Cloning a drive to upgrade a hard disc

[Licensed to Quill]

I am having no luck getting anyone to tell me how to upgrade a hard drive on
a Portege from 12 gig to 30

Can I install the empty 30 gig drive into the portege, use the recovery disc
to install the OS, connect it to the Internet update the OS. Then put that
drive in another computer, put the 12 gig back into the Portege and copy all
files to the other computer?

Presumably all OS files which arent copyable because they are in use will
not be copied but all software, dat files, dll files WILL be copied and the
udated versions of all files will be on the 30 gig drive in any event? Is
this too easy or will I find that this doesnt work because the 12 gig
drive's registry wont end up on the 30 gig drive? Is there a way around this
given that I do emphatically NOT want to merely reinstall all the software
and do three years worth of forgotten configuration changes all over again
on the new drive?

Symantec says that there is no way of using Ghost unless I have enough empty
space on the computer to write a .gho file and then copy it somehow directly
or indirectly onto the new drive: which I cant because the whole reason I am
doing this exercise is because the old 12 gig drive is full. (or should I
copy lots of software, my documents and picture-file directories onto a DVD
until there is enouigh space on the and then Ghost the rest onto the drive
prior to copying it to another DVD, then try to restore most of the OS from
that gho file onto the 30 gig drive?

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

I am having no luck getting anyone to tell me how to upgrade a hard drive on
a Portege from 12 gig to 30

Can I install the empty 30 gig drive into the portege, use the recovery disc
to install the OS, connect it to the Internet update the OS. Then put that
drive in another computer, put the 12 gig back into the Portege and copy all
files to the other computer?

Presumably all OS files which arent copyable because they are in use will
not be copied but all software, dat files, dll files WILL be copied and the
udated versions of all files will be on the 30 gig drive in any event? Is
this too easy or will I find that this doesnt work because the 12 gig
drive's registry wont end up on the 30 gig drive? Is there a way around this
given that I do emphatically NOT want to merely reinstall all the software
and do three years worth of forgotten configuration changes all over again
on the new drive?

Symantec says that there is no way of using Ghost unless I have enough empty
space on the computer to write a .gho file and then copy it somehow directly
or indirectly onto the new drive: which I cant because the whole reason I am
doing this exercise is because the old 12 gig drive is full. (or should I
copy lots of software, my documents and picture-file directories onto a DVD
until there is enouigh space on the and then Ghost the rest onto the drive
prior to copying it to another DVD, then try to restore most of the OS from
that gho file onto the 30 gig drive?

There are several ways to do this. Here are two of them:

a) Using an imaging tool:
- Split your hard disk with a partitioning program (e.g. Acronis).
- Create an image file of your system partition. Store it on drive D:.
- Save the image file on some networked PC.
- Install the new disk.
- Split it.
- Use the recovery CD to load the OS.
- Copy the image from the networked PC to drive D:.
- Restore the image with your partitioning program.

b) Using a desktop PC:
- Buy a $10.00 adapter that lets you connect your laptop
disk to a desktop PC.
- Connect the laptop disk to a desktop PC as a slave disk.
Ideally, the desktop PC should run Win2000/XP.
- Use xcopy.exe with the appropriate switches to copy
the old laptop disk to the desktop disk.
- Use xcopy.exe with the appropriate switches to load
the new laptop disk.
- Install the new disk in the laptop.
- Boot the laptop with your Win2000 CD into the Recovery Console
and use the fixmbr and fixboot commands to make Win2000
bootable.

 

[Licensed to Quill]

Hi Pegasus

Are there any other ways of doing this? I said that I couldnt do the first
because the drive on the first disc is full and I did try the second with
curious results which I am not keen to replicate and which no one could
explain

I put the two drives in a 733MHz Pentium 111 desktop computer (not some old
steamer with LBA problems) and booted off a DOS diskette (I also tried to
get the system to see both discs by booting off a Partition Commander floppy
and copy an entire drive that way)

The desktop saw the 12 gig drive without a problem but wouldn't see the 30
gig one at all, whatever I did in the BIOS. In fact it couldnt even identify
the drive manufacturer. I then found that putting the laptop drive into the
desktop had destroyed the 30 gig drive. I then had to replace it and it did
the same thing again with the new drive.

