Copying hard disk then booting it in USB case

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I am attempting to backup a Win XP system by copying the entire disk, as an
image, to another disk which is enclosed in an external USB Case.

The theory is, I can then boot the USB disk as an emergency recovery option.

I have successfully made the image but when I attempt to boot the USB disk
(as opposed to the SATA internal disk), windows gets so far then 'aborts' to
protect my data.

I tried disabling the SATA interface so that the only disk which was enabled
on the system was the USB disk, but still no joy.

Can someone help me to make my USB case bootable? Is this even possible?

Maybe I would need to install GRUB and 'swap' the drives prior to booting.
Is that a sensible option? Is there a Microsoft way of achieving this, maybe
via the ntloader ini file (whose name I cannot recall at this point).

I would rather not be in the situation where I have to physically swap the
drives to boot from my 'recovery disk'.

Any assistance would be much appreciated.
 
Lyall Pearce said:
I am attempting to backup a Win XP system by copying the entire disk, as
an
image, to another disk which is enclosed in an external USB Case.

The theory is, I can then boot the USB disk as an emergency recovery
option.

I have successfully made the image but when I attempt to boot the USB disk
(as opposed to the SATA internal disk), windows gets so far then 'aborts'
to
protect my data.
Click to expand...

have a look here:
http://www.ngine.de/index.jsp?pageid=4176
 
Thank you for your prompt reply.

Whilst the referenced page is quite useful, it is not quite what I am
looking for.

I have an existing windows system.
I have cloned the disk onto the USB disk
I would 'like' to be able to boot the USB disk, as opposed to replacing the
physical disk in the computer, with the cloned drive.

Any further suggestions?
 
Thank you for your prompt reply.

Whilst the referenced page is quite useful, it is not quite what I am
looking for.

I have an existing windows system.
I have cloned the disk onto the USB disk
I would 'like' to be able to boot the USB disk, as opposed to replacing the
physical disk in the computer, with the cloned drive.

Any further suggestions?

--
...Lyall






- Show quoted text -
Click to expand...

You need to know if your computer's BIOS (on the motherboard) allow
for the system to boot USB devices first.
 
As stated in my original post, Windows gets so far into the boot and then
aborts.
So, yes, the BIOS does support booting from USB.
 
Lyall Pearce said:
I am attempting to backup a Win XP system by copying the entire disk, as an
image, to another disk which is enclosed in an external USB Case.

The theory is, I can then boot the USB disk as an emergency recovery option.

I have successfully made the image but when I attempt to boot the USB disk
(as opposed to the SATA internal disk), windows gets so far then 'aborts' to
protect my data.

I tried disabling the SATA interface so that the only disk which was enabled
on the system was the USB disk, but still no joy.

Can someone help me to make my USB case bootable? Is this even possible?

Maybe I would need to install GRUB and 'swap' the drives prior to booting.
Is that a sensible option? Is there a Microsoft way of achieving this, maybe
via the ntloader ini file (whose name I cannot recall at this point).

I would rather not be in the situation where I have to physically swap the
drives to boot from my 'recovery disk'.

Any assistance would be much appreciated.
Click to expand...
Good for You!
I am trying to do the Same exact thing with the Same exact results -
Unfortunately!
And my bios too supports boot up from Usb Drive.
I am sad that no one has an answer to your Post ! To Hard???
Maybe Unsolveable??? Hmm?
SomeOne somewhere Email me the answer to the unsolveable-
-Please Post what actually does work not what supposed to? I dont know.
 
I did, at the time, find something, somewhere that talked about some tweaks
to the copied system so that windows could boot from USB. (Windows, for some
reason, was never configured to be able to boot from USB, even though it can)

This was all too hard so I simply went and bought a Disk Caddy and put the
cloned disk into a Caddy holder and the original disk in another holder.

I now turn off the computer, pull out one disk holder, put the other disk
holder in and boot up.

So, I achieved what I was trying to do, boot the backup, just not quite in
the way I was envisaging.
 
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