So you have removed your 'graphics' to an image file...that you are now trying to recover...and you made that image to 'protect' your files before installing win 8.

Now you cannot 'restore' them...so what part of my statement about 'don't' didn't you understand?

I am imagining you cleared your 'graphics' off the machine so you could make a partition...and install win 8.

That's what I mean when I say 'don't'.

You do NOT imperil a mission-critical computer [read 'work'] with a temporary beta OS, no matter how appealing it may seem, not if you don't want to end up with problems...;)

I can't win.

Uvah.....google is your friend.

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/hardware/how-to-getting-started-with-vhd-files-in-windows-7/3324

All is right in the world of uvah. The rescue disk I booted into and navigated to the external drive where the system image is. Forty minutes later and................................

Huzzah!

Some useful info for those who are interested: http://www.askvg.com/windows-8-hidden-secret-features-and-useful-hotkeys/ and a plug for Start 8: http://www.askvg.com/start8-download-freeware-to-get-start-button-orb-and-start-menu-back-in-windows-8/

Hehe...that'll be the day....sorry Ross. Couldn't resist...lol. 

Look at it this way. There's no other world like mine. Insanity reigns.

Proud mother at the marching day parade...to other mum..."Isn't my son grand...he's the ONLY one in step..." ...;p

I had to give it a shot though. Had my choice of two different system images. Since that last todo I plan to make a new one once a week.

I'm just waiting for some new AMD drivers.

Still lovin the 8 koolaid ;)  Just have more than a few games with problems launching (can't even launch Mass Effect 3 in fullscreen...but 1776x1000 windows are arright.)

This OS is amazing...and now I'm going to sleep.

That's a matter of opinion... bastard refuses point blank to install correctly on my system.  After 6 -7 attempts, and it still refusing to boot without the disc on-board, I'm giving up. 

My rig obviously doesn't like it.

So says the sole member of the Windows 8 fan club.

Yes, the sound of one hand clapping ....;)

Clap clap...clap clap.

Taps playing in the background.

And don't ya just hate it when the other hand gets in the way... f**ks up a perfectly silent percussion movement in D-Flat

On these forums? Yes.  On Neowins the debate is raging for hundreds of pages and I'd join in but I don't feel like reading all that.

It's faster at pretty much everything, storage spaces are awesome, the networking is better (though the built in drivers for one of my NICs aren't so hot) it looks like 32 bit apps can use about 1.7 gigs instead of 1.3 without going bonkers, my games are smoother when I boost the settings (the ones that work, at any rate)

So yeah, I just need new drivers and I'm set.

Windows 8 has a lot going for it. It has so much going for it that I will probably buy it shortly after it's released. But I do not like the unholy marriage of Metro and the classic desktop.

Storage (NTFS, SSD, and NAS related) enhancements - http://www.snia.org/sites/default/files2/SDC2011/presentations/monday/NealChristiansen_Win8FileSystemPerformance.pdf

I finally had time to mess with Win8. I couldn't be bothered messing with my drives, so a virtualbox install was what i did.

Well, my original impressions were wrong. Win8 is much, much worse. For those who have the opinion, "embrace change, don't be put off by learning something new", you can stop reading now. I don't buy that argument in this instance.

It's horrible!!
If i wanted a completely different UI experience, i would install Linux, or buy a Mac! I want windows, and that means using the tried and tested UI that has worked (with all it's flaws) for what, 17 years? I can embrace a new Windows OS, by saying that i mean staying true to what Windows means. I do not want my mobile device experience to be what i must deal with on a daily basis on my home PC. Win8 is not windows in the accepted meaning.

I'm not even sure it should be called Windows 8. MS should just call it Metro and say to the world they have moved on from intuitive icon based UI to a new OS.

I love some of the features under the skin. The ribbon in explorer was very neat, and i liked the new disk options available.
I loved the new task manager. It's brilliant!

I will be forever unhappy if those above new features, and others, never make it too a Win7 SP2, since that will be the only way i will get to use them, for unless Stardock waves a hell of alot of it's magic on Win8 (and by that i mean rendering metro useless) then i won't use it ever again.

I will acknowledge that since i was using it in VirtualBox, some of the annoyances may not be there when using it as your native OS, but not enough to fix it.

I know it's not the final version, and we are likely to see something quite different upon release, but i'm confident the headline will read something like this,

"The King is dead...long live the King."

Since upon release......Windows, as we know it..........will have died.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/5630/indepth-with-the-windows-8-consumer-preview/1

Probably the most comprehensive preview I've noticed

Snips from page 4 of 19 (only part of the conclusions since I'd rather not rip other peoples content) -

Metro conclusions

For most, the number one fear with Windows 8 and with Metro is that Microsoft is sacrificing current desktop and laptop users of Windows in an effort to chase the tablet market. Some may disagree with me, but I don’t think this is true. The Start menu is gone, but consider this: the best thing that Microsoft did to the Start menu came in Vista, when the new integrated search made it so that you didn’t actually have to go digging through folders and sub-folders. Not only is that search functionality alive and well in Windows 8, but the problem of folders and subfolders that it was created to avoid is also gone.

 Yes, Metro is very different from what came before, and yes, Metro was clearly designed with touch in mind, but once you learn its tricks (and especially once you’ve got the new keyboard shortcuts dedicated to memory) it acquits itself as a flexible and powerful user interface. Even if you’re on a massive 2560x1440 display with multiple monitors and never, ever touch the Windows Store or a Metro app, the Start screen serves as a much more configurable and useful application launcher than the tiny Start menu ever was.

Snips from page 19 - 

 The other problem Windows 8 is going to have is that, while it offers some nice under-the-hood updates, and while Metro is much more usable with a mouse and keyboard than some pessimists will lead you to believe, it’s not the essential upgrade for PCs that Windows 7 was. Thanks in part to the user-facing and under-the-hood improvements in Windows 7, desktops and laptops don’t need a new operating system like they did three years ago when their only options were the aging XP, the flawed Vista, or the alien landscape of Linux.

 If you’re reading this, the chances are good that you’re a technology enthusiast with a decent system, and you’re the ones to whom Windows 8’s under-the-hood enhancements will appeal the most. Give the preview a test drive, evaluate whether you’ll use the new features, and give Metro a fair shake—like it or not, it’s the future of the platform, and it’s well-implemented here. If you’re happy with Windows 7, though, this isn’t the must-have upgrade that its predecessor was, and Microsoft’s long-term support cycle—mainstream support until 2015, extended support until 2020—means that you’ll still get significant software updates (new DirectX and IE versions and a handful of other backported features) for awhile and security updates for even longer. You’ve got time to wait for Windows 9.

Computer management....sensible computer management REQUIRES an understanding of file/folder placement.  You can't chuck it out with the pissy excuse there's a wanker's search function to find things....

Some people don't actually LOSE them ....they live WITH those same folders.

They know where things are...so they can be sure to back them up - just one reason to understand a Computer's Architecture.

This new crappy interface might appease the plug ignorant who know no better.... but anyone who has 'dabbled' in GUIs will rightly call it idiotic.

He's talking about the start menu, not the files on the drive.  You back up separate bits of your start menu often do you?

At any rate, fuck this.  I don't even know why I still hang out here.  I like you guys but I no longer care.