Recovery and operation of captured running states from multiple computing systems on a single computing system

A computer program product comprising one or more computer-readable storage media having thereon computer-executable instructions that, when executed by one or more processors of a single computing system, cause the single computing system to perform a method for restoring access to running states of a plurality of primary computing systems onto the single computing system, the method comprising the following:

• an act of accessing a captured running state of each of the primary computing systems on the single computing system, wherein the captured running states each include, or are altered to include, at least one device driver that is configured to interface with a common virtualization component that runs on the single computing system, wherein the common virtualization component is configured to at least indirectly interface with hardware on the single computing system, at least part of the hardware using a different interface than the at least one device driver is configured to interface with;
• an act of identifying a boot order for each of the primary computing systems;
• and
• an act of booting the captured running states for each of the primary computing systems in the identified boot order on the single computing system.

A method for restoring access to running states of a plurality of primary computing systems onto a single computing system, the method comprising the following:

• an act of capturing the running states of each of the primary computing systems;
• an act of ensuring that each of the captured running states includes at least one device driver that is configured to interface with a common virtualization component, wherein the common virtualization component is configured to at least indirectly interface with hardware on the single computing system, at least part of the hardware using a different interface than the device driver is configured to interface with;
• an act of identifying a boot order for each of the primary computing systems;
• and
• an act of booting the captured running states for each of the primary computing systems in the identified boot order on the single computing system.

A computing system comprising:

• one or more processors;
• at least one hardware component;
• a device driver that is configured to interface with operating systems using a hardware interface to thereby control the hardware component;
• one or more computer-readable media having thereon the following:
• computer-executable instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, causes the computing system to operating a common virtualization component that is configured to at least indirectly interface with the device driver;
• a captured running state for each of a plurality of primary computing systems, wherein each capture running state contains, or is altered to contain, at least one device driver, at least some of which operate using a different interface than the hardware interface;
• and
• computer-executable instructions that are structured such that, when executed by the one or more processors, they cause the computing system to perform the following:
• an act of identifying a boot order for each of the primary computing systems;
• and
• an act of booting the captured running states for each of the primary computing systems in the identified boot order on the single computing system.

A method comprising:

• inserting a first device driver into a first running state of a first computing system, the first device driver being configured to interface with a virtualization component on a recovery system;
• inserting second device driver into a second running state of a second computing system, the second device driver being configured to interface with the virtualization component on the recovery system;
• capturing the first running state of the first computing system;
• capturing the second running state of the second computing system;
• including the virtualization component on the recovery computing system;
• restoring the first running state to the recovery computing system, the first device driver interfacing with hardware of the recovery system through the virtualization component;
• restoring the second running state to the recovery computing system, the second device driver interfacing with the hardware of the recovery system through the virtualization component;
• providing access to the first and second running states.