Is it possible to ghost a WinXP boot partition to a new hard drive?

[xizor]

I couldn't get this work to work earlier this summer after ghosting because WinXP would complain about verfication or something lame like that.

Now I'm going to have to switch my 3 home computers to new hard drives and I really don't want to format and fresh install them all again.

x

 

[tyanni]

Since you have a non-corporate version of windows, it will require activation I believe if you install on a diff. pc.

 

[GAZZA]

I think you get an activation code when installing the program, correct me if I'm wrong ?

also depends on what version of ghost your using, also take into account the older versions (pre- 2003) are not able to copy a NTFS partition to NTFS partition. I found this out the hard way you have to copy NTFS to FAT32/16.
But the updated version has the ability to copy NTFS to NTFS .

btw Xizor you live not too far from Woolwine VA where I reside

 

[xizor]

hmm... corporate version eh? looks like its too late for these installs though, what a waste of a weekend.

x

 

[redbeard1]

What version of ghost are you using? What version of XP? How big are the drives you want to put in new? Over 120 gig and XP has issues.

I've used ghost 7, 7.5, and 2003 many times, the way your describing what you want to do, and have not had any issues.

 

[xizor]

I think you guys are missing the point, ghost works perfectly with my hard drive. I can make an exact copy to a new hard drive no problem, BUT WinXP knows its on different hardware and refuses to load so it requires a new installation.

 

[redbeard1]

If by changing hard drives, you mean that you are changing to a whole new computer or motherboard, then you need to reload windows. Ghosting xp works if you are swapping it back into the same computer.

 

[boggsie]

Originally posted by: xizor
I think you guys are missing the point, ghost works perfectly with my hard drive. I can make an exact copy to a new hard drive no problem, BUT WinXP knows its on different hardware and refuses to load so it requires a new installation.

What precisely do you mean by 'refuses to load'?

I when I have done this in the past, I always ghost PRIOR to doing the whole activation thing. I have a ghost of XP, Office XP, etc. but I created the ghost, before I activated. Now, when I image, I get the 'call microsoft' prompt, and I go through the 2 min Q & A so they can verify that I am not a bogus software pirate.

So, when you say it refuses to load, will it absolutley hard stop and not load, or is it prompting you to call MS to manually activate?

 

[xizor]

redbeard1, that's kinda what I'm getting at. Its the exact same computer, except I'm changing to a different hard drive. Same mobo etc.

It boots to the login screen, but when you try to login it kicks the user back out with a message saying the computer couldn't be verified or something to that effect. This happened when moving from a Western Digital -> Maxtor hard drive and a IBM -> Western Digital. There isn't even an option to reactivate, it just complains. A repair installation didn't work for me either.

I don't want to ghost the installation, I want my entire drive, files and installed programs.

 

[xizor]

here's some more info:

http://www.experts-exchange.com/Operating_Systems/WinXP/Q_20292761.html

>The problem that some folks are missing here is that there is a thing called the HAL which is compiled in a dll. The hardware info and SID are not just housed in the registry >anymore, the hal.dll is part of the deal and can't easily by bypassed. That is the reason for my first post to point out that one needs to do things to be able to move an XP >installation from one machine to another. I also pointed out to use the SysPrep utility because that is its function, which is to prepare moving the XP installaion from one >machine to another.
>
>By just moving the HD to the other machine XP will probably choke just on the fact that the mother boards and the CPU are completely different. They will have different >check sums and serial numbers not to mention probably a different bus architecture and few other gotyas and for XP these are consider major hardware changes. I know by >experience that it will only be pure luck to take a HD from one machine and plug into another machine with Win2000 or XP installed on it and have bootup into the OS.
>
>The first link I posted outlines how to move a current XP installation from one machine to another. One of the things it mentions is to use NTBackup as way not only for >backing up the current installation but how to use it to preprare for it to be installed onto another machine. It outlines what one needs to do step by step. It sort of implies >that a second HD is part of the mix.

>>>In this case, what should I care about SID

>You have no choice in this. It has very little or nothing to do with networking. Since the SID is contructed partly based on your hardware and this hardware isn't going to be >a match on the new machine so XP will see that the SID probably is incorrect and will probably not boot.

 

[redbeard1]

A friend had the a similar error, and after searching around, one of the suggestions was to boot using win98 boot disk that has fdisk on it, and then use the fdisk /mbr command. After he did that, it booted.

Here is the post.

OS forum

 

[corkyg]

I don't use Ghost, but every week I clone my HDD to an identical HDD.. I then switch drives after the cloning (in DOS using DriveCopy 4) and it boots. XP Pro finds "new hardware" everytime, installs it and asks to reboot. Then when that is done, the two drives are totally interchangeable - but only on the same machine. I do this on both my "desktops" (actually floortops) and my lappy. I have duplicate drives ready to go for every computer.

 

[xizor]

well I just tried the first of the three, moving the system from a 80GB to 120GB WD JB series. All went well, ghosted and XP found the new device and installed it fine. I'm guessing this only because the drives were nearly identical except for size.

*update*

The first time I tried I only had one partition on the disk, so I went back and fdisked it, partitioned, formatted it again and reghosted. This time WinxP gives an error that it cannot activate and kicks me back out to the login screen. Same WD drives but different result, this really is cumbersome.

 

[GAZZA]

OK initially I thought you had issues with Ghost itself not being able to copy your drive correctly but now it seems otherwise.
I have just recently changed from a AMD xp 1700 cpu + Asus A7V8X KT400 chipset mobo to a new P4 2.6c + ABIT IS7 mobo with the same XP installed SCSI drive, what surprised me was the fact that it actually booted into XP and found all the new hardware correctly and installed the drivers for it.
Normally this isn't the case with most newer mobo's as 99% of the time you get the good old blue screen blah blah...
Have you tried to use the same hard drive and put a newer cloned drive in your original pc and see if that works ?