Second Hard Drive in XP Home

  • Thread starter Thread starter Shooter
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S

Shooter

Hi,

I'd be grateful for some advice. I have a computer with some programs /
data on it that are commercially critical - and I'm very reluctant to fiddle
with it. I worry about having a bullet-proof back-up in place though.

At present I use Drive Image 7 to create image files of the entire C drive
across my network to another computer. The problem is, I've heard Drive
Image is buggy, and I'd really like to test whether it would actually work
if my disk crashed.

So I'm considering installing a second hard drive on the machine, creating
the image on that, and then seeing if the machine boots o.k. from the new
drive.

What I really need information on, is how XP behaves regarding boot drives.
For example, if I install the second drive as the slave, how can I force XP
to boot from it. If I simply remove the power cable from the original
drive, is XP likely to figure it out and use the second?

I've fiddled with BIOS settings in the past, but on non-critical computers -
I can't afford to have this particular computer down for more than an hour,
and messing it up completely would put me out of house and home! - so I'm
reluctant to tinker too much!

Many thanks in anticipation.
 
Shooter said:
Hi,

I'd be grateful for some advice. I have a computer with some
programs / data on it that are commercially critical - and I'm very
reluctant to fiddle with it. I worry about having a bullet-proof
back-up in place though.

At present I use Drive Image 7 to create image files of the entire C
drive across my network to another computer. The problem is, I've
heard Drive Image is buggy, and I'd really like to test whether it
would actually work if my disk crashed.

So I'm considering installing a second hard drive on the machine,
creating the image on that, and then seeing if the machine boots o.k.
from the new drive.

What I really need information on, is how XP behaves regarding boot
drives. For example, if I install the second drive as the slave, how
can I force XP to boot from it. If I simply remove the power cable
from the original drive, is XP likely to figure it out and use the
second?

I've fiddled with BIOS settings in the past, but on non-critical
computers - I can't afford to have this particular computer down for
more than an hour, and messing it up completely would put me out of
house and home! - so I'm reluctant to tinker too much!

Many thanks in anticipation.
Click to expand...

I should seriously think about who you listen to in future - DI is *NOT*
buggy (and, if you heard that, why did you buy it?!) I've been using it for
years - the only time I've ever had a problem it was due to a failing drive,
not anything to do with DI.

If you really want to screw things up - try using Ghost.
 
Drive Image 7.0 is fine.
Image your OS over to the 2nd. drive, swap the cables (always make sure your
pri drive is on the end connector) & set both drives to Active with
Partition Magic.

In BIOS, let it do an auto-find, then go to General settings and set both
drives to auto-detect.

If you want to be able to dual-boot, change your boot.ini file -
Right click My Computer/Properties/Advanced tab/Start up & recovery
button/Settings/Edit
This should open boot.ini in Notepad.
Save the original settings somewhere as a backup, then edit it to (XP
Professional is an example, you will have to edit accordingly if you're
using Home, using your original as a guide) -

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP
Professional" /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP
Professional (#1)" /fastdetect
 
Hi,

Haven't really heard much of any problems from users of Drive Image, though
I don't use it myself.

To test Drive Image, and to make the results realistic, replace the existing
hard drive with the spare, then restore one of the backup images to it.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Windows
Windows isn't rocket science! That's my other hobby!

Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone
 
Cerridwen,

You wrote:

<< I should seriously think about who you listen to in future - DI is *NOT*
buggy (and, if you heard that, why did you buy it?!) >>

Many thanks for the useful advice provided below - but I can't see how your
rant about Drive Image is helpful! It's 'bugginess' is well documented, and
the support page for it at Symantec lists *hundreds* of potential error
messages.

Anyone who knows a diddly-squat about software knows that some users can
have a wonderful experience with a particular app., but this is of little
comfort to those users who, because of different system set-ups, have
profound problems.

What I am doing is anticipating a potential problem.

Why did I buy it? Because it came recommended - it was only when I tried to
set the damn thing up across the network, realised that the documentation is
very poor, and then heard about the bugs that I started to question my
choice :)

Good Luck
 
Thanks Rick,

That's probably the easiest solution - I'll try it.

By the way, I had a quick look at my BIOS, and it doesn't appear to look
well set up in any case: the boot order is listed:

CDROM
HDD-0
CDROM

and that's it! No mention of a floppy. I'm tempted to make this a bit more
standard in any case.

