Restoring a backup. Can't access backup files.

My laptop failed. Before I sent it back to HP for repair, I pulled the SSD and used an external adapter to make a complete backup using HDM 17 advanced (purchased). The unit was returned with a fresh windows install so I decided to just reload SW and enjoy the clean install. I am having trouble getting HDM to "see" the backup files. I did the BU with a different machine obviously and have since moved the files to my server. I don't see any way to point the restore to a BU it doesn't have in its backup list. My plan was to write the entire backup to an external drive (since I did an entire disk BU--not the way to go it seems). How do I recover from this mess? The knowledge base article regarding this is gibberish and does not correspond to my 17 SW at all (probably why it only gets 1 star ratings). I would expect to just be able to go to the BU file and click, but none of the file types are associated with HDM. Pretty lazy developers.

BTW-I experimented with a folder BU to see how that works. When I went to restore (to a different location) it said the target volume would be deleted and replaced. Surely they can't mean that but I did not proceed with the restore. Is this a bad translation from German??? I'm not feeling very good about my purchase....

Should I also submit this as a support request? I figure the forum would be quicker.

Spend a lot of time but figured out a solution. I first tried to build a Windows recovery flash drive to no avail. The build process does not work. I then tried a Linux recovery. This did build, but booting from it took many minutes and showed several errors. Also had no network access. However, the program finally started. I put the BU on an external flash drive and made a new blank partition on the the drive (did not use Paragon to do this as I read a number of posts complaining about this not working well). Plugged in the external drive before I started the Linux recovery boot. After figuring how to run the software without a mouse (not recognized), I used the wizard with the option to restore a VD backup to another partition. This did work and my files former windows partition is copied to the external drive.

I'm quite experienced with this sort of thing but found the HDM software very difficult to use and will not be using it again. My bad for not testing the restore before I sent my laptop back for repair, but one would reasonably expect that if presented with a BU option to backup the entire computer, it would be possible to restore individual files readily. NOT THE CASE. I am also surprise that one needed to use the recovery media to restore a backedup partition to a different partition. Why make this useful process so difficult.

BTW, as I mentioned above I did do a little experimenting, Made a backup where I selected "files and folders". When I tried a restore of one file, it warned me that doing so would DELETE the target partition! What the heck. Maybe a typo but I obviously did no proceed.

I just use a desktop computer running Windows 10 to restore backups. I attach the drive using a USB adapter, load up Paragon HDM 17 (or whatever#), choose Restore, navigate to the backup files, choose the USB connected drive as the target, press ok/go and the backup is back where it belongs. If you don't have a second computer on which to install Paragon HDM then you're out of luck and stuck with using a bootable USB drive. But restoring from within Windows 10 is soooooo much easier and faster (IMO).