As a necessary recovery option during or after system imaging of your Windows 11 or Windows 10 computer, we recommend that you validate the system backup imagewhich ensures that you can successfully restore Windows from it, because if the data on the image or the image itself is damaged, you will not be able to restore or transfer the Windows image.

How to Verify a Windows System Backup Image

There are many situations that can invalidate a Windows system backup image; for example, if you saved data on a scratched hard drive, the backup image may be corrupted. Hence, if your backup image file has been corrupted, you will not be able to restore it successfully.

To ensure that a system image backup is valid without actually restoring it, you can mount the backup image with a trusted image backup software and then verify it. For the purposes of this post, we will be using a free AOMEI Backupper Standard software to check the integrity of a Windows system backup image in one of the following ways:

1. In the process of creating a system image
2. After the system image creation process

Let’s look at the description of both instances.

The dedicated software will do the following:

• Check the integrity of the backup image file.
• Diagnose corrupted data, if any.
• Check for any other inconsistencies in the backup image file.

1]In the process of creating a system image

This option to validate or validate the Windows system backup image during the backup process requires you to use system imaging software.

Do the following:

• Download and install the AOMEI Backupper Standard software on your Windows 11/10 PC.
• After installation, run the program.
• Click Backup on the left navigation bar.
• Click System Backup on the right panel.
• On the next screen, click where the arrow points and select a destination (external hard drive, USB flash drive, NAS, network location, etc.) to save the backup image.
• Click Start Backup to start creating a system image.
• After starting the backup process, click the button Settings.
• Check Check backup integrity on completion option.

This will validate the backup image file after the backup is complete and ensure that it is restored successfully.

2]After the system image creation process

To verify the Windows system backup image after the system imaging process, follow these steps:

• Launch AOMEI Backupper Professional.
• go to Home.
• Select a system backup task.
• Press Settings on the right side.
• From the drop-down list, select Advanced > Check Image.

Alternatively, follow these steps.

• go to Tools.
• To choose Check Image.
• Select backup time point verify.
• Click Next to start checking the image and you will now see the progress of checking the backup image.
• When the task completes and there are no problems, click Finish.

That’s all about how to check the Windows system backup image!

How to view a Windows system image?

To view a Windows system image or restore a single file from a Windows system image backup, follow these steps:

• Open Disk Management.
• In the Disk Management window, click action > Attach VHD.
• Click Browse and locate the system image backup file.
• Click Open and mount the image. The mounted system image will appear as a disk in your computer window.

How can you test the effectiveness of your backup and recovery solution?

You can run the following tests with your backup solution:

• Run a test to see how long it takes to back up a given amount of data. Run recovery of the same information and write down the results.
• Run the app backup. Run a restore of the same application and write down the results.
• Run a VM backup.
• Run a remote recovery check.

Does Windows Backup include a system image?

When you set up Windows Backup, you can let Windows choose what to back up, including the system image, or you can choose the items you want to back up and whether you want to include a system image.