Shifting the OS to another drive

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In the past I have had issues with a failed motherboard and RAID setup on my computer. With a new (but same) motherboard I managed to install my OS to an old and slow hardrive and recover the data from the raid set up, thankfully. I have since junked one of the original raid drives as the connector on the back was broken.

As it currently stands I have my OS on my old slow HD. I removed that and tried to install the OS to the one remaining HD, not possible, I tried everything and the windows install would not detect it. So I plugged my old HD back in and booted up, I plug in the other HD and its picked up and works fine, so I try again to install the OS to the ex raid HD and it still wont pick it up. Lots of stress.

I have now ordered a 1tb F3 HD, how hard would it be to transfer the contents of the old HD across without having to try and battle with the windows 7 setup not finding new drives again?

Thanks
 
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Do i just clone the old disc onto the new disc, remove old disc and the computer will boot from the new one?

recommend any decent cloning software? what about windows mirror?
 
Yes, just plug both drives in and use the software to copy an exact replica of the old drive.

I have not used cloning software before, but I do know the basics of it, and so I cannot recommend any cloning programs.

I think that Windows Mirror is used for RAID 1 and only available in the Ultimate and Enterprise editions.
 
Well I have done some research and it seems that Acronis True Image seems to be the favourite among people.

You simply plug both drives in, boot into Windows normally, load Acronis True Image and select the drive you want to clone, then select the destination.
 
there may be a myriad of issues which *may* arise from cloning OS drives, you most likely will need to re-sid the machine afterwards, and Windows may need to re-activate again.
 
Its basically performing a sysprep, it will wipe off IDs associated with previous accounts etc (serials, passwords, shares) and will bring it all back to default value of when you install windows for the first time, but obviously you get to keep the files. Totally up-2-u though.

Also whilst Acronis is good,I prefer Symantec Ghost, its very robust and trusted (i use it for my image deployment at work),and I have done some disk-to-disk copies with it in the past and never had any issues.
 
I've never had any problems migrating from HD to HD using Acronis (or, in the past, Ghost).

Never had to reactivate Windows and never had any software break.

If you have a Western Digital HD in your PC, you can even grab a free copy of Acronis (hint - you don't even have to be using a WD HD in the migration, just need to have one in the PC when you run the software).

Link to Acronis True Image WD Edition Software:
http://support.wdc.com/product/downloaddetail.asp?swid=119
 
Acronis TrueImage is good However you can just use the free cloning tool that's available from your new disk manufacturers website. Seagate and WD both allow you to use this for free IIRC.
 
Clonezilla is a good option, I'd be sure you have your windows disc around to repair / reactivate when you swap the drives. (Vista being particularly picky)
 
Another vote for Acronis (used a few times now). Excellent piece of kit to have in the tool box with the spare SATA and power cables!

So long as your motherboard is the same model and revision you shouldn't run into any problems with Windows activation, serials or drivers. If you are going to a new model motherboard, then I'd say install Windows from scratch as it will probably end up saving you time in the long run compared to chasing down resulting bugs.
 
theukmoog said:
I've never had any problems migrating from HD to HD using Acronis (or, in the past, Ghost).

Never had to reactivate Windows and never had any software break.

If you have a Western Digital HD in your PC, you can even grab a free copy of Acronis (hint - you don't even have to be using a WD HD in the migration, just need to have one in the PC when you run the software).

Link to Acronis True Image WD Edition Software:
http://support.wdc.com/product/downloaddetail.asp?swid=119
Click to expand...

+1

I got the free Seagate version of Acronis and used this to clone my copy of Windows from the old 5400rpm Toshiba drive to a new 7200rpm Seagate drive, and has worked flawlessly. Everything works as if nothing has changed :).
 
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