Clone master HD to slave HD

jsmoke · 19 Sep 2015 at 10:25

I have two SATA HD in my PC, one is just for storage. Can I clone my master drive onto this so I have a backup drive if the master goes down. So I would be able to just change the boot order in BIOS and boot from slave drive with full OS.

Any free software or tips here?

Destination · 19 Sep 2015 at 11:20

a sort of mirrored raid?
some motherboards support hardware raiding
modern windows can software raid
unsure on how the array is rebuilt in a catastrophic failure situation, varies with the array

jsmoke · 19 Sep 2015 at 11:26

Hikari Kisugi said:
a sort of mirrored raid?
some motherboards support hardware raiding
modern windows can software raid
unsure on how the array is rebuilt in a catastrophic failure situation, varies with the array

Not RAID, I just want to create an image of main HD and then clone/load that onto the second HD so I can boot from either.

TheVoice · 19 Sep 2015 at 11:28

RAID would make more sense really, otherwise your backup drive (there's no master or slave with SATA) is going to be reliant on the backup process being run as opposed to just handled natively in the background.

jsmoke · 19 Sep 2015 at 12:01

TheVoice said:
RAID would make more sense really, otherwise your backup drive (there's no master or slave with SATA) is going to be reliant on the backup process being run as opposed to just handled natively in the background.

Ok I will try and explain a bit more. My main HD has been making funny noises over the last week and I have having errors when booting up the PC, but after a few attempts it will load but I think my main HD is on the way out.

But I have two HD's on this PC, the second HD is formatted on D: and acts just as storage. But I have a feeling the main HD with the OS is going to die soon. So I want to clone the main HD's OD/files etc.. to the second HD so when it die's I can just switch HD's.

And there is no RAID on my motherboard I would need to buy a RAID card, by which time the main HD may have died. I am not buying a RAID card anyway.

KIA · 19 Sep 2015 at 13:59

jsmoke said:
But I have two HD's on this PC, the second HD is formatted on D: and acts just as storage. But I have a feeling the main HD with the OS is going to die soon. So I want to clone the main HD's OD/files etc.. to the second HD so when it die's I can just switch HD's.

You won't be able to "just switch hard drives" if you have other data on the storage drive.

1) Use Macrium Reflect to create an image of the OS drive and store the image on the storage drive.
2) Buy a new OS drive. Use Macrium to clone the old drive to the new.

Waiting for a drive to die is asking for trouble.

jsmoke · 19 Sep 2015 at 14:43

KIA said:
You won't be able to "just switch hard drives" if you have other data on the storage drive.

1) Use Macrium Reflect to create an image of the OS drive and store the image on the storage drive.
2) Buy a new OS drive. Use Macrium to clone the old drive to the new.

Waiting for a drive to die is asking for trouble.

When you say store the image on the storage drive, can I not just create an image and clone it onto the storage drive as if it were a new install of an OS?

KIA · 20 Sep 2015 at 13:44

jsmoke said:
When you say store the image on the storage drive, can I not just create an image and clone it onto the storage drive as if it were a new install of an OS?

Sure, if the storage drive is completely empty. It won't be like a new OS install, it will be an exact clone of the current installation.