Best way to clone a Hard Drive

[Deaton Design]

I have a computer here at the shop that I do all my signwork on, and it has did well for about 8 years. But, I need to put in a bigger hard drive.
What is the best way, or program, to clone the old hard drive over to a new one, system software and all. The old hard drive is only 60 gb, and Im going to put in a 160 that I already have here, bought but never used.
Thanks for any and all advise and help.

 

[SignBurst PCs]

Have you thought about just adding it in as a second drive? Then store your files on it instead of the C:/ drive?

Anyhoo... I have used some good ones in the past, but "Ghost" was a very simple drive image (or clone) software.

 

[chopper]

I have use what is called bart pe,ghost I think this is the same as mentioned above, I use it to back up my drives so if there is a failure it is stored on several different drives and I can replace the affected drive and install the sofware with bart pe ghost,

//chopper

 

[jiarby]

ghost!

 

[iSign]

I tried Ghost once, & it worked well. I had at least a dozen programs, email settings, FTP settings, printer settings, internet settings yada yada yada... & I reformatted a computer & then ran the ghost image as an experiment.

Everything came back up perfectly, with very little input from me. The process to build my drive back up the old way would have taken at least half a day.

The only downside in my case was some small irregularities, or conflicts or other inexplicable little issues here or there that I ALREADY had been dealing with, was the reason I wanted to re-format. It wasn't a real critical thing, just some nuisance or other I hoped to move past. I knew it would not be solved, if I restored with Ghost, but after I decided to reformat, I decided I didn't care as much about the nuisance issues as I did about trying out the ghost restore as a test.

I was right that the restoration brought EVERYTHING back just like it was, good and bad, but it was an extremely convenient way to recover the previous condition of a computer.

I agree with Signburst, that adding in a second drive, and keeping your files on the new larger drive, and the OS & applications on the existing smaller drive makes a lot of sense.

Do you have an auto-backup system in place?

 

[Replicator]

True Image

 

[trakers]

All the major drive manufacturers offer, for free, a program to do just what you want, to migrate the entire contents of your old drive unto a new (usually larger) one.

Used the Seagate program hundreds of times with perfect results.

If you bought a retail drive the program should be included on a disc, however, I like to grab the newest version off the web.

As an example, if your new drive is a Seagate (which is the best drive at this time) then go here: http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/crm/selfservice/search.jsp?DocId=201991

If it is a Western Digital, then go here (I don’t have the WD website address as I don’t buy WD drives, but here is the program): http://majorgeeks.com/Western_Digital_Data_Lifeguard_Tools_d2855.html

If it is some other brand, search the manufacturer site ad they will have a similar program. They are designed specially for the task, work well, and are free!!

 

[Modern Ink]

We run a Dell server for our shop with (1) 200 gig drive for the OS & (3) 500gig drives for data and backup.

We save all of our jobs to (1) of the 500gig drives. The second drive mirrors the first drive and the 3rd backs everything up weekly.

If one of the drives goes bad we can just pull it out and put in a new one and it automaticlly rebuild the data on the drive.


We also save our file to an off-site storage as well. That way in a MAJOR problem our data is not lost.

 

[3dsignco]

I run Acronis New Image. I cloned my Drive when I finished building it and had everything loaded. Has saved my butt a few times as recently I have been getting a run of bad drives. Thank you seagate.

Then all my client files are on a triple mirrored 500gig drives. with one hot swap for alternating backups. Which I would like to say I do every week.. But in reality Maybe once a month.

 

[jiarby]

iSign is right about Ghost.... it isn't much help if you back up your problem too!

 

[iSign]

As an example, if your new drive is a Seagate (which is the best drive at this time) then go here...

I beg to differ...

I run Acronis New Image. I cloned my Drive when I finished building it and had everything loaded. Has saved my butt a few times as recently I have been getting a run of bad drives. Thank you seagate.

wow... you too?
I had 3 Seagates fail on me within as many months!
I had 2 WD MyBooks go bad a few months apart in 07, which were both replaced with more WD's the next day... but I could never trust them after that, so I got two Maxtor 1TB NAS drives... both fried on me, & one of the refurbished warranty replacements fried as well... they suck! ...and their customer service sucks too!! (I have another refurbished drive... wanna buy it?

Now I run a 4TB Buffalo that Signburst suggested... I love it!

 

[Techman]

As an example, if your new drive is a Seagate (which is the best drive at this time) then blah blah.. .

There has been a serious problem with Seagate drives lately..
There is talk of a class action suit. Rumors?

However it is not a hardware problem. It is a firmware problem. They are aware of it and offer a upgrade fix for any one using the seagate drive with this possible problem. To get the update you must email them and describe your drive.

