Copying a hard drive; does anyone know......

[StewartKnight]

I want to transfer EVERYTHING on my h/d to another h/d before the first one dies, so that I don't have to reinstall software, windows etc.

 

I'm sure I've seen some software (Paragon, I'm looking at you!) that does this. Does anyone know and have experience of software that will do that for me?

 

This is for a home computer BTW.

[creese]

Acronis?

[Domino]

Driveimage xml is normally a good bet DriveImage XML Backup Software - Data Recovery Product

[powdarrmonkey]

Clonezilla (truly free software in the proper sense).

[Potato-Peeler]

Clonezilla

[dayzd]

If you don't want to do a bit-for-bit copy (not always necessary), you might wanna try XXClone : XXCLONE, A New Way of Cloning the Windows System Disk

 

It does a regular file-copy of everything of your disk, then makes it suitably bootable, so in many regards it's a cloned drive, with the bonus of being slightly less fragmented!

I've used it to upgrade a system drive to a bigger disk and it worked fine. That said, I've only used it once so take that into account while making your choice!

[Cue]

Symantec Ghost Solution Suite 2.5 (read: Not Norton). Of course, that's assuming you already have it or have the money, or can borrow it or something (you only need the console, maybe get a friend to make a WinPE image on a CD or something, though I can't really recommend it entirely since I highly doubt this is within their terms).

 

Alternatives to Norton Ghost (Imaging / Cloning programs) Try here for some good alternatives, free and paid.

 

I can't recommend Ghost enough if you do a lot of imaging though, just don't touch the Norton side of things, their Norton branded stuff is full of bloat and I was very quick to remove anything and everything with "Norton" from any system I touched, every time I get a laptop to repair and they're on the trial it's the first thing I insist on (Microsoft Security Essentials all the way).

 

If you need any more of a sales pitch, I'm an avid detester of all Norton products, and usually steer clear of most Symantec products altogether, but I loved Ghost from the moment I started using it.

Edited April 12, 2010 by Cue

[andy_nic]

i've used HDclone (i think that was what it was called). the free one will do a straight clone of everythink from 1 hard drive to the 2nd hard drive, its booted from CD i think, been a while since i've used it. i used it to fix a friends PC did its job saved me loads of time rebuilding the PC

[bossman]

"Acronis" True Image Home edition 2010 is the DBs

 

Only £24

 

Acronis True Image Home 2010: Backup and Recovery - PC - PureBuy

[FN-GM]

I needed this doing when i changed a laptop hard drive. I took it into work and used WDS.

[creese]

We use Acronis to clone our training room PCs. It's reliable and fast.

[rh91uk]

Clonezilla works a treat for me!

[MkII]

macrium : Ghost Windows for Free with Macrium Reflect (A Visual Guide) | TipsFor.us

or

paragon drive backup express : Ghost Windows for Free with Paragon Drive Backup Express (A Visual Guide) | TipsFor.us

[tech_guy]

I'd go for DriveImage XML - it's never let me down. I use it on a BartPE disc.

[MkII]

DriveImage XML is getting long in the tooth... the two I posted are improvements - go check out the howto's

[chris-t]

Definatly acronis for me. Never had any problems with using it, Edited April 14, 2010 by Domino
Link to illegal software

[Ben-UK]

I have a SATA 250Gb hard drive, that has about 50Gb winxp install on it.

 

I want to clone the image to another, smaller HDD thats 80Gb in size.

 

Will any of the programs listed in this thread work ?

 

We have a HDD cloner dock but it wont work, i think its because the target drive is smaller than the source drive 250gb > 80gb.

 

Thanks for the help

[creese]

I have a SATA 250Gb hard drive, that has about 50Gb winxp install on it.

 

I want to clone the image to another, smaller HDD thats 80Gb in size.

 

Will any of the programs listed in this thread work ?

 

We have a HDD cloner dock but it wont work, i think its because the target drive is smaller than the source drive 250gb > 80gb.

 

Thanks for the help

 

Acronis will.

[Ben-UK]

Acronis will.

 

Acronis True Image Home 2010 worked great !

 

Thanks for the help.

[creese]

Converted eh?

 

They have some good products and a very helpful sales/help team.