I need to install a new ard drive and migrate my XP
installation over from my old drive to the new one.
Can anyone advise on the best way to this without having
to re-install XP and all the software from scratch.
Use an "imaging" utility such as Norton Ghost, PowerQuest
Drive Image, Acronis True Image, Future Systems Solutions
Casper XP, TeraByteUnlimited BootIt NG, R-Studio R-Drive
Image, etc., to copy the byte-for-byte image of the old HD to
the new HD. Set the new partition to be "active" before the
copy so that it will be bootable, and make the new HD the
only electrically connected HD in the system before you boot
it up for the 1st time. Thereafter, you can re-connect the new
and old HDs wherever you want, making sure that the new HD
is at the head of the HD boot sequence in the BIOS. If they are
on the same channel, either can be the Master, the other the
Slave. If they are on separate IDE channels (a tiny bit faster
for file transfers), each can be jumpered as either Master or
Slave if they are the only devices on their respective channels,
i.e. even both can be Slave - it doesn't matter.
If, perchance, one XP OS is allowed to see the other HD
as containing a bootable XP OS, the XP boot loader may get
involved and thereafter give you an option of which XP OS to
boot up. You may rename one of the OSes in the C:\boot.ini file
so as to distinguish them, or you can comment out the 2nd OS
listed there by putting "[]" around its name, and use the BIOS
boot sequence to select which HD boots up. Of course, if you
want just one working copy of the XP OS, you can reformat the
other HD and use it for file storage.
*TImDaniels*