Move C Drive to New Hard Drive

[Dock006]

I know this is going to seem pretty silly to those who have been around
but I just can't seem to get it together. I just installed a new large
hard drive and I want it to become the primary drive and move the
contents & OS boot from the old primary without re installing each
program. I hope I was clear enough.

 

[Big_Al]

I know this is going to seem pretty silly to those who have been around
but I just can't seem to get it together. I just installed a new large
hard drive and I want it to become the primary drive and move the
contents & OS boot from the old primary without re installing each
program. I hope I was clear enough.

You want to 'clone' the drive.
Acronis True Image Home would be 'my' first choice. It will clone the
c: drive onto the d: drive, regardless of size difference. You then
remove the c:, make the d: now your primary c: drive and reboot. If
all goes well, your new large C: drive is not booting and all is as was
but with a different drive.
Later you put the old C: drive back in if you want and format it, once
you've made sure all is well, remembering its basically a backup right
now, and is untouched.

 

[philo]

You want to 'clone' the drive.
Acronis True Image Home would be 'my' first choice. It will clone the
c: drive onto the d: drive, regardless of size difference. You then
remove the c:, make the d: now your primary c: drive and reboot. If
all goes well, your new large C: drive is not booting and all is as was
but with a different drive.
Later you put the old C: drive back in if you want and format it, once
you've made sure all is well, remembering its basically a backup right
now, and is untouched.

Yep...that's the right answer .

just check first though, the new drive may have come with cloning software.

(or it maybe avail free from the mfg's website)

 

[Big_Al]

Yep...that's the right answer .

just check first though, the new drive may have come with cloning software.

(or it maybe avail free from the mfg's website)

Yes both seagate and maxtor I think have some software available for
free that will aid in installing their new drives. And one is a clone
(not to make a pun) of the Acronis software.

 

[philo]

Yes both seagate and maxtor I think have some software available for
free that will aid in installing their new drives. And one is a clone
(not to make a pun) of the Acronis software.

LOL

AFAIK it actually is Acronis
but a version that's limited to work only if one of the drive's is from the
MFG it came with

 

[Andrew E.]

Those posts really are pretty bad for an xp user.....One doesnt need cloning
or mirroring 3rd party software when xp already has it installed...Simply
install the new hd as slave on the same IDE cable (new closer to board),set
jumper pins master/slave,C: as master.Once in xp,go to run,type:diskmgmt.msc
In msc,R.click the new hd,select format,follow the wizard with default
settings,
once thru,exit msc.Go to run,type: XCOPY C:\*.* D:\ /c/h/e/k/r click on
run.
Agree to all in the DOS window.Also,D: being the new hd letter,if asigned
diffrent
letter,then use that instead.Thats all,shutdown pc,set new as master.

 

[philo]

Those posts really are pretty bad for an xp user.....One doesnt need cloning
or mirroring 3rd party software when xp already has it installed...Simply
install the new hd as slave on the same IDE cable (new closer to board),set
jumper pins master/slave,C: as master.Once in xp,go to run,type:diskmgmt.msc
In msc,R.click the new hd,select format,follow the wizard with default
settings,
once thru,exit msc.Go to run,type: XCOPY C:\*.* D:\ /c/h/e/k/r click on
run.
Agree to all in the DOS window.Also,D: being the new hd letter,if asigned
diffrent
letter,then use that instead.Thats all,shutdown pc,set new as master.

:

No!

That is absolutely positively WRONG!!!

Though that worked with Win9x...
It will *NOT* work with XP, Win2k or Vista.

You cannot xcopy a live system.

The only way you could do it is by attaching the old drive and the new drive
to a separate machine...which is not always possible or practical.

Also, if using that method it would be better to use robocopy from the
resource kit...
it has some advantages over xcopy.


FWIW: Even though I have heard a hundred times that xcopy will not work...
Just to be 100% sure I did try it to see exactly why not.
The reason it will not work is that files that are in use...cannot be
copied...so they will be skipped...
thus leaving the so called "clone" corrupted

 

[Dock006]

I want thank you all for your replies. The last reply reminded me that I
failed to tell everyone that this new drive is a 1T SATA drive (Western
Digital) intsalled in an older computer without SATA. I installed a PCI
card for the SATA interface. The software (Data Life Guard Tools) that
came with the drive has tried but only copies which ever profile is
logged on at the time we try to set up. XP see it as a Page drive. If
anyone knows how to get it to see it without going to the profile which
also causes the program to fail and reboot.