My hd is failing just received a new one in the mail from dell
today. What is the best way to clone my new hd I don't want to spend hours
installing all of the programs. Also is there any preparation that I need
to do to the new hd?
Thnak you
angel:
:
Probably the most practical way is to clone the contents of your old drive
using a disk imaging program such as Symantec's Norton Ghost or
Acronis True Image. But if you don't want to incur the expense of
purchasing one of those programs (although they can be *very* valuable for
performing future backups), virtually all HD manufacturers have
freely available a disk-cloning utility designed for their HDs.
Perhaps the replacement Dell drive already came with such a utility or you
can get it from Dell?
I assume you know how to connect & configure your new hard drive or adequate
instructions for doing so were included with your Dell drive. If you feel
uncomfortable about this I would recommend you let a professional technician
do the work. It's not terribly difficult to replace a HD, but like
everything else involving computer hardware changes, if you haven't done it
before it can be a bewildering & frustrating experience.
Anna
Anna, thanks for your help I'm not sure how to connect & configure my new
hard drive, but with a little bit of guidance or knowledge from people
like you I feel comfortable doing it. I just need a brief description how to
configure and clone my hard drive.
ty
:
angel:
I see that you're corresponding in the microsoft.public.windowsxp.hardware
newsgroup with Mr. Wendell on this identical issue. So perhaps it would
best if you continue to do so in order not to get conflicting or differing
advice from me which might further confuse you because of our different
approaches.
Anna
Anna, I like you approach much better can you help.
Thank you
angel:
Please understand that in no way am I contradicting or disputing the advice
& recommendations Mr. Wendell is, or will be, providing you. I've no reason
to believe that whatever information he provides you would not be helpful to
you re this issue. But there can be multiple approaches to solving this or
that computer problem, and although each one may be a valid way of
accomplishing the desired objective, it will frequently confuse the
inexperienced user because of the differing approaches. So it's best to
follow one course of action until that time you determine that particular
approach is not a practical, workable solution to your particular problem.
Having said all that, I'm not entirely sure where to start. So let me ask
you a few questions...
case and connect the new drive to a data cable connector and power plug? If
not, would you have a friend or acquaintance to help you do this?
without the need to have initially installed both drives internally. If we
went that route, i.e., using a USBEHD to accomplish the cloning operation,
naturally we would eventually replace the old drive with the new one
following the cloning operation.
frankly, do you truly understand the import of my questions, or are they
bewildering to you? I ask that question because if they are, it may be more
desirable if you could get professional help, at least in terms of the
hardware changes and manipulations we have been discussing. So think about
that.
Now as to the disk-to-disk cloning operation...
Assuming your Dell replacement drive did not come with software to
accomplish this and no free software is available, are you agreeable to
purchasing one of the two disk imaging programs I previously mentioned, and
if so, which one?
Anna
angel said:
anna
Here we go I will answer all of your questions.
#1 No I have not installed my new drive still using old drive
#2 I ran diagnostic test
#3 I don't believe that there is any corruption
#4 Make of new hd western digital caviar se
wd1600 Enhanced IDE drive 160.0gb
and it did not come with any information or brackets
#5 As far as I know there is no corruption and yes I can get inside of my
computer
#6 I do not havean external harddrive
#7 If I need to buy a disk imaging program I decided on acronis
Finally I'm not bewildered always willing to try something new.
How will I be able to install new hd for cloning if it did not come with
brackets?
Thanks for your help
Anna, I will be replacing my system battery as well should I do that first
and boot my computer prior to installing my hd.
Anna, No I'm not bewildered thank you for asking, my hd from dell did not
come with anything no instructions nothing I wonder if I made a mistake
buying their product. Anyway I have it now so I guess I will use it, I
guess
I will buy acronis as it is recommended in this forum as being the best.
angel:
Since your new replacement drive is a Western Digital, perhaps the most
cost-effective way to proceed is to download a program from WD (available
from their website) which will allow you to undertake the cloning operation,
i.e., copying the entire contents of your old drive to the new WD drive. But
before getting to that, you'll need to connect (temporarily) your new WD
drive.
I assume you know how to gain access to your computer's components by
removing the case's side panel - the left one as you face the computer. You
probably will also have to remove the right panel in order to eventually
permanently install the new HD, but for the moment that should not be
necessary. PLEASE MAKE SURE YOU UNPLUG YOUR AC POWER CORD BEFORE UNDERTAKING
THE FOLLOWING...
What we want to do is to connect the new drive to an available IDE data
cable (commonly called a "ribbon" cable) connector and a power plug (usually
a "Molex" plug). Note how your present drive is connected to the ribbon
cable and power plug. It will basically be the same way when you connect the
new drive. Remember that we're *temporarily* connecting the new drive; after
the cloning operation we will permanently connect it.
Your new drive will arrive (most likely) jumpered Cable Select (CS). For the
moment leave it that way; we may later have to change the jumper setting.
From your description, it would seem that you have an available IDE
connector on the cable that's presently attached to your old installed
drive. The end connector (Master) is connected to that drive and there
should be a middle connector (Slave position) on that cable that's free.
It's that connector that you will use to connect to the new drive. It's
really not important *what* IDE cable connector is attached to the new drive
for this cloning operation to come. You could even detach one of the
connectors to your optical drives and connect that to the new drive for our
purposes if it was more convenient to do so. But if there *is* a free middle
connector on the cable going to the old installed drive and it's physically
convenient to connect to the new drive, use that one.
You'll need a box or some other contraption placed just outside the case on
which to place the new hard drive after you connect it to the data cable &
power plug as described above. A cardboard shoe box is fine. You just don't
want the drive to be dangling precariously from the cable connections, so
ensure that it's propped up reasonably well.
Please review the above and see if you feel comfortable about this
installation process. If you do, then we'll go on to the actual cloning
process using the WD utility. I'll provide you with information about
downloading, installing, and using that utility to clone the contents of
your old drive to the new one..
BTW, you mention you're planning to change your motherboard's battery. Is
there some reason for this? I assume your computer is not much older than
two years or so and ordinarily a battery change shouldn't be necessary. It
won't hurt, of course, assuming you correctly install the right battery, but
why are you doing so?
Anna