Drives manufactured before dec. 2008, have the problem. This includes 160 gig drives and up to 1.5 tera. A firmware bug affecting the 7200.11 the DiamondMax 22, the Barracuda ES.2 SATA and the SV35. thru dec. 2008...

SOme user find data is not accessible after a power on. Or there is a 30 second freeze up while streaming data or video. etc.. Or a complete failure..

IF you are a MAC user
You are hosed if you have no access to a Mac Pro or a Windows PC. People who returned drives to Seagate got a refurbished drive, even if a brand new one was sent in. Mac users should completely feel screwed by now.

Overall. unless your tech is up to date then you could be hosed. A seagate drive will suddenly just plain quit. This is a well known problem. Seagate offers a software utility that will tell you if your drive is at risk, but that only works on Windows PCs. They provide some firmware updates for the affected, but at this point they do not appear to have an updater that will run under OS X for MAC's.

If a tech does not know about this then get a new technician. The unknowing tech is a lamer.

http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/crm/selfservice/search.jsp?DocId=207931

 

[choucove]

I wanted to chime in with a little more questions on this matter if possible.

Several of the solutions mentioned above in this I have had a little practice testing out, being Acronis True Image and Norton Ghost. Most of my experience is with a version of Ghost, though unfortunately I don't know the exact version. While working with the Engineering department at the University of Kansas we had used Ghost for imaging mass numbers of computers in several different labs. It was amazingly smooth and I wish I could replicate this type of setup for myself for other business as well. A server was set up as the Ghost image host, where we could remote login, set up a Ghost session selecting the image file and the number of client computers that would be loading that image. Then we just pop in a boot disk to each of the computers, type the IP address of the Ghost server in, and let it start loading the image. Amazingly smooth and efficient.

Now, most of the problem I have run into in the past is several of the more well-known imaging tools requires that you have the software INSTALLED on the computer even to restore an image. This means that in a situation where you are putting in a fresh unformatted drive to recover after a complete crash or similar, you still would have to install Windows and install the software to be able to recognize the image files and run the software to restore that image to the drive.

My question then, with all of your experience, what other software out there could I create an image of a drive, and not have to follow through this whole process of reinstalling Windows and the software in the situation of recovering the image if an entire new drive or a blank drive were used?

Is there software that will allow me to just create a sort of boot disk and select the image file and run directly off a bootable disk? I've seen several use an imaging tool, such as is available on the SystemRescueCD linux live CD, and create an image in a separate partition on the same original hard drive for recovery (like many HP and Dell systems come set up now) but if you would have actual drive failure and need to replace the drive you would also lose your image in that situation.

 

[iSign]

Most of my experience is with a version of Ghost, though unfortunately I don't know the exact version...

...several of the more well-known imaging tools requires that you have the software INSTALLED on the computer even to restore an image...

...what other software out there could I create an image of a drive, and not have to follow through this whole process of reinstalling Windows and the software...

I think I answered your question before you asked it... even though you had some experience with ghost, your experience seems to have either not included the problem you are concerned about... or if it did... well my experience with Ghost 10.0 differs:

I tried Ghost once, & it worked well. I had at least a dozen programs, email settings, FTP settings, printer settings, internet settings yada yada yada... & I reformatted a computer & then ran the ghost image as an experiment.

Everything came back up perfectly, with very little input from me. The process to build my drive back up the old way would have taken at least half a day.

 

[3dsignco]

Chucove,
I can't speak for ghost but with acronis Yes you can do what your asking. I think you may be getting backing up and cloning mixed around. When I do a clone of my Boot drive If my original takes a crap which it has. I just plug in the cloned drive that I have sitting on the shelf and start the computer normally like nothing happened. It is an exact copy of my original form the day I cloned it. Then I will run Acronis and clone the drive again on a new drive so I have another reserve. And stick it on the shelf untill the next Seagate drive craps out.. (I no longer by Seagates)

Now when I do my Backups. Yes I do need the software to restore my back up as it compress's the files and does a parity check to make sure everything is backed up perfectly. I do backups occasionally but the way I run my drives I have never had a complete failure as to when I have needed to restore all three drives at once.

 

[jimbug72]

Does Symantec make Ghost for Macs? Not sure but based on Deaton Designs Avatar I'd say they're Apple users.

 

[choucove]

I understand, thank you both for your help. I wasn't sure that Acronis had the ability of restoring an image of a drive onto a new drive without having to first actually install the software. I never had created a boot disk from Acronis (or Ghost for that matter, as the boot disk I had and used were for a special version of Ghost that is not really listed and for sale as "Ghost") but that is very helpful to know!

 

[Deaton Design]

Does Symantec make Ghost for Macs? Not sure but based on Deaton Designs Avatar I'd say they're Apple users.

The hard drive I will be cloning is on my pc at the shop. My mac is at home.
Thanks guys for all this info.

 

[The Vector Doctor]

apple - carbon copy cloner or super duper