Neither drive was ever seen or even identified by any computer after
insertion in the desktop. (I still have the adapters which didnt cost much)
I am not keen on trying that expensive (if quick) course again. No one has
the slightest idea what could possibly have happened beyond weakly
suggesting that I might have put the laptop drives in upside down which I
didnt.

Which is why I was asking the question here

 

[Jetro]

You can make 12 GB image using desktop, then restore the image onto 30 GB
laptop disk using Ghost over TCP/IP network. The same is true for Acronis
and other products.

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

Hi Pegasus

Are there any other ways of doing this? I said that I couldnt do the first
because the drive on the first disc is full and I did try the second with
curious results which I am not keen to replicate and which no one could
explain

I put the two drives in a 733MHz Pentium 111 desktop computer (not some old
steamer with LBA problems) and booted off a DOS diskette (I also tried to
get the system to see both discs by booting off a Partition Commander floppy
and copy an entire drive that way)

The desktop saw the 12 gig drive without a problem but wouldn't see the 30
gig one at all, whatever I did in the BIOS. In fact it couldnt even identify
the drive manufacturer. I then found that putting the laptop drive into the
desktop had destroyed the 30 gig drive. I then had to replace it and it did
the same thing again with the new drive.

Neither drive was ever seen or even identified by any computer after
insertion in the desktop. (I still have the adapters which didnt cost much)
I am not keen on trying that expensive (if quick) course again. No one has
the slightest idea what could possibly have happened beyond weakly
suggesting that I might have put the laptop drives in upside down which I
didnt.

Which is why I was asking the question here

It is very easy to destroy a laptop disk when using the adapter
I mentioned, by plugging in the cable back to front. This has the
effect of applying the power supply wires to the wrong pins, with
disastrous results.

There are indeed other ways to clone a laptop disk to a new
disk. The are safer but more laborious or more expensive.
Here are a few more:

a) Ask your friendly computer dealer to do it for you (if you
can trust him!).
b) Boot the machine with a Acronis recovery CD, then create
an image on a networked PC.
c) Boot the laptop with a Bart PE CD (www.bootdisk.com),
then establish a network connection to some other PC
and zip up drive C: to that other PC. To make a Bart PE
CD, you need a CD burner and a load of a WinXP Professional
CD (but no licence number!).
d) Boot the laptop with a network boot disk (www.bootdisk.com),
then use DriveImage or a similar product to create an image on
a networked PC.

Methods b) to d) all have their traps - they may or may not work
with your laptop, depending on the network adapter you use.
They also involve a fair amount of work. This is why it is important
to manage disk space carefully so that never paint yourself into
a corner.

 

[Licensed to Quill]

You can make 12 GB image using desktop, then restore the image onto 30 GB
laptop disk using Ghost over TCP/IP network. The same is true for Acronis
and other products.

I think this opens up a whole can of worms: I have never managed to network
my computers together however much I call the network by the same name,
allow file sharing wherever it is needed, allow permissions, let myself do
whatever I want behind my own firewall. Nothing ever gets seen by the other
computers on the network (OR is seen on the 12 gig computer) and they ALL
use the same wifi sharing connection

I would LOVE to image the whole drive to a desktop somewhere but with 11.5
gig of a 12 gig drive used up, I have painted myself into a corner on that
one (unless someone has some suggestions I hadn't thought of: I was trying
to copy innocuous directories to a DVD-R disc and delete them and image the
rest using Ghost etc but posted here because I was wondering if there was
likely to be an easier way; as I am using the same computer and in THEORY
should be able to use the registry on the old drive on the new drive

 

[Jetro]

Next option is to borrow the USB enclosure.

 

[Licensed to Quill]

Unfortunately against every one's advice I installed Roxio Easy CD Creator
5: That never worked and now that I have installed it, none of my USB or
SCSI storage drives work: I cant even use Sony Easy CD Creator to write to a
CD any more

Is there a third party uninstall program anywhere I can use to repair the
damage done to a 2000 system by Easy CD Creator? Or is there a thread
anywhere which recommends what to do once this catastrophic piece of
software has trojaned itself onto a Windows 2000 system?

 

[John John]

Maybe these can help:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;270008
http://www.roxio.com/en/support/kb/ecddvdc/ee6000061.jhtml

RegSeeker might prove helpful in removing Roxio registry keys:
http://www.hoverdesk.net/freeware.htm
Use with caution, it's quite powerful!

