unable to see orig. drive using new cloned drive for os

Windows xp home. I used disk clone and made a new copied 250gb sata drive with os on it. I then switched sata cables to make it boot from the new drive and I put the 160gb drive in the 2nd sata slot. The system boots fine & works fine off the new copied 250gb drive. In Device manager both drives show as working properly. However, I am unable to see the original 160gb drive through my computer and am unable to access it. Please help me solve this dilema. I would like to also use the older slower sata drive as an additional library/dvd site. (Interestingly if I switch the sata connectors and let the os boot from the original drive, I can see both the old 160gb and the new 250gb)(The new 250gb has a faster access and quicker boot time is why I want it to boot my os from it.)

 

Hello emt,

Thank you for choosing Acronis Disk Backup Software.

Please be aware that we recommend you to unplug one of the hard drives right after the disk cloning process has been finished (your PC will shut down automatically in order to let you to unplug one of the drives), since keeping both source and destination hard drives connected (actually, identical drives) might cause this sort of problems, because of the Windows XP drive letters assignment rules.

Since Windows is still bootable (which is a kind of luck in such cases ), the only thing I can recommend you to try is to assign the drive letters to the partitions of your second hard drive manually from Windows Disk Management (Start -> Control Panel -> Performance and Maintenance -> Administrative Tools -> Computer Management -> Disk Management).

Thank you.
--
Alexey Popov

 

Thank you Mr. Popov. I did as advised on changing the orig. 160gb drive to another alphabet higher up that was not used and my cloned 250gb drive now has access to the original 160gb drive. I shutdown & restarted the system & it boots fine off the 250gb clone and the alphabet given prior to shutdown was retained by the os for the 160gb drive thus I am still able to see the drive without revisiting disk management in windows. Also, if I simply swithch the SATA plug in at the motherboard, the 160gb boots the system & the 250gb is now usable as before mentioned. Since I now have access to both drives I am planning on monthly using disk clone to copy one drive to the other. (I hope the program allows me to copy 85gb of data from the 250gb drive to the 160gb drive when I delete all of its partitions in a month). The following month I am planning on reversing the process again 160gb back to the 250gb drive. I don't mind replacing a months worth of personal data if the hard drive should fail (of course I hope I can pull it off with the boot disk). And, I love the convenience of not having to find cd's etc. of backed up data to reinsert. With internal harddrives less than $50 for 160gb after rebates, I'll skip the cd's most of the time and only use the faster & quicker hard drive imaging. (will keep a boot cd just in case) .

 

Hello emt,

I'm glad to hear that you managed to solve the problem.

If you have any further questions please feel free to ask.

Thank you.
--
Alexey Popov