Restore a system partition on a 2nd disk

Hi
I have installed a 2nd hard drive on my PC. My system partition C:\ in on disk 1. I have created an image of C:\ and then restored it on my disk 2 (partition M:\). Everything worked well and I have a system partition on each disk.
Then I have disconnected my disk 1, put the disk 2 into master and tried to reboot my PC, but it stopped on the blue screen of Windows and nothing else.
I thought that with this procedure I would get a perfect copy of my original system partition on my disk 2 and that I would be able to boot from this disk only.
Does anybody know why it doesn't work ?
Thanks

 

Yes. You need to create an image of disk1 (not just the C-partition) and restore that to disk2.

Or, install Windows on disk2 (now, when it is your master disk), and THEN restore C to disk2.

 

I have a Maxtor 200GB disk failing so I bought a WD 250 GB HDD.

Restored an image of a 40 GB "C" partition to the blank HDD and set it active on the properties page and increased it to 60 GB.

It booted just fine, XP noted the change in the drive and asked for a reboot.

I did not restore an MBR, repair MBR or do a reapir install of XP. So much for having to copy the entire drive (to have it boot)!

What Charlos needs to do is not have disk 1 in place when the partition is restored. Disk 2 needs to be in the position of disk 1 and then restore.

 

Hello charlos,

Thank you for choosing Acronis Disk Backup Software.

Please try to use "Clone Disk" wizard. This wizard allows transferring the operating system, applications and data of an entire hard drive. Or please create the image of entire hard drive and then restore it on the second drive.

Thank you.
--
Irina Shirokova

 

Thank you to all of you for the support. I'll try your proposals and let you know
Regards

 

Just one additional question before proceeding. If I use "clone disk" wizard, does the program give automatically some new "letters" to the new partitions on the 2nd disk (different than c:\ for the system partition ?) ? Should the new system partition have the c:\ letter or does it work also if the new system partition has a different letter ?
Thanks

 

Hello charlos,

When you choose the automatic mode, the program transfers all the data, including partitions, folders and files, to a newer disk making it bootable (if the older was bootable as well). Everything including the installed operating systems, data, disk labels, the partition letter, etc. will remain the same.

Thank you.
--
Irina Shirokova

 

Thanks but this might be a problem, no ? If I want to keep my first disk on my PC and want to keep on it my initial partition system (as a back up in case the other disk dies) I can't live with 2 partitions on my PC with the same letter even on 2 different hard disks. So which one should I change : the partition system on my 1st or 2nd disk ? And how can I do this ? Ususally it is quite difficult (and dangerous) to change the letter of a partition system, isn't it ?
Thank you

 

Hello charlos,

The main goal of the "Disk Clone" wizard is upgrade when you move from small hard disk to a new large disk. However, if you wish to leave the hard drive in the computer you will need to clone the disk under Windows (it will ask you to reboot the computer to perform the operation please press "Yes" that you want to restart) rather than after booting with Acronis Bootable CD.

Each Windows system will see different partition layout. There will be no problems with letter assignment. However, after you boot into one copy of Windows you may not see the other disk in "My Computer". If this happens please navigate to "Start" -> "Control Panel" -> "Administrative Tools" -> "Computer Management" -> "Disk Management" and assign letters to the other drive manually. This will not affect letter assignment when you boot from this second drive, however, and everything will work properly.

Thank you.
--
Ilya Toytman