Copy OS Hard Drive 1 to 1st Partition on 2nd HD?

I have 2 hard drives.

HD 1, the master, is 40 G and has Windows XP & all my programs. It is labeled C:\.

HD 2, the slave, is 300 G & has my data & True Image Backups, etc.

Can I copy my HD 1, Windows XP partition, onto the first partition of HD 2 ( currently labeled "F:\" ) & then if HD 1 ever fails, just put HD 2 as the master and boot into Windows from HD 2? If I switch HD 2 to become the master on the IDE cable, will the system see it as the C:\ drive?

If the above works, what program should I use to copy? Acronis Disk Director Suite 10.0's "Copy Partition" wizard? I also have an older Seagate DiscWizard version, DiscWizard for Windows (not Acronis - the newer version of Seagate DiscWizard is made by Acronis & is like True Image). True Image will only copy one partition from one hard drive to another hard drive that has only one partition.

My goal is to have Windows boot up from my second HD if my first HD fails.

Thanks for anyone's help!!

 

You can use DD10 to copy the partition with only a small chance of corruption. I have had corrupted "Copied Partition" operations in both the "Stand Alone" version of DD10 as well as when copied under Windows, but they are rare events in my experience with DD10.

I have also experienced corruption CLONING back-up hard drives (again a rare event luckily) using the manufacturer's utilities. When this happens I just re-do it.

The only way to tell is to boot the partition up and put it through the paces. I have copied the C: partition numerous times on different disks and they have worked fine, but DD10 did not allow them to be labeled C:.

If your first hard drive fails pull it out and if the second hard drive does not boot use the repair console to recover it ("bootcfg /add" or "bootcfg /rebuild").

If there is an uncorrupted Windows OS on the drive it should boot after being added. I'm not sure if it will see it as the C: drive but it non-the-less should boot. (If I am wrong a re-install will still save your data {AND restore the letter C:} as long as you are careful to install/format it only in the failed partition). I do realize this is exactly what you want to avoid.

Perhaps others have tried what you want and can clarify this "C:" last point.

(I recognize that a Catch 22 situation is involved when backing-up any drive or partition as the "BACK-UP" must be "proved" somehow in order to empirically call it a "BACK-UP": realistically many times we must accept and assume it is correctly backed-up due to time constraints and other circumstances {like retaining one's sanity}).

 

lionman: I set up 2 disks like you propose and tried it out. I was using the Windows loader with XP's installed (5 XP partitions total and all worked on both disks with no proplems, no troubles).

1: COPIED C: FROM FIRST DISK TO SECOND DISK IT WORKED FINE, BROWSER AND ALL. I also set up a DATA PARTITION on second drive and "moved My Documents" to the "I" drive ( the copied "C:" drive was listed "H" {"H" was listed as primary and active by DD10} on the second disk, as "C:" was not available as it was already used on the first disk ).

2: I removed the first disk and set the second disk as MASTER and it would NOT BOOT (I expected this). In the repair console I tried bootcfg /rebuild--> drive did not boot (this I expected to work!)

3: I tried fixmbr and chkdsk r, but still no windows boot (all hanged on blue- screen-of-death).

4: I then Installed OS SELECTOR rescue media) but still no boot, only the blue screen.

5: I installed DD10 stand alone version and changed drive letter: it showed that it changed the letter from "H:" to "C:" (this I did not expect) but still no boot only the blue screen!! I used all the functions of DD10 that were not greyed out or non-functional, but still no boot.

I should have tried this out Before replying to your post. I was using what I thought was common sense and logical deduction.

I was sure bootcfg /rebuild would recover the partition due to a previous experiment I tried on Windows XP: I copied (in windows explorer by dragging and dropping) ONLY THE WINDOWS FOLDER into another ntfs partition and using bootcfg /rebuild was able to boot this sawed off XP ( no documents and settings or program files) and it was able to get on the internet!!

Yes there was no "firewall" or "user settings" and AT&T browser did not allow me to down-load it's software but I down-loaded three freeware programs: 1. comodo firewall, 2. Clam antivirus, and 3. Firefox browser which I operated for over a week with no real problems!! I finnally was satisfied that it was stable in this truncated state.

I wrongly concluded that ANY uncorrupted "CORE XP" would be able to be recovered with the repair console. In this instance it didn't work. Perhaps on another machine it would work.

I think It should work in principle but it is not working on MY MACHINE. Reading articles in the Microsoft knowledge base and on the web were highly complicated concerning the problem of changing drive letters and is beyond my understanding at this point. Perhaps another experimenter could figure out a way to get this to work, as it seems that it should be able to be pulled off.

