Question Hard drive copy and reassign drive letter - failing HD, cannot clone

[Michael]

I have been trying (via Acronis True Image) to clone and backup my data and programs drive. OS (Windows 10) is not on this drive. Unfortunately there must be bad sectors as it fails. Chkdsk /r also fails about at the 1% level (just continues to boot into Windows). Seatools says that it fails the short test. Cannot get the USB tools to work.

I am currently using Teracopy to copy all the files and folders over. As an example, my Steam library is on the drive and most programs that I don't care if they launch quickly.

There is nothing on the drive that I need to have or could not download again.

Can I copy this over to a new drive and then remove the old one and change the drive letter on the new drive to the existing one and all the programs will work? The copy will flag the files that fail so I will have a list.

 

[Iron Woode]

I have been trying (via Acronis True Image) to clone and backup my data and programs drive. OS (Windows 10) is not on this drive. Unfortunately there must be bad sectors as it fails. Chkdsk /r also fails about at the 1% level (just continues to boot into Windows). Seatools says that it fails the short test. Cannot get the USB tools to work.

I am currently using Teracopy to copy all the files and folders over. As an example, my Steam library is on the drive and most programs that I don't care if they launch quickly.

There is nothing on the drive that I need to have or could not download again.

Can I copy this over to a new drive and then remove the old one and change the drive letter on the new drive to the existing one and all the programs will work? The copy will flag the files that fail so I will have a list.

to fix this issue you need hdd recovery/repair software such as Spinrite.

I had the same problem cloning a client's hdd. I used spinrite on it and it took several hours to temporarily fix the drive. I cloned the drive and everything turned out fine.

 

[Michael]

to fix this issue you need hdd recovery/repair software such as Spinrite.

I had the same problem cloning a client's hdd. I used spinrite on it and it took several hours to temporarily fix the drive. I cloned the drive and everything turned out fine.

GRC - that rings an old bell, I remember them from when before I joined Anandtech ages ago. I had Shields Up! ages ago.

I am copying all the files now, but I definitely need to clone? Again - not the boot disk with Windows on it. Spinrite costs about as much as a new HD. If there was something crucial on the HD it might be worth it, but I mainly just want to save time re-DLing all the files.

Chkdsk and Seatools both fail.

 

[Iron Woode]

GRC - that rings an old bell, I remember them from when before I joined Anandtech ages ago. I had Shields Up! ages ago.

I am copying all the files now, but I definitely need to clone? Again - not the boot disk with Windows on it. Spinrite costs about as much as a new HD. If there was something crucial on the HD it might be worth it, but I mainly just want to save time re-DLing all the files.

Chkdsk and Seatools both fail.

you could try:

Free Hard Disk Repair Software for Disk Repair | Step-By-Step Guide

If you are facing hard drive logical error in Windows 10 and need hard disk repair software, you can read this article to get help. This page shows you five solutions for disk repair, including free hard disk repair tool.

www.easeus.com

there are others and some are free. No guarantees though.

Good luck!

 

[Jimminy]

Once, I copied everything on a data disk to a new disk. Then I uninstalled the old disk in device manager. Then I set the new disk's drive letter same as the old one had been. It worked fine, and to be honest, I never thought about it possibly not working
The old disk wasn't failing though. I just wanted a new disk to put the data on. Maybe I only got lucky?

 

[Michael]

I was able to copy the entire drive except for one file onto my NAS. Deleted the bad file and trying a clone again.