John

 

[Jetro]

Uhm, are you sure you still want to clone this installation? )

 

[Licensed to Quill]

Uhm, are you sure you still want to clone this installation? )

I still think it would be a nightmare trying to redo three years worth of
software corrections, configurations, registry changes, software
registration number entries, usage keys required by software companies which
no longer exist, WINFAX records where their backup program has failed years
ago (and I have to rely on hope alone that I can rebuild their logs with no
backup) etc etc etc.

I might have to do this eventually when I start realising that I no longer
want to continue to use a three year old computer. And I suppose the
arguments against are that the 3yrold can be retained for the use of these
pieces of software alone but I wanted to cross that bridge when I come to
it. (not that I am not already there with using a 650 MHx Portege when I
also have a 1.4GHz Satellite here)

I thought I could buy some more time with instaling a network and sharing
files but despite a literally hugenumber of tries, I just cant get my
network to share files between computers which all have file sharing turned
on everywhere in sight, all have the same workgroup name and which share the
same WiFi connection to the Internet

 

[Jetro]

Software hive and others as well as Winfax Data directory are plainly
transferable.

You can start new thread in ..win2000.networking group.

 

[Licensed to Quill]

Software hive

Yes, but I have software with special security settings which mandate going
to the manufacturer's site and downloading a special key every time I need
to (re-)install the software. The manufacturer was transmuted into another
company a year or so ago in some acrimonious litigation. So I doubt if the
new owner of the company will honour all the old licenses. AND the old
importer of the software who sold it to me originally no longer distributes
it. (It is all a bit stupid as the software can only be used with a special
piece of hardware which isn't otherwise available. It's not as if every one
would be able to copy it and use it in any way)

 

[Licensed to Quill]

Well the Zap Roxio file did something even though it says it only works with
Easy CD Creator 6 and I am using 5. But when I did try to run it, they
managed to fool me because immediately it asked me if I am trying to delete
a version 4 or 5!!!

Anyway, after I ran it, neither the USB drives nor the Iomega SCSI drives
which did work before no longer work. This is becoming catastrophic?

I did do a backup of the registry before installing Easy CD Creator just in
case (I am not THAT stupid)

I now have a 58 megabyte file in my My Documents folder called 25th
December 2004 Registry.reg and wonder how I can replace the registry with
the info in this working file? There isn't a scanreg /restore in Windows
2000 is there?

I tried doubleclicking on it and was asked if I wanted to ADD the data in it
to the current registry which I am not entirley sure i do want to do, but i
did and was after about 20 seconds told that I cant add all this info to the
registry.

Anyone know how to replace the obviously corrupted info in the present
registry with the backup in this file?

 

[John John]

How did you back up the registry? Anyhow, see if this can help:
How to back up, edit, and restore the registry in Windows 2000
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;322755

If you just exported the whole registry you most likely won't be able to
just restore the whole whack just like that, the registry should have
been backed up with the Backup utility. You might have to parse the
registry file you created then try to restore selected hives or keys.
The key that would be of concern is the hardware & Enum keys or this
branch: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM. Maybe you can try restoring the
whole HKLM hive so that you get rid of Roxio program entries at the same
time. If you can't restore the whole hive then try parsing it. MAKE a
working copy for parsing!

Did you try: Disabling the problem devices, reboot to make sure the
drivers are unloaded then delete (uninstall) the problem devices and
reboot again and having Plug and Play reinstall the devices but with you
pointing it to the proper drivers instead of Windows choosing the
drivers? Or, if Plug & Pray installs Roxio drivers without asking try
using the Add Hardware Wizard to install and point windows to the proper
drivers?

John

 

[John John]

PS: Do you have a repair folder and what is the date on the file
system._ ? If it's not too old or if you are confident that no
significant hardware changes were made after the date you might be best
restoring that instead of trying to parse that huge .reg file you made,
let us know.

John

 

[Licensed to Quill]

PS: Do you have a repair folder and what is the date on the file
system._ ? If it's not too old or if you are confident that no
significant hardware changes were made after the date you might be
best restoring that instead of trying to parse that huge .reg file
you made, let us know.

