Cloning

If this has been covered before, please point me to the appropriate thread.

I have a Thinkpad Z61m with a 160 GB HD. This drive has appx 100Gb of stuff on it. I want to use TI 11 Home to clone the 160GB drive to a smaller 120GB drive. The 120GB drive will serve as my backup drive. The aim of this exercise is to have everything (bootable OS included) on the backup drive so that if the main laptop drive fails, I could just substitute the backup drive and be off and running. Using XP Pro for OS.

Can I do this? Anything special I need to know?

Thanks.

 

henryf,

Because of 240 head CHS geometry in a Thinkpad, you will probably need to do a reverse clone to have a bootable backup. This means installing your 120 GB HD in the laptop, performing the clone and then reinstalling your 160 GB HD in the laptop. To keep an up to date backup you would need to do this every few days. Impractical isn't it. In addition, despite having 100 GB of data on the 160 GB HD, it probably won't fit on a 120 GB HD, depending on the last sector in use.

The answer. Don't clone as a backup solution. Use images.

http://radified.com/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1132968474;start=7#7

See Reply #7 (First three paragraphs)

 

Thanks for your prompt response. the link was quite informative.

Are the OS and the boot record included when creating an image? Can I restore the image to a clean new HDD if the original HDD fails (or fi the computer goes missing?)

 

The image contains your OS and MBR. Everything to restore to a new blank HD if the old HD fails. I'd do 100 image restores for every restore due to HD failure. Almost all restores are for software problems and restores are so easy to do. I now do them unattended. Acronis software can't do an unattended restore however.

If someone steals your computer and you still have an image then it is useful. It can be mounted in another computer and the data can be accessed. Typically the image can't be restored to another computer and have it boot straight up but it often boots after a Repair Install. Some imaging software has components for "different hardware" restoring. Acronis Universal Restore for example.

This week I restored (not using special software) an image of a 1 year old computer with SATA HDs to a 10 year old computer with IDE HDs. I'd call that "different hardware". After a Repair Install with the WinXP CD, the restored OS booted normally.

 

Thank you. This is exactly what I need to know.

I can't tell you how much I appreciate your help.