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Cloning hard disk partitions selectively

M

max789

Member
Hi

I've a Seagate hard disk divided into 5 partitions: C, D, J, K, and H. C and D are primary partitions with C as the system drive hosting Windows XP.

I'd like to clone partitions C, D, and J only to a new, larger sized WD Caviar Black drive, and replace my old Seagate with the WD. Ideally, the end result is that the cloned C, D and J partitions will be identical in size to the existing ones, with a large unformatted section on the WD drive.

What would you recommend as the most straightforward procedure to accomplish the above objective using free software tools? I've spent some time reading about DriveImage XML, BartPE and a few tools but none seems to offer the selective cloning feature. Further, there appears to be frequent problems with how to set the OS partion of the new drive active.

Thanks!

Max
 
With Acronis (I've used the version of this provided free as Seagate's Disk Wizard) you can create on a new drive a Partition of any size you choose to specify, choosing also whether or not it is a bootable drive with an OS on it, and then Format it and Clone everything from ONE existing drive (that is, logical drive, not physical HDD) to the new Parition. Then you can repeat the process for another source drive, making the second Partition in the Unallocated Space of the new HDD unit. And so on.

You MAY be able to do exactly the same jobs using the free downloadable HDD utility package from WD called Data Lifeguard Tools (there are several versions). Most likely the WD tools will only make the clone copies TO a WD new HDD unit (it won't care where the data comes from). I have not used that package, but I expect it will do the same functions as Seagate's software does.
 
err partition to partition copy is all you need.
most anything does that. including xml/clonezilla. xml is easiest as it does it in windows.
 
Hi

Thanks for all your helpful feedback, especially about Seagate's DiscWizard. Still trying to learn as much as possible about cloning and imaging...

Max
 
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