Backup strategy for a system which may need a hard drive replacement

[George Saridakis]

Hi Folks,



I have a laptop with a single hard drive which may be going south and want
to devise a backup and restore strategy that will minimize fix time.



If I look at my hard drive folders, I have the following:

1.. Dell
2.. Documents and Settings
3.. Program Files
4.. Windows


If I backup 2 & 3, and get a replacement disk which is not identical to the
current hard drive, can I restore 2 & 3 and expect them to work as before
the hard drive replacement?



What happens to the old system state with the new hard drive?



thanks

George

 

[WTC]

Hi Folks,



I have a laptop with a single hard drive which may be going south and want
to devise a backup and restore strategy that will minimize fix time.



If I look at my hard drive folders, I have the following:

1.. Dell
2.. Documents and Settings
3.. Program Files
4.. Windows


If I backup 2 & 3, and get a replacement disk which is not identical to
the current hard drive, can I restore 2 & 3 and expect them to work as
before the hard drive replacement?

No there are many files from 2 & 3 that are tied into 4. Use some imaging
software to create a image of your drive then when you replace the drive you
can restore the image.

What happens to the old system state with the new hard drive?

A new hard drive device will be found.

 

[Guest]

Since you have a laptop, you should consider that your options for a
replacement hard drive may be restriceted to a manufacturer only [OEM]
solution: not definite but a definite maybe.

To backup and restore, you will need an external hard drive.

Given this to be the case, then buy a Maxtor or Seagate device as you will
have disk copying applications on an accompanying CD. At the same time find
out what specifications for the laptop HDD and buy a new one of the EXACT
SAME SPECIFCATIONS - if you need some extra disk space for movie files or
MP3s, use the external drive: it will be cheaper in the long run.

The Sofwtare will also enable you to initialise the drive, format and
partition.

Use the tools CD to clone the Laptop drive to the USB drive.

Then swap out the Internal HDD for the new one and clone back from the
external USB Drive. Given that the two internal drives are same make, model,
capacity etc. Windows should reboot without problem.

 

[WTC]

Since you have a laptop, you should consider that your options for a
replacement hard drive may be restriceted to a manufacturer only [OEM]
solution: not definite but a definite maybe.

To backup and restore, you will need an external hard drive.

Given this to be the case, then buy a Maxtor or Seagate device as you will
have disk copying applications on an accompanying CD. At the same time
find
out what specifications for the laptop HDD and buy a new one of the EXACT
SAME SPECIFCATIONS - if you need some extra disk space for movie files or
MP3s, use the external drive: it will be cheaper in the long run.

You don't need exact specifications. The new hard drive can be any size. As
long as the BIOS recognizes it.

 

[George Saridakis]

Hi William,

I have Retrospect 6.5 and tried to use a disaster recovery bootable disk
several weeks ago. The bootable disk would not run completely (quick
disappearing blue screen made it impossible to capture any error message).

I wiped the disk and reinstalled XP and all my applications and used
Retrospect to recover my files and application data. I suspect I had disk
problems since I had not run chkdsk before creating the disaster recovery
boot disk.

I could try running chkdsk with error fixing before I create another
disaster recovery disk, but I was also trying to identify a plan B in case
this happens again as it took me 5 days to install and download patches and
updates to all the applications I run.

thoughts?

George

 

[George Saridakis]

Hi BAR,

I have a replacement warranty on the machine, so I suspect they might find a
disk of an alternative mfg.

I purchased an external DVD burner that uses a Firewire connection to the
laptop and I use that device and Retrospect 6.5 to do backups. My
subsequent message responding to William details how the Retrospect Disaster
Recovery approach failed and I am looking for an alternative plan B.

thanks

George

Since you have a laptop, you should consider that your options for a
replacement hard drive may be restriceted to a manufacturer only [OEM]
solution: not definite but a definite maybe.

To backup and restore, you will need an external hard drive.

Given this to be the case, then buy a Maxtor or Seagate device as you will
have disk copying applications on an accompanying CD. At the same time
find
out what specifications for the laptop HDD and buy a new one of the EXACT
SAME SPECIFCATIONS - if you need some extra disk space for movie files or
MP3s, use the external drive: it will be cheaper in the long run.

The Sofwtare will also enable you to initialise the drive, format and
partition.

Use the tools CD to clone the Laptop drive to the USB drive.

Then swap out the Internal HDD for the new one and clone back from the
external USB Drive. Given that the two internal drives are same make,
model,
capacity etc. Windows should reboot without problem.

No there are many files from 2 & 3 that are tied into 4. Use some imaging
software to create a image of your drive then when you replace the drive
you
can restore the image.


A new hard drive device will be found.

 

[WTC]

Hi William,

I have Retrospect 6.5 and tried to use a disaster recovery bootable disk
several weeks ago. The bootable disk would not run completely (quick
disappearing blue screen made it impossible to capture any error message).

I wiped the disk and reinstalled XP and all my applications and used
Retrospect to recover my files and application data. I suspect I had disk
problems since I had not run chkdsk before creating the disaster recovery
boot disk.

I could try running chkdsk with error fixing before I create another
disaster recovery disk, but I was also trying to identify a plan B in case
this happens again as it took me 5 days to install and download patches
and updates to all the applications I run.

thoughts?

George

Look in your even viewer for errors.

start>run and type

eventvwr

also disable Automatic Restart by

start>run and type

sysdm.cpl

go to Advance>Startup and Recovery Settings>uncheck "Automatic Restart".

When the next time an error occurs, write down the message and post a new
post with you error.

 

[C.Joseph Drayton]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Laptop hard disks have been standardized for more than 8 years. So
long as the height is correct you can use any manufacturers drive.
The only thing that you would THEORETICALLY need to worry about is
if you are going to a faster drive. The faster drive may cause and
overheating problem. I have yet to run into such a problem, but it
is theoretically possible.

Ciao . . . C.Joseph

That which a man buys too cheaply . . .
He esteems too lightly

Since you have a laptop, you should consider that your options for a
replacement hard drive may be restriceted to a manufacturer only [OEM]
solution: not definite but a definite maybe.

To backup and restore, you will need an external hard drive.

Given this to be the case, then buy a Maxtor or Seagate device as you will
have disk copying applications on an accompanying CD. At the same time find
out what specifications for the laptop HDD and buy a new one of the EXACT
SAME SPECIFCATIONS - if you need some extra disk space for movie files or
MP3s, use the external drive: it will be cheaper in the long run.

The Sofwtare will also enable you to initialise the drive, format and
partition.

Use the tools CD to clone the Laptop drive to the USB drive.

Then swap out the Internal HDD for the new one and clone back from the
external USB Drive. Given that the two internal drives are same make, model,
capacity etc. Windows should reboot without problem.




:

No there are many files from 2 & 3 that are tied into 4. Use some imaging
software to create a image of your drive then when you replace the drive you
can restore the image.



A new hard drive device will be found.

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