How do I copy my HD to my new PC?

[CRE]

Oops, I forgot to post the problem....

I have a Pentium III computer with Windows 2000 Pro and important info on my 10gb Quantum HD. Right now I'm building a Pentium IV w/ the Soyo P4I Fire Dragon. My question is, how would I copy my old HD to my new computer without losing any information? I do not want to go through the hassle of installing every program over again considering everything is tailored to my taste. I have access to Norton Ghost and DriveCopy, but I'm afraid that by using those programs, my system would not work because the specs of the two computers are not the same.

If anyone has any experience with my problem or any suggestions as to what I can do, please reply. Thank you, Alan.

 

[Bleep]

Well the problem with doing that is that unless you have the same stuff that is videocard--soundcard-- chipset it can be a real problem but here is how to go about it.
Plug the old drive into the new machine and set it as slave on ide2 use the program that came with your hard drive to do a mirror image to the new drive. Remove the old drive and your on your way to solving a ton of problems with drivers and stuff like that.

Bleep

 

[corkyg]

Since there is no text in your message, I assume that your topic says it all?

The easiest way for a new system is to simply clone your HDD using DriveCopy, Drive Image, or Ghost. DC creates a floppy boot method that is OS independent. Clone the drive, set it to REPLACE, and UNHIDE. When done, put the new drive in the new computer and go from there.

 

[Jonathan93]

Considering it is a new PC, you will probably have to reinstall most of your applications (You cannot copy everything, because Windows on the two machines is different, and needs to remain that way.). Probably one of the easiest ways of copying it over is to pull the Hard Disk out of your old PC, and putting it in your new one. Just copy what you need off of it, then put it back. This can also be achieved by networking the two PCs (You'd need a NIC in each PC and a cross over cable.)

If you want an exact copy of a drive, Partition Magic can copy partitions to new drives and enlarge them and shrink them for you. Also, if you boot up into safe mode, you can copy every file on your PC but the C:\Windows\win386.swp using Explorer (That is a swap file, so it doesn't matter anyway, And this has only been tested with 9x).

 

[Skibby9]

Sorry, CRE, but like others are posting, you're gonna have to reinstall some of your apps. While I can't say that I know everything about transferring files to new computers, I can tell you that I'd expect a real sh!tstorm of problems with driver issues by using an exact duplicate of the HD in your other machine.

Of course, I could be wrong, but I figure it's worth the time to make sure that you get it right the first time, by making a fresh installation of all your apps and updates. You can still transfer important files via networking, or adding the old HDD to your new machine.

 

[littlezipp]

You really should do a clean install of the OS on a new system, otherwise you are going to have problems. Take the extra time to make sure that it all goes in correctly otherwise you might be unhappy.

 

[zigCorsair]

Here it is. 95/98/ME/XP all transfer between systems fine. However, you are running 2K. If the MB/Proc combo is close enough, it might work, but I really doubt it. It might, however, work if you were to upgrade to XP. You'll lose in performance, but I understand you don't want to deal with reinstalling programs. Then again, XP might need new DLLs anyway.

Reccomendation: reformat.

edit: when you switch a win2k hard drive from one system to another, it does not work. I am reasonably sure this means that if you ghost the old hard drive to the new one and switch the system, it will not work.

note - I have this experience from switching btw AMD and Intel. Has anyone successfully switched between Intel and Intel before?

 

[SaigonK]

Use ghost and you can do it.
You will not need to reinstall any of your apps, etc. etc.
Just turn your your IDE controller from the current one to "Standard IDE Controller" under device manager then ghosit it and put it down to the new drive.
It should work just fine and wont be a problem, remember that Ghost costs money so if you do intend to only use it once, you might want to just forego the $$ and do a complete reinstall.

 

[Richard98]

Since you have access to ghost and drivecopy, you could try it and see if it works. I was able to transfer the contents of my old system (Intel celeron with integrated sound/video) to my new system (ASUS thunderbird) without any problems, but I was using Win98 at the time.

 

[musixian]

I'm surprised nobody's mentioned Aloha Bob! If you go to Aloha Bob's Web Site you can look up (and purchase) PC Relocator which promises to not only transfer files/programs/settings, but will do it across different OS's. I haven't challenged it to the limit, so I can't tell you for sure, but the guys on "The Screen Savers" say they've had good luck with it. It's retail and there's no demo, so you'll have to shell out about $30 for it, but consider it an investment in time saved. Sheesh, I'm not even getting commission.

 

[CRE]

Thanks for all the replies. I checked out that Aloha Bob's PC Relocator and it looks pretty good. Has anyone had any experience with it? If I don't do that, I'm probably going to try to ghost it first, but I'm doubtful it would work so I am ready to just reinstall everything and spending the next few days copying data.

If there are any more suggestions, feel free to post!

Thanks again....