Upgrading to larger hard drive

[Guest]

Greetings all-
Looks like this group has some pretty serious expertise with Vista. I'm
running Vista Ultimate (Home Premium upgrade - anytime upgrade to Ultimate).
All is currently very smooth, with one exception which needs to be addressed,
so I thought this would be the best place to ask to following question:

I am running out of disk space on my 120GB drive and would like to replace
it with a 300GB or better, so what I'd like to know is --- Is there a
ghosting type program such as Acronis True Image, or Norton Ghost, that would
allow me to make a bit-for-bit copy of my existing Vista volume and move it
to a larger drive, without having to back-up critical files, and do a triple
re-install (XP, then Home Premium, then the Ultimate install)??

Any help is appriciated - Frank

 

[Frankster]

Most disk manufacturers include in the kit a program to auto-configure your
new drive either as an additional drive or as a replacement boot drive. In
the replacement case, the utility will automatically copy all of the
contents of your old drive over to the new drive. Slick as a whistle.

If you buy the new drive OEM you may not get this utility. In that case, go
to the drive manufacturer's website and check. It is usually available for
download.

-Frank

 

[Guest]

Thanks much - I'll post back on results

Wow - this was a "Frank" little chit-chat

 

[pete]

or you can look at it another way.........
Leave the HD and all of its programs where it is and add the new HD as a
slave drive(EIDE) to the existing configuration.This way you will have even
more space and less work.
Each EIDE channel can handle 2 devices with the appropriate cable which is
most likely already there.On the back of the HD are jumpers you will need to
set the new HD jumpers to slave and then install into machine by plugging it
into the middle connection of the Eide Cable and plugging in power .When XP
starts go to Administrative Tools/Computer Management/Disk Management and
format the drive........its now ready for use.
You could then copy and paste all of your personal files over to a new
folder as well as move IE cache as well as Outlook Express mailbox over
under their respective Tools options.All new Programs that you install in
the future can be installed onto the new drive.
your choice
peter

 

[Mike Hall - MS MVP Windows Shell/User]

That is what I would do too..

or you can look at it another way.........
Leave the HD and all of its programs where it is and add the new HD as a
slave drive(EIDE) to the existing configuration.This way you will have
even more space and less work.
Each EIDE channel can handle 2 devices with the appropriate cable which is
most likely already there.On the back of the HD are jumpers you will need
to set the new HD jumpers to slave and then install into machine by
plugging it into the middle connection of the Eide Cable and plugging in
power .When XP starts go to Administrative Tools/Computer Management/Disk
Management and format the drive........its now ready for use.
You could then copy and paste all of your personal files over to a new
folder as well as move IE cache as well as Outlook Express mailbox over
under their respective Tools options.All new Programs that you install in
the future can be installed onto the new drive.
your choice
peter

--


Mike Hall
MS MVP Windows Shell/User
http://msmvps.com/blogs/mikehall/

 

[Rock]

Greetings all-
Looks like this group has some pretty serious expertise with Vista. I'm
running Vista Ultimate (Home Premium upgrade - anytime upgrade to
Ultimate).
All is currently very smooth, with one exception which needs to be
addressed,
so I thought this would be the best place to ask to following question:

I am running out of disk space on my 120GB drive and would like to replace
it with a 300GB or better, so what I'd like to know is --- Is there a
ghosting type program such as Acronis True Image, or Norton Ghost, that
would
allow me to make a bit-for-bit copy of my existing Vista volume and move
it
to a larger drive, without having to back-up critical files, and do a
triple
re-install (XP, then Home Premium, then the Ultimate install)??

Any help is appriciated - Frank

In addition to Frankster's reply, Ultimate comes with Complete PC Backup
which is drive imaging. Use that to image all the partitions to an external
USB drive, then remove the old drive, install the new, and restore the image
by booting the Vista DVD and choose repair the computer. Then choose
Complete PC Backup restore.

Acronis True Image Home version 10 works in Vista as well. I'm not sure if
Symantec has a Vista compatible ghost product yet,

 

[Art]

This is generally good advice however before you follow it make sure your
motherboard can accomodate 2 hard drives and a DVD drive. Some of the new,
less expensive boards only have 1 IDE controller. You might have to go the
SATA route to add a 2nd drive.

Art

 

[Guest]

Rock --

Bought 2 new 320GB drives - Prior to installing the primary, I did a
complete PC Backup to the slave. Installed the new drive, booted into the
Vista DVD, did my keyboard-language etc; then did a Windows Repair. It found
the backup and restored it completely. Once finished (after a reboot for the
new hard drive), expanded the 111GB partition, to the full 320GB. Worked like
a champ! Must admit, this was a very easy (albeit a little time-consuming due
to the volume of data) way to upgrade a drive, without having to re-load. All
done with tools available within Vista. Final note: copied all data from the
old slave to a directory on the new disk, installed the second new 320GB
drive, prepared it, then copied the data back. A couple of things needed to
be re-indexed (Music Library on D), but it's working very well indeed. Do not
remember this capability in XP without 3rd party software.

Thought you all would like to know --

 

[Rock]

Great! Yep XP does not have the tools to do this. Glad it worked so
smoothly for you too. Gives you some confidence in the Complete PC backup.
I image my systems using Acronis True Image Home version 10 and Complete PC
Backup for redundancy.