Transfering info. from old hard drive to new hard drive

ztech · #1 January 18th, 2004, 11:38 PM

I need a new hard drive. I think mine is about to crash. I think I can purchase a new one, make it the slave drive and transfer everything over to the new drive that way but I am not sure. i need advice on what the best way to do this is. Thanks

**Murf** · #2 January 19th, 2004, 02:04 AM

You cannot copy a operating system. And some programs if just copied over will not work, as they have to be installed.

Since you are putting a NEW Hard Drive in, and IF you have the original cd's/floppies of your programs, then this would be an ideal time to install Windows fresh on a clean hard drive. You will have to save email, favorites, etc which can be copied.

Otherwise you would have to make an IMAGE of the drive then you can trnasfer the image to the new drive. It would take software, such as GHOST, Drive Image to do this.

What makes you think the drive is going bad. If you have some software problems, then transfering everything over to the new drive, (even an image) you are transferring your problems.

THIS is one way to do it.

ztech · #3 January 19th, 2004, 11:33 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Murf

You cannot copy a operating system. And some programs if just copied over will not work, as they have to be installed.

Since you are putting a NEW Hard Drive in, and IF you have the original cd's/floppies of your programs, then this would be an ideal time to install Windows fresh on a clean hard drive. You will have to save email, favorites, etc which can be copied.

Otherwise you would have to make an IMAGE of the drive then you can trnasfer the image to the new drive. It would take software, such as GHOST, Drive Image to do this.

What makes you think the drive is going bad. If you have some software problems, then transfering everything over to the new drive, (even an image) you are transferring your problems.

THIS is one way to do it.

My drive is making noise and on boot up has said it cannot read drive c. I purchased a new drive today and was told there is software that came with it which I can use to make an image of my old hard drive to install on my new one. It is a Western digital.

**GretaP** · #4 January 20th, 2004, 12:52 AM

Hi ztech,
Western Digital's Data Lifeguard Tools is the software to which you are referring......if you didn't receive this disk with the new drive, you can d/load it from here. The instructions for using Data Lifeguard Tools for copying the drive are here . Since the drive that you want to copy is already failing or has failed, you may not be able to perform a successful drive copy.