The only remaining question is if a re-install into the "C:" will allow access to the data in the "D" partition. Perhaps when I have more time I will try this operation out. Again it seems logically that the data should be recoverable, but it will remains a mystery to me untill I try it out.

 

Since you have TI, I think you're overcomplicating the procedure. I doubt you'll get a bootable copy if you use DD to copy your XP partition to the F: drive. It's kind of like a semi-clone since you're not copying the entire drive. Having two "clones" in the computer is just asking for trouble. Windows hates it and one of them will be modified sooner or later. That is why they always tell you to disconnect the cloned drive before booting back into Windows for the first time. As soon as Windows sees the cloned drive it changes it.

If you want to keep your C: drive letter on the "backup", I would recommend that you just do your regular TI backups of your current C: drive. Then, if your drive goes bad, you can connect the 300GB drive as the first drive and then restore your backup image into the first partition. You may have to run XP repair to fix the drive to boot since it wasn't previously bootable, but that should be it.

 

lost most control of my fingers so pleaqe bear with me, it hurts like hell 2 type.

wait a sec. i must be missing something here. if you R talking about moving your boot partition 2 another drive then booting from it i've done it 4 years and a zillion times if thats no what u mean lease forgive me 4 not understanding.
i do it one of 2 ways

use Ti to backup the boot partiton, then restore it to the any drive i want to but after reboot i use DD10 (what ever) 2 make sure that partition is defined as primary and active (of course unhidden)
u usually (if the other drive is still connected) need 2 hide the C: boot partition (releasing the C: letter free 2 be used by the now new boot partition on the same or another drive)
or

run DD10,9, etc
use DD10 2 copy the partition 2 the drive u want. hide the current C: partition
makje sure the partition i copied to is set primary, active - and not hidden!
thaTS IT
reBOOT

MAIN THING 2 REMEMBER , THE PARTITION - BOOT Prtition has 2 be primary, active and unhidden

when u hide a C: active partition then unhide another primary partition that now unhidden primary partitions letter usually becomes C - dont forget 2 set the partition active (DD10)

sorry, kinda ill will elaborate if needed if this is not clear enough let me know

 

RTShaw: IN DD10 do you use OS SELECTOR to hide and unhide the partitions? Do you know if you can hide and unhide not using OS SELECTOR (using DD10 proper?). On my machine DD10 proper seems not to have this capability, but I could be just ignorant of where this capability is accessable on the tool bars/menues.

Thanks --cortez

 

Cortez;

.. i use DD10, partitions magics pqboot and other utils..
u know partition magic, i think ver 8, has a wonderful tutorial on how a hard drive is set up, partitioning, diff between primary/ extended partitions, etc.
Also (a real goodie) how the various partition types are read and assigned letters by your os.. it does make a diff. it assigns partition letters one way if the added partitions are extended then if they are primary and u can have more then one primary partition. i find with multiple partitions and drives its best 2 have only your boot partition defined as primary..

once u understand it its very very simple.
on this machine next 2 my bed im tripple booting. xp.vista 32 bit, vista 64 bit


how ever i feel all of em are simple and basically just hide the current primary boot partition, unhide a diff primary partition, make it active then reboot. added stuff is hidding various partitions, etc..
now if i'm in vista and i can barely move my hand and DD10's on my desktop i run that, if i'm screwing around with various flash rives im subject to click pqboot32.eze.. all are super simple 2 use. no the current os selector has a problem but its easy enough to fix for some reason although i fixed the screwed up line (thanks 2 another users postings here i think Thomas) anyway lazy as i am i just dont really trust it. so until Acronis comes out with a fixed version (unless i had the source code so i could fix the software itsself-myself) i will keep using what's more comfortable 4 me at the moment i'm booting into another os.. u have 2 understand, i can hardly see, in pain 24/7 taking tons of hideous meds some narcotics i hate em all the side effects sux!!!!!! So i am apt to do strange wierd things when it comes 2 my babies (my systems i've built) so i may no take the easiest or fastest route if its detrimental 2 me or hurts 2 move my hand, finger, or body in that direction -if that makes sense...

i hope i answered you....sorry 4 jumping around

Ron

 

yes u dont need os selector but it makes it a lot easier especially if you have some partitions u dont want to be seen in some oses..

