Hard Drive Transplant

[TessMcTessy]

OK, really not sure if this is the right forum for this, but eh, it's hard drive related! My friend's computer's hard drive is dying. Dying fast! I am not even sure if it's still working enough for this to work. But I've read places about transplanting all the data from one hard drive to another, including all files and programs and the operating system.

Her hard drive is 40 Gig, and has no added partitions. It's just the C Drive. The information I've found said I'd just load the new hard drive as the slave, copy all files and folders onto the new new hard drive. Then remove the old one, and set the new drive as the slave. It seems that simple. I know the number of partitions must be the same. So 1. I am guessing since hers is NTFS, I have to make sure the new one is the same.

I am guessing there is more to it. It just seems too simple. Will the new hard drive even be ready for the file transfer? Is the set up process easy? If I am missing something big, I'd love to know.

Thanks for reading!!!
Tess

[LeftCoast]

The new HDD should have a utility that will do this easy, whether it be on floppy or bootable CD. Read the instructions on the installation, and you should be all set. If any problems, you have our number...

You can also use a utility called Norton's Ghost, but unnecessary for this, IMAO.


And welcome to TechIMO!

[TessMcTessy]

Thanks! I really hope this works out! Otherwise I'll have to start from scratch and just put Windows XP in her new Hard drive. Oh, also, if the old hard drive is beyond being able to start the computer, is this because of important system files being lost in bad sectors?

I ask this because I was wondering if I did have to remove the old drive completely and just install windows into the new hard drive, would I be able to hook the old drive as a slave and get any files from it? I know not to get actual programs, but i mean sound files and pictures, and the like.

Thanks!
Tess

[LeftCoast]

Absolutely. That's probably the way I'd do it, to tell you honestly. I feel it's always best to start fresh, when OSs are concerned. Also, I'd make two partitions(C<@ 7-8 gigs> and D), and install JUST the OS on C, and leave D for storage and programs. That way, if you ever need to reinstall the OS fresh, your D drive is already "backed up", sorta. If you do it this way, though, make sure to change "My Documents" to the D drive, for the same reason as stated above and also so you don't eventually start running out of room on C (many people save gigs of pics and music in My Docs, and wonder why they are running out of space on the C drive!).

Just my 2 cents...

[TessMcTessy]

Unfortunatly, my friend's gathered a lot of programs that she'd rather not have to reload. I'll keep that in mind though. (I'm very worried about the drive being too far gone.) Anyway, thanks so much for the response, i'll be sure to let you know if everything worked out well. This all happens monday! Wish me luck!

Tess

[paul9]

norton ghost should be able to copy everthing over for you. or acronis drive image may work. i got norton ghost free with my motherboard.

['G']

I would back up irreplaceable data first before going the image or HDD-to-HDD copying way.

The HDD may go with HDD-to-HDD as it might with imaging as it will be stressed during this time.

Get the data backed up first and then take an image from the source (primary HDD) to the destination (secondary HDD).

[TessMcTessy]

OK Things didn't go so well. I thought I was lucky when the Hard drive came with a program to transfer the data. Unfortunately, it was not meant to be. As the program was copying the hard drive, the computer crashed and would not restart. I figured her old drive had enough. Anyway, the disc that came with the drive had the option to boot from the CD. So i switched the two, made the new drive master, and old drive slave. Then I ran the program and it let me transfer the data! But... When it finished, i took the CD out and rebooted (and made sure it would boot from the new drive. but after the bios, all it showed was a little blinking underscore at the top left of the screen. Sooo though it copied over, it won't start. Not sure what to do now. I guess I have to just restore windows, but it turns out she doesn't have her original CD.

The transplant if failing! the patient is dying.

Well thanks for reading!
Tess

[TessMcTessy]

Well, I never did post a followup about the eventual succsess, so I thought I would do that now. I really owe it to the forums here! I was about to give up and just reinstall windows on her new drive and be done with it, but then I found a thread here about HP computers having a hidden partition for restoring the computer. After more searching I found out how to access it and was able to restore windows without deleting any of her files. After having restored windows, I was able to successfully transfer the contents of her old drive into her new hard drive with success. And everything worked out well!

I figure it was my own fault for the problems before. I really should have run chkdsk to make sure all the important files were away from the bad parts of the hard drive before trying to transfer the contents to the new drive. But everything worked out and her new drive is great. Thanks to everybody here for all their help!

Tess

['G']

Glad it work out ok.

Well done.