If I were to install a slave harddrive, and put HDD-1 in the above boot
list, would the computer boot successfully from it if the power supply from
HDD-0 was unplugged?

Many thanks
 
I'll clarify my previous post.
Both Drive Image 7 and Drive Image 2002 are included with the packaged
version of Drive Image 7, Drive Image 2002 is designed for XP.
 
Hi Johnf - thanks for your suggestions about dual booting etc. - really
useful.

BTW, according to the Symantec / PowerQuest site, DI 7 is intended for XP,
DI 2002 is for ME, 98 and earlier.

Cheers

And thanks again
 
Cerridwen,

I forgot to mention that immediately after installing Drive Image, it caused
'Not enough server storage' errors on other computers on the network.

This is now accepted as being a common issue with this software. It had
changed the IRPstacksize for some reason.

There was no mention, download, or fix on the DI support site to help me
with this.

I'm not a computer expert, but I eventually solved it with a lot of
research, and then by editing the registry and changing the IRPstacksize to
15 on all the XP computers that could no longer be accessed.

So perhaps my lack of confidence in the software is not entirely unjustified
:)

Good Luck
 
Shooter said:
Cerridwen,

You wrote:

<< I should seriously think about who you listen to in future - DI is
*NOT* buggy (and, if you heard that, why did you buy it?!) >>

Many thanks for the useful advice provided below - but I can't see
how your rant about Drive Image is helpful! It's 'bugginess' is well
documented, and the support page for it at Symantec lists *hundreds*
of potential error messages.

Anyone who knows a diddly-squat about software knows that some users
can have a wonderful experience with a particular app., but this is
of little comfort to those users who, because of different system
set-ups, have profound problems.

What I am doing is anticipating a potential problem.

Why did I buy it? Because it came recommended - it was only when I
tried to set the damn thing up across the network, realised that the
documentation is very poor, and then heard about the bugs that I
started to question my choice :)

Good Luck
Click to expand...
Erm, I wasn't ranting - if anyone was, then you were. I don't call a 100+
page online manual "scant documentation". IME, the people who dismiss
something as 'buggy' are those who cannot be bothered to spend the time
learning how to use it. I think you must be confusing it with Ghost - there
are no known issues with DI - Ghost, OTOH, well it's Norton, need I say
more?!

So, let me get this straight - you consider every error a 'bug'?! I suggest
you learn the meaning of the term. Issues that are thrown up by various
hardware combinations, aren't 'bugs' - neither is it a 'bug' if the user has
failed to prep the destination drive, or set up the network drive correctly.
It works flawlessly for me because I took the time to make sure that the
setup was correct and that the drive and network was prepped correctly. You,
obviously, did not and therefore must expect problems.

This appears to be a definite chair/keyboard interface error. Solution?
Replace user.
 
Shooter, I have been using Drive Image for years and have the current
DI7/2002 version. I use Drive Image 2002 to image my XP disk and have
restored from it many times, it works great. I don't do it over a network
but just image to my slave drive.
 
johnf said:
I'll clarify my previous post.
Both Drive Image 7 and Drive Image 2002 are included with the packaged
version of Drive Image 7, Drive Image 2002 is designed for XP.
Click to expand...

Another idiot who can't even read a box. 2002 is designed for 9x/NT. DI 7 is
designed for 2000/XP.
 
That may be what the box says but the tech's at Powerquest suggested using
DI 2002 instead of DI 7 with XP because of some limitation that I discovered
with DI 7 and it works just fine.
 
Hi,
If I were to install a slave harddrive, and put HDD-1 in the above boot
list, would the computer boot successfully from it if the power supply
from
HDD-0 was unplugged?
Click to expand...

Yes, it should.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Windows
Windows isn't rocket science! That's my other hobby!

Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone
 
I'd better correct my earlier post, it contains an error:

Installation of Drive Image 7 caused an error due to a change in the
IRPStacksize - but this *only* occurs on the computer on which DI7 is
installed. Checking my notes I was incorrect to state that the IRPStacksize
had to be altered in the registry on other computers on the network. On XP,
changing the value to 15 did the trick.

If you've searched for this solution, my apologies. Do a search around:
Drive Image 7, IRPstacksize, and (maybe) your particular "error message",
and an up to date solution should show up - perhaps even my original post
(somewhere) which was a bit more accurate and had some MS links.

Cheers
 
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