Need to clone HD with errors

R

Randem

I have tried two different HD cloning software packages Easy Gig II and
Acron True Image (it seems that Acronis purchased the Easy Gig software)
Acronis is also the Seagate cloning software. So maybe I only tried one
package...

What I need to do is to copy (clone) all available sectors to the new HD
skipping the bad ones. Does anyone know of a software package that can do
this?

--
Randem Systems
Your Installation Specialist
The Top Inno Setup Script Generator
http://www.randem.com/innoscript.html
Disk Read Error Press Ctl+Alt+Del to Restart
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T

Tim Meddick

Randem,
That sounds impossible to me, because, in 'cloning' a drive, all
sectors must be copied exactly, it can't leave 'gaps' in the filesystem can
it? What's it supposed to put there instead - create blank filesystem?
No - the way to go is to just clone the drive with the software it looks
like you've already chosen - then look for a way to re-examine / re-test bad
clusters. Any data there on the original disk is lost anyway. You'll just
get the space back after re-testing the bad clusters.


==


Cheers, Tim Meddick, Peckham, London.
 
P

Pegasus [MVP]

Randem said:
I have tried two different HD cloning software packages Easy Gig II and
Acron True Image (it seems that Acronis purchased the Easy Gig software)
Acronis is also the Seagate cloning software. So maybe I only tried one
package...

What I need to do is to copy (clone) all available sectors to the new HD
skipping the bad ones. Does anyone know of a software package that can do
this?
Click to expand...

You can do it if you restate your aim: Instead of copying all sectors to the
new disk, you can copy all files and folders to the new disk, provided that
they are still readable. Here is the method:
1. Connect both disks to the same machine.
2. Boot into WinXP.
3. Partition/format the new disk.
4. Boot the machine with a Bart PE boot CD.
5. Use robocopy to copy the old disk to the new disk.

You can achieve the same outcome by connecting both disks to some other
WinXP machine, then use robocopy.
 
H

HeyBub

Randem said:
I have tried two different HD cloning software packages Easy Gig II
and Acron True Image (it seems that Acronis purchased the Easy Gig
software) Acronis is also the Seagate cloning software. So maybe I
only tried one package...

What I need to do is to copy (clone) all available sectors to the new
HD skipping the bad ones. Does anyone know of a software package that
can do this?
Click to expand...

Assuming the source disk is unreadable (else you could slave it in another
machine and selectively copy the files you need), there exists software to
recover from an unreadable disk.

We've used Easy Recovery Professional with great success in similar
situations. There may be other products that do the same.
 
P

Paul

Randem said:
I have tried two different HD cloning software packages Easy Gig II and
Acron True Image (it seems that Acronis purchased the Easy Gig software)
Acronis is also the Seagate cloning software. So maybe I only tried one
package...

What I need to do is to copy (clone) all available sectors to the new HD
skipping the bad ones. Does anyone know of a software package that can do
this?
Click to expand...

dd_rescue can be used to copy sector for sector, bypassing any
sectors that cannot be read. You could do a first pass on your
destination disk with

dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/hdb

which would overwrite the destination with all zero's data. That
makes it easier later, when you see an all zero's sector, to
conclude the sector could not be read on the source.

Then, you'd play with this.

http://www.garloff.de/kurt/linux/ddrescue/

So far, the regular "dd" has been good enough for me, since
I use it for disks that are still in good shape. I recently
replaced the hard drives on my current computer, and used
the regular "dd" to copy them exactly.

Paul
 
R

Randem

No, you misunderstand.

BTW: I found a way to do it by creating a backup image of the drive and that
will allow you not to copy bad sectors. Then I can restore to a new drive.

I really dont care what is there, I just need to be able to get to the
recovery partition to restore the new drive to factory defaults.

--
Randem Systems
Your Installation Specialist
The Top Inno Setup Script Generator
http://www.randem.com/innoscript.html
Disk Read Error Press Ctl+Alt+Del to Restart
http://www.randem.com/discus/messages/9402/9406.html?1236319938
 
P

Pegasus [MVP]

Randem said:
No, you misunderstood also... I needed it to be bootable. I found a way to
do it.
Click to expand...

If you format the partition under WinXP and if it is a primary and active
partition then it *will* be bootable with my method. I recommend you try it
for yourself - it is surprisingly easy!
 

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