Transferring files from one disk drive to another on the same computer

Hello,

I recently installed a second hard drive on my computer. I use this computer for a one man business I run. I would like to know how I can move most of the files from drive C to drive E (the new drive). I am running out of space on drive C (down to less than 1 GB). The machine responds sluggishly to requests. I fear a system failure as I have experienced freezes, which forces me to shut down the computer and reboot.

I will appreciate any helful hints/suggestions.

Thank you
Betrando

 

1gb is not much, but it's plenty to keep you from experiencing sluggishness, etc. 1gb will not slow you down as you describe. More likely your system is just overrun with spyware. Most people's machines are these days. Follow instructions at this link:
http://www.fixyourwindows.com/windowsxpsolutions.htm

also see here:
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/SupportCD/OptimizeXP.html

and finally, here:
http://www.fixyourwindows.com/optimizewindows.htm

But if you just want to clone to the bigger drive, follow the instructions for cloning in the TI manual.

But if I were you, I would reformat and install fresh on the bigger drive. Then recover whatever data you need from your old drive or an image of your old drive. Read the above pages first to learn how to defend yourself against spyware, so your new install starts off without any of that stuff.

Good luck.

 

I don't want to disagree with JimmyTop. He may well be right about spyware slowing your system, but with TrueImage, you can do an interesting experiment.

Make a full backup of your current boot drive. Restore that image to the larger drive, and during the restore, expand the partition to use a lot more space. Boot from the larger drive and see how things run.

If the system runs a lot faster, then the limited free space was at least part of the problem. However, I'd suggest that you still check to see if you have any spyware and remove it since that is a primary cause of slow operation and crashes.

 

Ok, I have backed-up all of my C drive to a folder I created on drive E (the newly installed hard drive). My objective is restore some program files and regular work files to drive E and to delete the same files on drive C. I do not want to boot from drive E. I want to continue to boot from drive C. Where on True Image do I begin? Is it "Restore Image"? Can I selected which files to restore to the new drive? How do I delete the same files from drive C?

I will appreciate any help.

Thank you
Greg

 

There are many reasons other than spyware and lack of free space why a system can get slow. If you're running Windows, it tends to get slower over time without specific maintenance. Expecially if you have installed and uninstalled many applications, the Registry gets bloated and lots of extra DLLs and other stuff gradually makes Windows much less efficient and slows it down. A clean install of Windows, even to the same disk, can make a world of difference.

I reformat my drive (after backing up all my data files) and do a clean install of Windows every year or so. I worked on one PC for a client, and the Win2000 PC was so slow that my client was going to get rid of it. I wiped the drive, reformat, clean install Windows, installed his applications and restored his data. It became like a brand new computer, massively faster and more responsive than it had been.

If you have the time and the ability, you may get a lot more benefit out of clean installing Windows on the new drive, rather than just porting over the image of a slow system to a bigger drive.

 

Hi Greg,

TrueImage can't do what you are describing. TI makes images of whole partitions. You can't restore a program from the image to the same or a different drive. Only restoring the whole image will restore programs.

You can restore individual files, and this is useful for restoring lost data files. However, you can just move the data from one drive to the other using Windows Explorer.

If you want to move a program, you should uninstall it and then reinstall it specifying the new drive. Be aware that you won't move as much as you expect because every program installs some of its files in the Windows folder or on the boot drive. As an example, installing Microsoft Office to D instead of C only puts about half the files on D.