Ghosting Notebook Drives with Desktop System

[Steve]

Tried ghosting an XP notebook drive to a larger notebook drive. Used
my desktop system to do it. Used IDE adapter cables and connected
source drive to Primary Ide controller and new drive to secondary
controller. Ghosting went well. Took new drive and placed it into the
notebook. Got NTLDR error messages. Could see files on drive when I
booted from XP Installation CD in recovery mode. Ran fixmbr and
fixboot to no avail from recovery console.

What went wrong. Used Ghost 7.5. Is is a geometry problem. Maybe I
should have noted the hard drive parameters of the original drive
while in the notebook via cmos setup and plugged those into my
desktop's setting for that drive prior to cloning ? Any ideas on how
to do this WINXP notebook cloning thing ?

Thanks in advance

 

[Rod Speed]

Tried ghosting an XP notebook drive to a larger notebook
drive. Used my desktop system to do it. Used IDE adapter
cables and connected source drive to Primary Ide controller
and new drive to secondary controller. Ghosting went well.

Should be fine, plenty do it that way successfully.

Took new drive and placed it into the
notebook. Got NTLDR error messages.

What did you do about booting the desktop system after
the clone had been done ? Its crucial to not let XP see
both the original and the clone on the first boot after the
clone has been done, otherwise it will produces a rather
mangled boot config that uses files on both drives and
that wont continue to work once you try booting off
just the clone with the original no longer visible.

Safest to do the clone from a dos floppy so you
can be sure that it wont boot until you have unplugged
the clone and will only boot off the clone in the laptop.

Could see files on drive when I booted from
XP Installation CD in recovery mode. Ran fixmbr
and fixboot to no avail from recovery console.

You should be able to fix it by repairing the installation.

What went wrong. Used Ghost 7.5.

Most likely the above. Just do it again correctly.

Is is a geometry problem.

Thats possible.

What did you actually clone ? You should have
cloned the physical drive, not just a partition.

Its also possible that the hard drive controller is
different enough in the laptop that the wrong driver
is being used and thats what stuffs the boot.

Maybe I should have noted the hard drive parameters of the
original drive while in the notebook via cmos setup and plugged
those into my desktop's setting for that drive prior to cloning ?

Its generally best to use an AUTO drive type setting
all the time, but that isnt always possible with laptops,
particularly if they are a bit long in the tooth.

Any ideas on how to do this WINXP notebook cloning thing ?

Do it like I listed, and if that doesnt work, repair the
installation in the laptop after booting from the XP CD.

That last should fix a driver problem if thats the problem.

 

[Steve]

You know... come to think of it... I believe I did test it in the
desktop system but can't recall if the source drive was still
connected when I did so. If the source wasn't in the desktop and I
didn't blow it there.... would having started the cloned drive in the
desktop after ghosting been a problem being that it was intended to
land up in the notebook ?

Also, being that I ran FIXMBR and FIXBOOT, what else should I try
doing from the XP installation CD ?

Thanks for your comments and any followup you can offer.

 

[Steve]

Its also possible that the hard drive controller is
different enough in the laptop that the wrong driver
is being used and thats what stuffs the boot.

Don't understand about the driver being wrong. If I used a DOS
diskette and by the nature of GHOST, would drivers actually matter.
Obviously no software driver (albeit windows drivers) were used during
the ghosting procedure ?

 

[Peter]

Steve,
If you put original drive back to your laptop, does it boot properly?

I would recommend safer ghosting procedure. Use network between your laptop
and desktop systems.
Create share on your desktop. Boot laptop with a "mapped drive boot disk"
from Ghost wizard. Dump laptop original disk image to your share (use
compression to conserve share space). Remove original disk from laptop. Put
new disk in your laptop. Boot laptop with a "mapped drive boot disk" from
Ghost wizard. Load laptop original disk image from your share. You can
readjust partitions at this time.
No need to mess up with your desktop drives, controllers, connectors, etc.
Just need enough disk space.

 

[Rod Speed]

Don't understand about the driver being wrong. If I used a DOS
diskette and by the nature of GHOST, would drivers actually matter.

Yes. I was talking about the drivers that XP itself uses
when attempting to boot off the laptop drive in the laptop.

Its those that are being used to boot XP and if there
is a problem with them and the chipset of the laptop,
because the drivers that are suitable for the desktop
chipset arent for the laptop chipset, you may have
a problem seeing the data on the laptop drive in the
laptop in the later part of the boot phase.

Obviously no software driver (albeit windows drivers)
were used during the ghosting procedure ?

True. But they are when you are attempting to
boot XP in the laptop. Thats the operation that fails.

 

[Rod Speed]

You know... come to think of it... I believe I did test it in the
desktop system but can't recall if the source drive was still
connected when I did so. If the source wasn't in the desktop
and I didn't blow it there.... would having started the cloned
drive in the desktop after ghosting been a problem being
that it was intended to land up in the notebook ?

Nope, that approach is fine. The important thing is that
BOTH the original and the clone cant be visible to XP
on the first boot after the clone has been made. You're
welcome to boot with either drive visible alone to XP.

Also, being that I ran FIXMBR and FIXBOOT, what
else should I try doing from the XP installation CD ?

Boot the XP CD and use the repair option that shows up early.

That does a lot more than fixmbr and fixboot, it effectively
does a reinstall but preserves the various settings etc.
If the problem is that the desktop drivers for the hard drive
subsystem arent suitable for the laptop, that will replace
them with drivers suitable for the chipset in the laptop.

 

[Steve]

Thank you all for taking the time to help me with my problems ! All
your comments are appreciated and I've learned some valuable tips !