Advice on Copy Disk with Ghost 9.0

  • Thread starter Thread starter Kelleher
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Kelleher

My system is Windows 2000 Pro, and I want to make a copy of my current
hard disk to a new disk. The current disk has two drives C: and D: .

I've read the Ghost 9.0 manual about how to do this but there's one
question I can't see answered. Hoping for help here..

Say I make the copy by copying C: (current) to X: (new), and D:
(current) to Y: (new). Manual says then one can make the clone the
master and boot from that.

But all the config files etc from the current disk refer to drives C:
and D: . But if the drives on the clone disk are called X: and Y:
isn't there gonna be a problem getting the thing to run?

Thanks for any help.
 
In your case clone disks, not partitions.
1. connect second disk using same type of mass storage controller
2. clone first disk to second disk, do not restart PC, turn off
3. remove first disk, move second disk to first (cables, jumpers)
4. start PC, redetect new disk geometry, start OS
 
If Ghost 9.0 is like its predecessor, PowerQuest Drive Image 7,
the utility clones a partition at a time. Each operation is for a
"drive", but a "drive" is their name for "partition".

When the new OS starts up, it will consider itself to be on the
one and only "Local Disk C:" partition, and it will assume that
the other partition is called "Local Disk D:", and all will function
as before. Only one of the copies need include the Master
Boot Record, of course, because that pertains to the entire
hard drive. Be sure that the OS is put in a "primary" partition,
and if it is to be self-loadable (i.e. contain boot.ini, ntldr, and
ntdetect.com), it should also be marked "active". The D:
partition (assuming that it's only data) can be put into either
a "primary" partition or an "extended" partition, it needn't
be marked "active" (even if it's in a primary partition), and no
MBR need be copied to the new hard drive for it, but it won't
hurt.

Be sure not to start up the new OS for the 1st time until you've
removed the old OS from its view (e.g. by disconnecting the old
HD), or the new OS will become permanently dependent on
the continued presence of the old OS. After the 1st startup,
it's OK if the old OS is present and visible to the new OS.
(This all assumes an OS in the WinNT/2K/XP family). It will
refer to the old partitions by names other than C: and D:, but
you will be able to drag 'n drop files between all the partitions
on the two hard drives.

*TimDaniels*
 
Thanks Peter & Tim for your replies.

Tim, when you say:
Be sure not to start up the new OS for the 1st time until you've
removed the old OS from its view (e.g. by disconnecting the old
HD),..
Click to expand...

if I wanted to test the disk copy result, would it be sufficient to
simply change the BIOS order precedence for the hard disks?

Since I've marked the X: drive (clone of the original C: drive) as an
active primary partition, and it's contains the MBR and other files
you mentioned, I'm wondering if making it first in boot line order
would effectively hide the old OS from view.

Am I dreaming?

Thanks again
 
You could fire up the old OS (on the old HD) to look at the
files in the new clone, and that shouldn't (I think) cause any
problems with the new clone because the new clone would
not be running as an OS, and all the partitions in the system,
not just those on the HD that contains the OS, would be
visible to the running OS.

But if you start up the clone (perhaps by just reversing the boot
order in the BIOS) with the old HD containing the partition with
the original OS still connected, the new clone will see its "parent"
and it will entangle itself with files in its "parent".

The most straight-forward way to avoid this is to disconnect
either the data or the power cable (or both) from the old HD
before booting the new HD, and with the old HD absent, the
new HD will be at the head of the boot order and it will boot,
even if it's jumpered as "Slave". (If you have a PCI card
IDE controller, though, check the BIOS to see that the boot
order hasn't changed such that it puts the card ahead of the
hard drive.)

Partition Magic has a "hide" function that makes a partition
invisible, but I haven't tested it for this purpose. One problem
with using PM is that another OS (in which PM is installed)
must be running in order to do this. If you have a 3rd OS to
use for this, fine, but most people don't have a 3rd OS installed
that they could use.

*TimDaniels*

"Kelleher" wondered:
 
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