>>On my machine DD10 proper seems not to have this capability,
if u r using vista or xp it does....

i wish i had the energy 2 type it all in 4 u but currently i dont. leat the basic operatins and set up of a hard drive and what the various types of partitions do/mean. its quite simple actually 2 make it quick just check on extended and primary partitions then u should understand enough to basically how 2 use DD then follow the DD10 docs on how 2 set active, hidden, unhidden, and to create those 2 types of partitions and thats it... use this rule.. only set you boot partition as a primary partition set all others extended.. you cant screw up then cause once u hide the current primary partition and unhide or create another primary partition your damn near there just set that partition active(you msy have 2 tell your bios 2 boot from the diff partition if u have an older motherboard)

 

Thank you all for your help. Great responses! MudCrab's seemed the simplest and easiest to do (didn't know I could do it). I like simple and easy; but I like functional and secure too. Unfortunately, they do not always seem to go together.

I just need to clarify some points, MudCrab or whoever can help:
The right procedure is as follows (is it correct?):
1) I take out the defective first drive and make the 2nd 300G drive the master. (I know how to do this)
2) I boot into True Image CD and restore the TI backup of the C: partition (which is on a later partition of the 300G drive) to the first partition of the 300G drive. (I know how to do this)
3) I do a Windows XP repair on the first partition to make it bootable and it is set to go! (I DON'T know how to do this)

Now some questions:
A) How do I do a XP repair? I did not see the option on my XP disk. It just gives me to option to install as an upgrade or new installation. Other options don't seem to apply.
B) Do I need to make the first partition primary and active with DD10 somewhere in the above steps?
C) Once I have done 1-3 above, will the first partition on the 300G drive (now the master) be seen as the C: drive?
D) Some of my programs point to the partition letters of the 300G drive (not including the first partition). Will those letters be bumped up one level since the first 40G hard drive has been removed and replaced by the now one 300G drive? I guess I can change those letters back to the old letters with DD10 (easier than changing options in all my programs).

Thanks for your help again all.

Lionman

 

U only do a repair if needed. Ive never had 2 do a repair as long as the image u R restoring has no errors. ALways check your backups theres a setting in TI options (TI10) tht does an auto check of the image file after its created. I also usualkly hve the image file checked prior to restoring and after restoring too when the option is available...
There shouldn't be a need for a repair...
THe other thing I do is an errorcheck of the partition priorto backing it up..

Any program pointing at a partition that changed letters has 2 have its pointer/icon changed to the new partition. in other words if your Gfx files are on D: and you have a shortcut to that dir (im keeping it simple as i can) then that partition changes to say F: then you go to the shortcut and change its path from D:\Gfx to F:\Gfx.

Lionman, it really helps if u check out the tutorial on hard drive & partitioning them. Partitionmagic has a good one but there are very good tutorials on the subject (not hard 2 understand or 2 long) all over the web..

xp repair is the recovery console u can either install it from the xp disk or run it from your xp disk. search 4 recovery console, ts really 2 muh 2 go into detail right here.

BTw.. i'm a long time Acronis users and will probably always be one. i mention partitionmagic because it does have such a decent tutorial on hard drive, partition types and such. But i swear by TI8, TI10, DDS10 all acronis products i use/used including osselector 8. 10 has a problem but its correctable (wish they'd do it).. in the C:\Bootwiz dir, bootwiz.oss theres a error listing partitions hidden & or active..keeping one primary partition from being set f u look at the lines that say hidden = and active= the error should be pretty obvious.

 

You may need to do a repair. Most likely you may just need to fix the MBR so it will boot (assuming it doesn't have one already). I'm assuming this is a data drive and never booted Windows before. As far as I know, the repair option is available further on into the install process. It will detect an existing installation and ask if you want to repair. Also, I think it copies all the Windows files back (sort of underneath, if you will) to your drive and you'll have to reinstall the service packs and updates that are not included on you install cd.

Yes, the partition needs to be primary for Windows to boot. TI should automatically mark it as active during the restore, but if it doesn't for some reason you can manually set it with DD.

It should be the C: drive.

Since the other partition(s) on the 300GB drive are not the primary Windows partition, you should not have any problems setting the drive letter back to what it should be if it changes. You could use DD or Windows Disk Management to do this.


I want to add that, in my opinion anyway, you're not looking at the easiest way to restore. Hard drives are pretty cheap now so just buying a new one to replace the 40GB one when it dies is the simplest solution. You can then just restore you 40GB whole drive image backup to the new drive and you're done (if your new drive is larger you can resize to use the new space). No drive letters change and nothing gets changed on your 300GB data drive.

 

RTShaw: Thanks for the lowdown on OS SELECTOR and other info. Along w/ your and MudCrab's insights I think I'm ready to attempt better set-ups.

lionman: you posed a question that needed to be addressed and forced me to re-evaluate my approach to backing up.

Gentlemen:
Again, much appreciated--cortez