Replace system drive

[Andre De Clercq]

I have a 20GB (physical) system drive on my XPSP2 pc. Ik want to replace it
by a 200GB drive. I have made an image (True Image) of the 20GB drive. Can
I just put the 200 GB instead of the 20GB (both Pata drives) into my PC and
load the image onto the 200 GB? Will it be automatically partinioned as
~20/180?. Thanks for any advise.

 

[Vanguard]

in message

I have a 20GB (physical) system drive on my XPSP2 pc. Ik want to
replace it by a 200GB drive. I have made an image (True Image) of the
20GB drive. Can I just put the 200 GB instead of the 20GB (both Pata
drives) into my PC and load the image onto the 200 GB? Will it be
automatically partinioned as ~20/180?. Thanks for any advise.

Acronis has their own forums although they do a good job of hiding a
link to it (I found it under their site index but the page under which
it was listed did NOT have the forums link).

http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/support/forum/

Their links take you to the Wilders Security Forums (which is not owned
by Acronis but instead is an independent forum group that covers several
products).

 

[Lil' Dave]

Question: Where and what is the image located on?

Comment: Don't put the 20GB hard drive back in until you're thoroughly sure
the 200GB is doing all it should in XP.
Dave

 

[Anna]

I have a 20GB (physical) system drive on my XPSP2 pc. Ik want to replace it
by a 200GB drive. I have made an image (True Image) of the 20GB drive. Can
I just put the 200 GB instead of the 20GB (both Pata drives) into my PC and
load the image onto the 200 GB? Will it be automatically partinioned as
~20/180?. Thanks for any advise.

Andre:
You might want to consider using the Acronis True Image program to directly
clone the contents of your 20 GB HDD to the new 200 GB HDD. Should you go
that route your newly-cloned 200 GB HDD will have a single partition
comprising the entire disk space of that disk (approx. 186 GB in binary
terms) and the contents of your 20 GB HDD will reside on that drive.

If the above meets your objective, install your 200 GB HDD in your machine
if you haven't already done so. It need not be partitioned/formatted. The
disk cloning process will take care of that.

So now you'll have your 20 GB HDD as your "source" disk and your 200 GB HDD
as the "destination" disk.

Use your Acronis program to simply clone the contents of your 20 GB HDD over
to the 200 GB HDD. If you're using the ATI 9 version, click on "Clone Disk"
under "Pick a Task". If you're using the ATI 10 version, click on "Manage
Hard Disks" in the "Pick a Tool" area and on the next screen click on "Clone
Disk".

Immediately following the disk cloning operation, disconnect your source HDD
and boot directly with the cloned 200 GB HDD. Ensure that the *only* storage
device connected to your system at that time is the 200 GB HDD. (Connect
that drive as Primary Master if you haven't already done so).

After that initial boot to the newly-cloned drive and you've determined that
the new HDD is properly functioning, you can reconnect that 20 GB HDD in
your system if you plan to use it in your system for whatever purpose you
have in mind. You can connect it as a Slave to your new PM or anywhere on
the Secondary IDE channel of your motherboard. I assume you know how to do
these things.

If, on the other hand, you desire the 200 GB HDD to be multi-partitioned so
that the contents of your 20 GB HDD would reside on one partition and there
would be one or more other partitions on that 200 GB disk, then the Acronis
disk imaging process would probably be a more practical way to go although
you could use Acronis's disk cloning capability as well to achieve this
objective. Consult the Acronis Help files for information on these
processes.
Anna

 

[Andre De Clercq]

Thanks Anna for the very precise and complete answer.

 

[John7]

Andre,

There is one more thing to consider before adding the 200GB disk.
First make sure:
1. Your PC bios supports disks above 128GB (134GB / 48-bit LBA).
2. Your Windows has SP2 installed (so supporting 128GB disks).
If these conditions are NOT met, the PC might suffer from lockups,
crashes and/or data corruption.

HTH,
John7