Cloning issue>Large to Small Drive..Please Help

Discussion in 'Acronis True Image Product Line' started by seshsud, Sep 12, 2007.

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  1. seshsud

    seshsud Registered Member

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    Hi,
    I have a registered version of Acronis True Image 10. I am trying to clone and the hard drive info is as follows:
    SOurce Hard Drive: 200GB of which 74.5GB is partitioned with NTFS of which only 21GB is used, the other 111GB is unallocated free space.
    Target Drive is 80GB (shows up as 74.53GB of unallocated space).

    When I try to go through the cloning wizard (using both automatic and manual modes) I get the following error: No matter what I try it leads to the same step.

    Acronis True Image Home failed to move your data because your new hard drive does not have enough free space to complete the operation. The reasons follow.

    1. Some of your partitions contain errors. We recommend you reboot your operating system and correct these errors. For example, start the Check Disk utility if you use Windows.

    2. Your new hard disk is much smaller than the old one. Make sure you've selected the correct old hard disk. If you have chosen the "As Is" option on the previous page, go back and try to select another option.


    I have done chkdisk several times on both source and destination disks.What is going wrong.Documentation states that I should be able to clone from a larger to a smaller disk as long as the total used up space is less than or equal to the target hard disk size. Am I wrongo_OPLease HELP...
     
  2. Brian K

    Brian K Imaging Specialist

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  3. seshsud

    seshsud Registered Member

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    Brian, defrag didn't work, what are the other tricks?
     
  4. Brian K

    Brian K Imaging Specialist

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    Do you want a single partition on the 80 GB HD? Do you have partitioning software?

    I'm not sure why you want to do this. Large to small. As a backup?
     
  5. seshsud

    seshsud Registered Member

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    Yes I want a single partition of 80GB.I am (away) from home and did not bring my partition magic software along so right now i dont have any partition software.

    Doing large to small because I built a PC with a 200GB harddrive for my folks but their old 80GB Seagate is still running strong,since they dont' use it much even 80GB is a lot for them.So thought I could clone the 200GB onto the 80GB and keep the 200GB for myself :)
     
  6. Brian K

    Brian K Imaging Specialist

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    OK. That's clear. Try this.

    Put your 80 GB HD in the computer as a slave. From WinXP Disk Management, delete the partitions on the 80 GB HD so that you have unallocated space.

    Still in Disk Management, create a partition (primary will do) in the unallocated space of the 200 GB HD. Use the full amount as you will delete this partition later. Using Acronis TI, create an image of your C: drive, writing the image to the new partition.

    Shutdown, change your 200 GB HD to the slave position and the 80 GB HD to the master position. Using the Acronis TI CD, restore the image you just created to the unallocated space on the 80 GB HD. For "restored partition type", choose Active. Restore the MBR if you like.

    When it's finished, shutdown and remove the 200 GB HD. Now boot to the 80 GB HD.

    Success?
     
  7. Brian K

    Brian K Imaging Specialist

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    seshsud,

    Any feedback for us?
     
  8. seshsud

    seshsud Registered Member

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    boy oh boy,had the worst ever time of my life..here's the story..

    tried your suggestion of partitioning the 200Gb and in the new partition created a backup of the existing hard drive (73.8GB).Prior to installing TI, I had installed Acronis Director also but didn't restart.I had 2 backups of the hard drive.Once I restarted, the system failed to restart,apparently some files in th windows/system32/config/system directory and/or MBR was corrupted. Tried recovery with winxp cd, no help, then I disembarked on the slippery slope of restoration.

    First tried to recover the 200GB hard drive with the image created on the 2nd partition,apparently system got restored to the same unstable state.Now Tried recovering it from the other backup I had on a removable storage (note: backup was created prior to system instability).This time the removable hard drive gave up in the sense it kept hanging after 50% of restoration onto the 200GB.
    Now tried to recover the image onto the 80GB (hard drive space was only 73.2GB which was greater than backup image, so TI kept on cribbing that it cannot revive onto a smller drive.

    With no hope in sight and no internet access, had to sadly format both the drives,installed xp on the 80GB and installed everything from scratch :(
    Kept hitting several roadblocks (not being able to find the right drivers,xp sp and other patches had hickups during instalation etc etc).

    To not give up hope,I am going to try this once I get back from vacation, Tryto recover the image onto the 200GB hard dirve (this time mvoe the image to a chained hard drive instead of a USB and see WTH will happen).PS I spent hours building this PC/setting up the right softare (all of this exists in the backup image).

    Now my folks PC has nothing but XP and all the freebies and I spent most of my vacation time doing this instead of having fun :(
     
  9. Brian K

    Brian K Imaging Specialist

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    seshsud,

    That's not much of a holiday.

    I'm trying to understand what went wrong. Was the 200 GB HD in a USB enclosure?

     
  10. DwnNdrty

    DwnNdrty Registered Member

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    seeshud, were you doing all this by running TI from within Windows? If so, I would suggest that you use the bootable True Image Rescue CD instead.
     
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