Image backup/rstore vs. clean install/all-file-backup/restore

[mm]

A general question:

Chris Quirke writes:
"It's a good idea to make a partition image backup of your XP
installation before you start, using something like BING. Simply
copying off every file is not enough, because unlike Windows 9x, XP
will not work when copied in this way."

If there is no partitin image, would it be sufficient to do a clean
install of XP Gold, and then copy over the file-by-file backup of, for
example, XP with SP3 installed. Wouldn't that leave everything
bootable, etc. and give the same results as an image restore?

 

[Shenan Stanley]

A general question:

Chris Quirke writes:
"It's a good idea to make a partition image backup of your XP
installation before you start, using something like BING. Simply
copying off every file is not enough, because unlike Windows 9x, XP
will not work when copied in this way."

If there is no partitin image, would it be sufficient to do a clean
install of XP Gold, and then copy over the file-by-file backup of,
for example, XP with SP3 installed. Wouldn't that leave everything
bootable, etc. and give the same results as an image restore?

No.

 

[mm]

No.

Not even functionally? Wouldn't it still work the same?

 

[Shenan Stanley]

A general question:

Chris Quirke writes:
"It's a good idea to make a partition image backup of your XP
installation before you start, using something like BING. Simply
copying off every file is not enough, because unlike Windows 9x, XP
will not work when copied in this way."

If there is no partitin image, would it be sufficient to do a clean
install of XP Gold, and then copy over the file-by-file backup of,
for example, XP with SP3 installed. Wouldn't that leave everything
bootable, etc. and give the same results as an image restore?

No.

Not even functionally? Wouldn't it still work the same?

Probably not even functional.

Use an imaging utility (free or otherwise), some sort of extrernal
drive/network share and make an actual image if you need to.