Restoring to a new larger hard drive - still confused

Hi

I have read the FAQ re-the above but am still confused.

I have an existing 40GB hard drive that I want to replace with a 160GB drive. To minimize physical swapping around of hard drives (I already have another Hard Drive in my other free internal slot) I want to upgrade using the Restore option. Therefore I have backed up "My computer" to an external drive, and plan just to replace the existing C: drive with the new 160Gb drive, boot up with the emergency boot disk and use the restore option to restore "My computer" onto the new hard drive. My confusion lies in:

Will I have to format the new Hard Disk before restoring using the "Add new Hard Disk option"?
I don't want to partition my new Hard Disk. If I use the restore option will it just put 40GB onto the new hard drive and leave the remaining 120GB as a continuation of the restored 40GB or will it try and make any remaining free space into a separate partition or (if I haven't previously formatted the disk (question 1)) will it leave the remaining 120GB as unformatted?

I hope this is clear, if not get back to me.

Step by Step instructions would be appreciated!

Thanks

 

No formatting of a brand new, unformatted drive is necessary. Just select Recovery and proceed. TI will create partitions as determined by the image that you are restoring.

After you select Recovery, you will step through a few screens until you see the graphical view of your new 160 drive with the 40GB partition. Here, you will have to drag the sliders to fill all the available space with your expanded 40GB C partition. Be sure to note and create zero bytes before and after the expanded c partition.

Backing up for a second, DO NOT select the check boxes to restore the entire 40GB disk image. Simply check to restore the C partition only - NO MBR! Windows will automatically create a fresh MBR for you after the restore completes and you restart the first time.

Windows will also notify you of new hardware which requires another restart. After that restart, everything will start up normally.

Good luck.

 

Thanks for the reply, I will let you know how I get on.

A couple of other queries after reading the PDF before I set off!

Excuse my paranoia but can I just double check the instructions re "MBR and Track 0" tick box. In the PDF file in FAQ (where in the example there are 3 partitions to restore), after restoring the last partition (i.e. at the end of the partition restoration process) it says to tick "MBR and Track 0" but in this instance of just one Partition ("the equivalent end of the partition restoration process for a single partition") you are saying don't tick?

When I get to logical drive letter screen do I still go for the option "No thank you. I do not want to assign a letter"?

Many thanks

 

You should be performing the restore when booted from the TI Rescue CD. The screen you reference only appears when restoring from within Windows.

If you have only one partition on your old drive and only one on your new drive, whether you tick MBR or not will not matter.

One mistake often made when restoring to a new disk is that the user has never visited the Windows Disk Management screen to see how their disk is configured. Just because they see only Drive C when in Windows Explorer cannot be construed as having only one partition. You need to look at the graphical view of Disk Management to make sure you do not have any recovery or diagnostic or other hidden partitions--which do not show in Explorer.

After restore completed, be sure and disconnect your original drive before first bootup.

Good luck with your Restore. Don't forget, you can boot from the CD and practice your procedures before you click proceed.

 

Right. I say don't tick anything but the C partition in your case because you have imaged only one partition, C.

In your case, I suggested not ticking and restoring the old MBR because Windows will automatically create a fresh one for your new 160GB drive.

As Mudcrab said, be sure you're in the right mode when you do your Recovery to restore your image. It's a simple process if you don't read too much into it.

 

Thanks to you all. Installed new Hard Disk Fine. In case it helps others my summary of what I did is below:


• As suggested it is worth doing a trial run of the initial steps to get familiar with the Menus and to check your Emergency boot disk works. Therefore put in you emergency boot disk and Re-start your computer. If your computer boots straight into Windows (and are confident you have created the boot disk OK) then (as in my case) your Bios is not set to try and boot from CD/DVD first rather than the Primary Hard Disk first. This is easy enough to sort out, but varies from PC.
• On your trial run Select True Image, then Recovery and check you can find your backup file. To come out press Esc then boot into Windows and then shut down your PC
• Remove your old C: drive and put your new hard drive in its place. Note check the jumper settings on the back of the Hard Disk first. It may be configured as “Cable Select”. I believe this setting is OK for some computers but mine is an older computer and it needs to have the Hard Disk with the operating system on it set to Primary (if unsure set to Primary). Refer to the top of the Hard Drive where there should be a picture of which connectors need to be connected together with the small plastic jumper for it to be set to Primary. If it needs changing get a pair of tweezers and move the jumper to the correct position.
• Switch on your Computer and Acronis Loader will load, and present 4 Options
o True Image (Safe Mode)
o True Image (Full)
o Drive Cleanser
o Windows
• I chose True Image (Full)
• Select Recovery and Click on Next
• Find your File. Note the letters assigned to Drives/Partitions may have changed so it might not be where you expect it to be (they automatically get re-assigned correctly at the end of the process). Click on Next
• Chose “Restore Disks or Partitions”. Click on Next
• Don’t Select Disk 1, just select the C: Partition “NTFS (C”. Don’t tick MBR and Track 0. Click on Next. At this stage you may have to wait 2 or 3 minutes before it goes to the next screen so don’t panic!
• In the “Restored Partition Location” Screen, Click on “Unallocated” which will be your New Drive (Mine was Unallocated 149 GB). Click on Next
• In the “Restored Partition Type” Screen, Click on Active and the Click on Next.
• The next screen is the “Restored Partition Size” screen. If not partitioning your New Hard Disk drag the slider to the right until all of the space on your Hard Drive is selected (in my case 149 GB)
• Leave Free space Before and After set to 0 bytes. Click on Next.
• Then asks if you want to Restore another Partition or Hard Disk. For my scenario I selected No.
• It then asks you if you want to validate your back up before restoring it (I chose No as I do this when I create the backup in the first place)
• Click on Proceed and restoration will take place. Wait!! Hopefully at the end it will say everything went alright. Click on OK,
• When finished remove the Emergency Rescue Disk and Re-Boot your Computer.
• Windows will load and say it has “Found new hardware”, let it go through this process (2-3min) at the end of which it prompts you to Restart your Computer otherwise the news hardware might not work properly. Select Yes and you Computer will restart (Note: Restart may not begin for 3-4, so don’t Panic just wait). At the end of the Re-Boot your system will be as it was before except you now have a larger Hard Drive installed.

 

Success! Glad to see you did it!

 

Hi roycymru I am glad you got everything resolved to your satisfaction I could not help responding to your last post with a step by step summary of how you did it. This will be so helful to a lot of newbies on this forum. I would like to commend you for taking the time to write this proceedure. Much easier to understand then the TI guide.
I have installed a few new hard drives and "recovered" to them, but I still printed out your "summary" and will keep it handy for future reference, thanks.

Good going!