Moving contents from one hard drive to the other

  • Thread starter Thread starter mike.kline
  • Start date Start date
M

mike.kline

I have gotten a new [bigger] harddrive and want to move the contents
(including windows and all installed programs) to the new drive and
use the new drive as the master. What are some of the better programs
for accomplishing this?

thanks!
 
I have gotten a new [bigger] harddrive and want to move the contents
(including windows and all installed programs) to the new drive and
use the new drive as the master. What are some of the better programs
for accomplishing this?

thanks!
Click to expand...

There are lots of Disk Imaging programs out there. Two of the most popular
are Acronis True Image and Norton Ghost. I've used both and my vote goes to
Acronis.
 
The clone utility that is provided by a lot of the drive manufacturers
works prtty well, and costs nothing.
 
I have gotten a new [bigger] harddrive and want to move the contents
(including windows and all installed programs) to the new drive and
use the new drive as the master. What are some of the better programs
for accomplishing this?

thanks!
Click to expand...

Most disk drive manufacturers provide you with the tools to move everything
to a new disk, so you are not required to buy any additional software.
 
I have gotten a new [bigger] harddrive and want to move the contents
(including windows and all installed programs) to the new drive and
use the new drive as the master. What are some of the better programs
for accomplishing this?
Click to expand...

I'd suggest Acronis True Image. You might also hear about Ghost.

I've used both, and prefer the former for a myriad of reasons.

1) It is easy to use
2) It will do backups for you after you transfer your stuff to the new
drive.

Buy it, Download it. Save it and your registration info to CD or
other medium.

CLONE your drive with it.
 
I have gotten a new [bigger] harddrive and want to move the contents
(including windows and all installed programs) to the new drive and
use the new drive as the master. What are some of the better programs
for accomplishing this?
Click to expand...

There are several ways to do this. The new drive should have a copy
utility, either on a floppy or CD that came in the box if it's a retail
drive kit, or it can be downloaded from the drive manufacturer's web site.
This is a free utility, an when I have used the one for Western Digital
drives it has worked fine. Make sure you first read, then follow exactly
the directions for making the copy.

On the commercial side I would recommend Acronis True Image Home, version
10. It can clone drive, but it is also extremely useful to have as a backup
strategy. In addition to cloning it can do imaging on a partition or drive
basis, and file backups. Images can be full, incremental or differential
resulting in reduced space for subsequent images. Restores can be done on a
file, partition or drive basis.

Check around for prices. I saw it recently at Newegg.com for $29.99 plus
4.99 shipping (versus $49.99 as a download from the Acronis site.)

Couple this with an external hard drive connected to the computer via USB,
Firewire or eSata and you a low cost but very effective backup strategy.
You can buy a preassembled external hard drive, the manufacturer's are many,
but I suggest putting one together, which can be done for a much lower cost.
Purchase the bare drive of your choice
as a white box kit, and install it an in external drive enclosure. It's
easy to do. Newegg.com had a 320 GB WD Caviar EIDE 7200 rpm drive for under
$90. Enclosures are in the $20 range.

When making the clone or drive copy, the key element to after the cloning
process but before booting up for the first time disconnect all drives
except the new, cloned drive, jumper / cable it properly, and have it as the
only drive in the system when the system first boots. Drive letters should
remain the same then. Afterwards you can reinstall the old drive as a slave
drive and use that for additional storage, or put in in an external drive
enclosure.

Good luck.
 
Back
Top