Software to clone disk and resize target partiions at same time?

[Peter]

I had to do something very similar a few weeks ago, but with two RAID

arrays. On one machine, the original 80GB mirrored array was on the
on-board IDE controller, and the new 250GB array was on a new SATA
controller. The original array had three partitions: 20GB "C", 20GB "D",
and 40GB "E".

I downloaded Maxtor's free MaxBlast 4 software from Maxtor's site. I chose
the .ISO version, which makes a bootable CD, so you perform all functions
outside of Windows.

MaxBlast allows you to create any number of primary partitions in NTFS or
FAT, so I created two 40GB NTFS partitions and one 171GB (100% of the
remaining space) partition. MaxBlast also formatted all three partitions in
under a minute (obviously a "quick" format).

MaxBlast then allowed me to copy each source partition to the larger
partitions on the new array:
* the first original 20GB to the first new 40GB partition
* the second original 20GB to the second new 40GB partition
* the original 40GB to the new 171GB partition
The whole process took about 90 minutes (about 60GB of actual data was
copied), and the new array booted perfectly after the old array was
disabled. Also, all of the disk space is there for each partition (40GB,
40GB, and 171GB). It's been running flawlessly since then, and now that
server has a TON of room to grow.

That's pretty good for free software, the drives can be from any
manufacturer (another server had WD source drives and Seagate destination
drives), and the interface and functions are very intuitive.

There are some serious limitations with this software. It does not work with
SCSI drives.
And it displays a warning "A version of Windows may be present on your
system. Maxtor recommends that you use the Windows version of MaxBlast 4 to
set up your drive. Do you wish to continue anyway?"

 

[Bob]

Thanks to everyone for their suggestions, comments, etc. I purchased
Acronis True Image v9 last eve (a download from Newegg for $29.99),
installed it, created the True Image boot CD, and a little more than an
hour later I had an 85% full 160 gig drive cloned over to a new 320 gig
drive with the partitiions resized larger to take advantage of the
larger disk. The clone disk booted perfectly and with no problems in
the few hours I've used it so far.

Can someone tell me the advantage of using a "True Image Secure Zone"
as a storage spot for disk images? As opposed to storing images in a
normal partition on a different physical disk?

 

[Eric Gisin]

Your problem. Ghost works fine for me.

Drive imaging is pointless and overkill for data.

 

[Rod Speed]

Thanks to everyone for their suggestions, comments, etc.

Thanks for the feedback, too rare in my opinion.

I purchased Acronis True Image v9 last eve (a download from
Newegg for $29.99), installed it, created the True Image boot
CD, and a little more than an hour later I had an 85% full 160 gig
drive cloned over to a new 320 gig drive with the partitiions resized
larger to take advantage of the larger disk. The clone disk booted
perfectly and with no problems in the few hours I've used it so far.

Can someone tell me the advantage of using a "True Image Secure
Zone" as a storage spot for disk images? As opposed to storing
images in a normal partition on a different physical disk?

It has no real advantage except a theoretical one that its a
little less likely to have the files on it accidentally deleted etc.

Its main advantage is that users who dont have that much
of an idea about what they are doing dont have to understand
partitions etc when they have just one physical drive.

 

[Bob]

:
:> Thanks to everyone for their suggestions, comments, etc.
:
:Thanks for the feedback, too rare in my opinion.

You're welcome. Only seems fair to me to let everyone know what the
outcome was and to thank everyone for their contributions. Usenet can
still be a good place, I've found, if things are kept on topic and
don't turn into name calling battles, etc.

:
:> I purchased Acronis True Image v9 last eve (a download from
:> Newegg for $29.99), installed it, created the True Image boot
:> CD, and a little more than an hour later I had an 85% full 160 gig
:> drive cloned over to a new 320 gig drive with the partitiions resized
:> larger to take advantage of the larger disk. The clone disk booted
:> perfectly and with no problems in the few hours I've used it so far.
:
:> Can someone tell me the advantage of using a "True Image Secure
:> Zone" as a storage spot for disk images? As opposed to storing
:> images in a normal partition on a different physical disk?
:
:It has no real advantage except a theoretical one that its a
:little less likely to have the files on it accidentally deleted etc.
:
:Its main advantage is that users who dont have that much
f an idea about what they are doing dont have to understand
artitions etc when they have just one physical drive.

Thanks again. That's what I suspected.

 

[Rod Speed]

Drive imaging is pointless

Nope, most obviously when a system has a problem and
you want to do a safety image before trying anything.

 

[Rod Speed]

You're welcome. Only seems fair to me to let everyone know
what the outcome was and to thank everyone for their contributions.
Usenet can still be a good place, I've found, if things are kept
on topic and don't turn into name calling battles, etc.

And can be very useful indeed with quite specific error messages.

You can often fix a problem in minutes just by searching with a
specific error message, particularly if the washup was posted too.

Got one situation with an Alcatel dsl router where the damned thing
had in large red letters 'no password set' even when you had just
set the username and password in the router. A quick search showed
that it was just whining about the telnet password, not the PPP password.

 

[Mike Redrobe]

Drive imaging is pointless and overkill for data.

Drive imaging has its place - it makes a complete system
restore much easier and faster (can be done by the untrained).

I agree its overkill for data though.