Moving Vista Install onto a larger HDD.

Wedge · 21 Jan 2009 at 10:02

Hi

I have a install of Vista on a 250G HDD, and want to 'move' it to a larger drive as im running out of space.

I have looked around the web and not really found an ideal solution, i have seen plenty of imaging software to ghost the drive, what i cant get my head around is how to get the image onto the new HDD and set that as your main C: drive?

Cheers.

bledd · 21 Jan 2009 at 10:15

acronis true image.

basically you run the bootable cd

two ways of doing it

method a.
put connect new hard drive
cd in + power up, use the 'clone disk' method -it lets you change partition sizes too.
power down, remove old hd

voilla.

method b.
put cd in, 'backup' (create image) and store it on another drive/partition/networkshare/external drive.
power off pc.
put new hd in
boot from cd
'restore' image to the new hd.

voilla

the 'image' is a stonking break big zip file, with all the boot sector info etc on it -blunt way of putting it

Wedge · 21 Jan 2009 at 11:41

bledd. said:
acronis true image.

basically you run the bootable cd

two ways of doing it

method a.
put connect new hard drive
cd in + power up, use the 'clone disk' method -it lets you change partition sizes too.
power down, remove old hd

voilla.

method b.
put cd in, 'backup' (create image) and store it on another drive/partition/networkshare/external drive.
power off pc.
put new hd in
boot from cd
'restore' image to the new hd.

voilla

the 'image' is a stonking break big zip file, with all the boot sector info etc on it -blunt way of putting it

Perfect, thank you bleed

bledd · 21 Jan 2009 at 11:49

it's not bleed

, no matter what spellcheck says

Wedge · 21 Jan 2009 at 17:47

bledd. said:
it's not bleed , no matter what spellcheck says

lol sorry bledd, my bad,

I got a copy of acronis true image 11 home today, hope that will do it? Am i right in thinking i dont need to install the actual program?

IAmATeaf · 21 Jan 2009 at 19:35

Wedge said:
lol sorry bledd, my bad,

Surely you mean sorry bledd, my bladd

jbloggs · 21 Jan 2009 at 19:51

Wedge said:
...Am i right in thinking i dont need to install the actual program?

If you want to use the ATI bootable CD (and you don't already have one), you need to install the program to make the actual CD, then once made you can uninstall program, and run ATI from CD....

Wedge · 21 Jan 2009 at 20:13

IAmATeaf said:
Surely you mean sorry bledd, my bladd

lol, not helpful

jbloggs said:
If you want to use the ATI bootable CD (and you don't already have one), you need to install the program to make the actual CD, then once made you can uninstall program, and run ATI from CD....

thanks

SinaiSound · 22 Jan 2009 at 01:00

Got a spare HDD?

You could use the inbuilt vista image backup thing

DragonWoLf · 22 Jan 2009 at 01:58

Hefner said:
Got a spare HDD?

You could use the inbuilt vista image backup thing

vistas built thingymajig? Wheres that? :eek:

Wedge · 22 Jan 2009 at 08:03

Copied the Acronis image i made over night to the new drive and its worked perfectly, thanks again for your help.

Im now officially a fan of ATI. I was worrried when i first looked at the drive as it was showing the same 250G of the old one (obviously) went onto disk managment, extended the volume, bingo

bledd · 22 Jan 2009 at 09:48

yeah, it's pretty awesome software, i 'tested' it before buying my home 11 licence

The Deuce · 22 Jan 2009 at 12:34

your vista will need reactivating. You will be back on a 30day trial now

Unlike XP, Vista is programmed to think that if it is backed up then it has been used in a new system, thus 30 activation period.