on something certificate making thing, they can ask them to get one at lesser price.

In one word Windows 8 is SHIT :P

Nah.. Win 8 is working just fine & far better, faster than win 7.. :showoff:

PS: I know your comment is sarcasm.. but some ppl might believe it..! <_<

[DKT27]

PS: I know your comment is sarcasm.. but some ppl might believe it..! <_<

Don't think it's sarcasm. 0veR hates Windows 8. :P

Seriously, there are only couple of malware in the wild which can attack pre-boot. We all know this secure boot nonsense is done to keep away the pirates and linux.

[edwardecl]

If you have malware that attacks pre-boot then you have other more serious problems then just the boot loader...

[mjall]

having windows 8 I hardly think I will ever use acronis anymore; re-installign windows 8 does not take more than 15 minutes or so; a fresh system following a format is much better for the registry

[Trancer]

I just hope Microsoft makes a patch to get the old start menu thing back .. to stop those moaning people who are complaining 24/7.. If you used pre/beta versions of Win 8.. so yeah it had problems.. but the final version is quite solid.. even my old so-hard-school & tech-savvy brother was impressed with it.. People should learn & adapt to new things & stop complaining about the change..

I just can't understand why some people don't want to move on from XP days.. Really.. :o

[speedpedal]

. . . Why would anyone want to keep XP? Because it worked. It was easy to use it was intuitive, and nearly all software and drivers were compatible.

If any of you were old enough to remember Some early advertising from a Famous German Car Company - their promise was to keep improving an existing design which they did for many years and it worked until

the early obsolescence philosophy forced them to give it up.

I bought multiple copies of 8 because it was inexpensive; and that I might have to give up my old XP and 7 boxes some day.

AS for the START BUTTON ISSUE . . .

Maybe a better start button would be just to install two Very large Keyboard Buttons . . . One GREEN to GO and One RED to Stop.

Also Simplify the QWERTY Keyboard with just the letters d-u-h. (All lowercase of course, as not to confuse the user.)

[nIGHT]

Some people didn't hate windows 8 for this start menu issue (I am disappointed only) but because of some functionality like these that makes it hard to migrate your existing system. My favorite online games won't even run under it. But, if these issues will be resolve I will definitely migrate and take dcs18's advice. ;)

[dcs18]

Just a few quick clarifying points:-

• Windows 8 does not require the new Secure Boot implementation (my system did not have it - it originally had a legacy BIOS before I upgraded the BIOS to UEFI only recently)
• Windows 8 does not install Secure Boot - it's native to some of the UEFI BIOS (even my own newly-upgraded UEFI does not have Secure Boot as it's a hybrid BIOS)
• Secure Boot can be turned on/off (I prefer to kill it and others can also switch it off if they wish to)
• It's not prudent to use Acronis True Image as an installation (I use the BootCD - any software that's available as a BootCD/DVD or as a portable is better off not being installed.)

I find umpteen of folks using Acronis as an installation - even today, some teenager PM'ed about his Acronis (it's IMO the best, but - sinks it's tentacles deeply, system-wide and also hogs resources.)

[DKT27]

@dcs18: True. However, last time I checked, it was a must for OEMs to have secure boot based MOBOs (obviously this also includes UEFI). And until the secure boot / UEFI outage, all the OEMs didn't even consider to provide an option for it. :huh: Not only that, Microsoft requires all the ARM based Windows 8 sellers to have secure boot turned ON be default and probably also not provide any options to disable it. So yeah, we with olders motherboards will not have much problems, but newer hardware ones are something to be concerned about.

About Acronis, I believe it takes time for the burnable versions to appear online?

[dcs18]

@dcs18: True. However, last time I checked, it was a must for OEMs to have secure boot based MOBOs (obviously this also includes UEFI). And until the secure boot / UEFI outage, all the OEMs didn't even consider to provide an option for it. :huh: Not only that, Microsoft requires all the ARM based Windows 8 sellers to have secure boot turned ON be default and probably also not provide any options to disable it. So yeah, we with olders motherboards will not have much problems, but newer hardware ones are something to be concerned about.

Yes, the UEFI BIOS in the latest breeds of OEM laptops do have a mandatory Secure Boot which needs (as per Microsoft dictats) to be on, by default - however, there's always been the option to turn it off in whichever OEM laptops I've had the chance to work on, so far.

Just an interjection, here - if Secure Boot were left without the option to be turned off, that would sound the death knell for Windows 7 and all OS (other than Windows 8.) Fortunately, that's not true.

About Acronis, I believe it takes time for the burnable versions to appear online?

Yeah, I generally don't wait but install Acronis on any Customers system that's due for a reformat - once installed and activated, I then create a Linux ISO from that (activated) copy of Acronis.

[DKT27]

I see.

As far as I remember, people can boot with Windows 7 even when secure boot is enabled, just that Windows activated with Daz loader will get unactivated. Kinda feel bad for Linux.

[bigcid10]

M$oft is closed source code so the can do that if they want

and the windows 8 system image program is better than acronis anyway. I don't like M$oft anymore the rest of us but

the other cheap mfg are just bitching a little too much,Acronis will figure a way around it

[dcs18]

As far as I remember, people can boot with Windows 7 even when secure boot is enabled,

Don't believe that hype, you'll get screwed - once the BIOS is set for Secure Boot, all other OS except Windows 8 will fail to boot from it (unless the certification is entrusted at every boot - this is how Microsoft shafted Daz and his loader.)

I invested a lot of time learning how to hack the OEM code (took upwards of 36 consecutive hours.)

BTW, with modern implementation, Windows 7 days are outnumbered - it does not support the GPT that I'm running Windows 8 on (GPT is going to be the final nail in the Windows 7 coffin, not Secure Boot.) To enable/disable Secure Boot (check the figure below) takes just a flick of the mouse - formatting [and installing] to GPT or back is a totally different ball game.