- Veeam Support Knowledge Base
- Restoring GPT Disk to Incompatible Legacy BIOS System
Restoring GPT Disk to Incompatible Legacy BIOS System
| KB ID: | 2407 |
| Product: | Veeam Agent for Microsoft Windows |
| Version: | Any |
| Published: | 2017-11-20 |
| Last Modified: | 2025-12-15 |
Cheers for trusting us with the spot in your mailbox!
Now you’re less likely to miss what’s been brewing in our knowledge base with this weekly digest
Oops! Something went wrong.
Please, try again later.
Challenge
After selecting a restore point during the bare metal restore configuration, the following message pops up:
OS disk in backup uses GPT disk. This may cause boot issues on BIOS systems.
If this is ignored and the restore process completes, the following may happen when the restored machine boots up:
No boot disk found
or
An operating system wasn’t found
Cause
A system with legacy BIOS mode only is not able to boot to an operating system using GPT.
Solution
Check BIOS boot settings of the machine being restored to and determine if it can be configured to use UEFI instead of Legacy mode.
If the machine can be configured to use UEFI boot, the steps below do not need to be performed.
For VM's this setting may be enabled in the Virtual Machine settings:
- vSphere VM
- Hyper-V VM must be Generation 2
If the machine does not have an option for UEFI boot in the BIOS, you must perform the following steps.
Part 1: Prepare System reserved Partition
To resolve the compatibility issue, it is necessary to manually create a System reserved as outlined in the following steps.
- Boot from the Veeam Recovery Media.
- Go to Tools and start command prompt utility.
- Run the following commands one at a time:
diskpart
list diskReview the list of disks on the system, and identify which disk number you will be restoring the OS to.
Use that disk number in the following command.
select disk #clean
convert mbr
create partition primary size=100
select part 1
format fs=ntfs label=”System Reserved” quick
active
assign letter=S
exitPart 2: Restore the OS
- Start the Bare Metal Recovery.
- Follow the steps of the restore wizard until you reach the Restore Mode.
- On the Restore Mode step of the restore wizard, select Manual restore (Advanced)
- Map the OS drive (e.g., C: ) to the empty space next to the System Reserved partition created in Part 1 of this guide.
Note:- Do not restore the EFI partition.
- Do not delete the System Reserved partition created in the previous steps.
- Complete the restore, Do not reboot.
Part 3: Make System Reserved partition bootable
- Identify which drive letter has been assigned to the restore Windows OS volume.
- Go back to Tools and open the Command Prompt.
- Run the following commands one at a time to list all volumes on the system.
diskpart
list vol
exit- Copy boot files from the restored OS to the manually created System Reserved partition.
Note:- This command assumes the OS is C: and the manually created System Reserved partition is set as S:
- The /f switch is only available with recovery media created from Windows 8/Server 2012 and higher.
bcdboot C:\Windows /s S: /f ALL- Reboot and start the restored OS.
More Information
Restoring MBR Disk to Incompatible UEFI System - KB3156.
If this KB article did not resolve your issue or you need further assistance with Veeam software, please create a Veeam Support Case.
To submit feedback regarding this article, please click this link: Send Article Feedback
To report a typo on this page, highlight the typo with your mouse and press CTRL + Enter.