John

Your idea about disabling the offending entries was a good one except that
when I rebooted the second time (after the uninstall), I received the error
message that it couldn't install the device: It said "YOUR SERVICE DATABASE
IS LOCKED" when it found the SCSI device. It then carried on and found the
device again about twenty seconds later and said it was installing it and
told me to reboot. But needless to say, that didn't assist the problem at
all. Funny, though, when it is sniffing around to see what is there on
startup before I even go into windows, the sniffing process doesnt even see
the devices (Zip, Jaz and Coolscan on that chain) which usually blink a few
times to show they are being detected.

You are right about your implications: I am petrified about the prospect of
parsing a whole registry or a whole section of the registry!! (even if I
knew what it meant)
I do have a repair folder along with a somewhat suspicious REGBACK folder
with all sorts of up to 20 megabyte .dat files in it dated 27th December
(which is unfortunately a few days AFTER the Roxio install). But maybe that
is an access date? Interestingly the system file shows in PROPERTIES to
have been created in 2003 and modified in June 2004 so if I can use them,
they might not be too disastrous?

But the Repair folder itself has files in it which date back to June 2000
which is before I even got the computer so they might not be all that much
use if they cause all my software to stop working and all my working
hardware to need re-installing? When you said REPAIR folder in your
message, might it possibly be called REGBACK?

 

[John John]

Do you still have any Roxio or Adaptec services starting automatically?
Do Crtl-Alt-Delete and look at the running processes, what's in there?
Look in your Services Manager and see what services are running and
which are set to Automatic Start. Before doing a registry restore we
should make sure that none of the useless Roxio services are still starting.

John

 

[Licensed to Quill]

Do you still have any Roxio or Adaptec services starting
automatically? Do Crtl-Alt-Delete and look at the running
processes, what's in there? Look in your Services Manager and see
what services are running and
which are set to Automatic Start.

Going into processes running, none seem to be Roxio or Roxio related.
Certainly after uninstalling and then doing a Roxizap, nothing is loading
automatically

 

[John John]

Certainly after uninstalling and then doing a Roxizap, nothing is loading
automatically

You never know with Roxio! Back to the registry backup and restore.
The backup files would be in C:\WINNT\repair and
C:\WINNT\repair\RegBack. (Assuming of course that your system drive is
C and that the %systemroot% folder is winnt). These are the files that
would be used to restore the registry system hive. You stated that the
files in the Regback folder were last modified in June 2004, these are
the files that you will restore, that will have to do and should do
providing that no major hardware modifications were made after that
date. You will concern yourself with only one file or hive, the System
hive. The software hive is quite frankly a bit old to be restored,
restoring the software hive would probably cause other software
problems. Follow these instructions:

1. Use the Windows 2000 CD-ROM or the Windows 2000 Startup disk to
start the computer.
2. When you see the "Welcome to Setup" message, press R for "repair."
3. Press C to run the Recovery Console tool.
4. Select the installation that you want to repair.
5. Type the administrator password.
6. At the Recovery Console command prompt, type the following commands,
pressing ENTER after you type each command:

cd system32\config
ren system system.old
ren system.alt systemalt.old

7. Copy the backup of the System hive from the
%SystemRoot%\Repair\Regback folder.

IMPORTANT: You need to restore the most recent copy of the System hive.
You also need to reinstall any hardware device drivers or programs that
run as services that you installed since the last time that you updated
your Emergency Repair Disk. (You stated earlier that the System file in
the Regback folder was the newest, June 2004, copy from that folder!)

To copy the System hive that was backed up the last time that you ran
the Emergency Repair Disk Wizard, type the following command, and then
press ENTER:

copy c:\winnt\repair\regback\system c:\winnt\system32\config

8. At the command prompt, type exit, and then press ENTER to restart
your computer.

That will restore the system to the June 2004 configuration. This
information is culled from
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;269075. You
should understand that this is usually a last ditch attempt before a
Windows reinstall, meaning that all other attempts to uninstall and
repair the devices fail.

On a final note, I am a bit concerned at the size of your registry
(58MB) and at the size of the registry backup files some being 20+MB.
These figures seem high to me, I have all kinds of devices and software
on my W2k machines and none have such a large registry or registry
backup files. IF the System file in C:\WINNT\repair\RegBack is GREATER
than 16MB this WILL cause problems, check that BEFORE attempting to
restore it. Good luck, if this doesn't work you are facing a reinstall
of some sort.

John