Newbie: Copying/cloning hard drive

  • Thread starter Thread starter Pavel
  • Start date Start date
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Pavel

I would like to buy another larger hard drive that is of a different
make than the one I have now, but I would like to transfer everything
including the OS (XP) onto the hard drive. Can this be done or do I
have to start from scratch?
 
Previously Pavel said:
I would like to buy another larger hard drive that is of a different
make than the one I have now, but I would like to transfer everything
including the OS (XP) onto the hard drive. Can this be done or do I
have to start from scratch?
Click to expand...

Can be done. Needs commercial tools (e.g. Northon Ghost) or
Linux skills. There was also a discussion here about using the
free (?) xxcopy tool some time ago.

Arno
 
Arno Wagner said:
Can be done. Needs commercial tools (e.g. Northon Ghost) or
Linux skills. There was also a discussion here about using the
free (?) xxcopy tool some time ago.
Click to expand...
Clueless troll. You can "dd" clone a disk under Win NT+ for free.
 
:
: Can be done. Needs commercial tools (e.g. Northon Ghost) or
: Linux skills. There was also a discussion here about using the
: free (?) xxcopy tool some time ago.

I just read up on xxcopy. I am not comfortable recreating a MBR as I
will be running XP and Windows ME.
Any particular version ghost meets my requirements?
 
Pavel said:
I just read up on xxcopy. I am not comfortable
recreating a MBR as I will be running XP and
Windows ME. Any particular version ghost
meets my requirements?
Click to expand...

I doubt that you'd have to "recreate" an MBR
with xxCopy, but rather just copy the one on the
hard drive that you have now.

Any recent version of Ghost could do the job,
but Ghost 9.0 (derived from PowerQuest's
Drive Image 7.0 due to a buyout by Symantec)
was developed by PowerQuest for WinXP
compatibility. Just do a "drive copy" to the new
hard drive, designating that the copy go to a
primary partition, that it be marked "active",
and that the MBR be copied over to the new
hard drive as well. The easiest procedure
involves jumpering the old hard drive as Master
(or the equivalent using Cable Select) and the
new hard drive as Slave (or vice versa). After
the copy, remove the old hard drive and put the
new hard drive in the position that the old hard
drive had. Then boot the new hard drive up
(for its first time) with the old hard drive invisible
to it. THEN (and only then *), you can connect in
the old hard drive and do with it as you wish. It
will be seen by the operating system as just
another partition (or partitions) having drive
letter(s) other than C:, and you can drag 'n drop
files to and from it, using it as an archive medium,
or you can dual boot between the two operating
systems (i.e. the "old" one and the "new" one)
using either WinXP's multi-boot manager or
the boot sequence in the BIOS, keeping the
old hard drive as a backup in case the new
hard drive fails.

*This important procedure step was first
mentioned here by a contributor and mentor
fondly remembered by us all as Rod Speed.
<cough> (He now goes by his other names.)

*TimDaniels*
 
Pavel said:
I just read up on xxcopy. I am not comfortable
recreating a MBR as I will be running XP and
Windows ME.
Click to expand...


BTW, Pavel, read about xxClone, which is a
simplified xxCopy, designed for use in cloning
hard drives. See www.xxClone.com . It was
written by the same author as xxCopy, and it's
free for download if you sign up as a beta tester.
It has been in the beta testing stage for about 2
years, now, and the bugs are only in the far reaches
of the functional envelope.

*TimDaniels*
 
I would like to buy another larger hard drive that is of a different
make than the one I have now, but I would like to transfer everything
including the OS (XP) onto the hard drive. Can this be done or do I
have to start from scratch?
Click to expand...

TrueImage 8 from www.acronis.com will do this. It's about $50, and
they have a demo version available. It's more user-friendly than
Ghost, IMO, and is a fine backup package as well.
 
just used xxclone tonight and all I can say is " W O W " --- I love it.
I cant believe the simplicity of this program. Literally, click click
double click click and done.

Get on this program asap if you need to do some cloning - I can't
imagine it will stay free.

It copies EVERYTHING - yes the MBR too. It really did just clone and
boot. I am running xp, and even tho it says I didnt "have" to unplug
the original drive, I still did, just in case. After the clone I
shutdown, unplugged orginal drive c, set the destination drive as
master, booted up - wala - perfect.

big thumbs up for thoroughness and extreme simplicity for this program
- btw did I mention I cloned 18.8 GB of data and was done under 30
minutes?! :)
 
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