Migrating to a new HD on my Lenovo T61

[TemjinGold]

Hey guys,

So I finally secure one of them DTG Hitachi 200gb drives from an ebay scalper and am ready to swap my dinky 60gb drive with this one. After calling Lenovo support, I discovered that I could just burn Recovery DVDs off the laptop so that I wouldn't lose my Vista Ultimate OEM. My question is: Is it better for me to get Acronis (or something similar) and clone my existing drive or is it better to just use the Recovery DVDs on the new drive clean? Data and such currently on the notebook drive is of no concern (I can easily backup it up and such.) My main concern is that the original drive had a hidden partition (as you Lenovo owners are well aware) and that this partition contained the info necessary to make the Recovery disks and to update the software to make them. Am I at any disadvantage if I simply use the Recovery DVDs I made on the new drive? Thanks!

 

[corkyg]

I have done three HDD upgrades on my Lenovo T60, and it is not hard. BTW - Vista Ultimate was installed, and it never caused a hiccup.

First, you need an external drive case for your Hitchi 200GB (I have two of them.)

Then you can use Acronis True Inage ver. 11. That is the only one that will clone Vista without you having to do a post op repair.

Install TI 11 and have it create/burn the bootable Rescue Media CDR. This is what works best. Don't try to do it from within Windows.

Now here's the scenario. With the Thinkpad OFF, the new drive is in the external case connected to a USB port. Boot the laptop with the Rescue Media, and after it is loaded, select the CLONE DRIVE function - right side, center of menu screen.

It then will analyze show your two drives to give you the choice of source and destination. Yiou want to clone from the internal to the external.

Then choose MANUal mode.

A new drive will not ask about deleting partitions on the target drive, but will ask if you want to keep data on the source drive. Say Yes. Then choose PROPORTIONAL if the two drives are different sizes. The source drive is your future backup ace in the hole.

You will then see some screens which show you the proposed result. If you agree, select PROCEED after that.

The cloning process from then on is out of your hands. It will duplicate your old drive proportionally to the new one, including the Thinkpad special partition. It can take then, anywhere from 10 minutes to an hour or so, depending on how much stuff is on your old drive.

When it is done, a screen will pop up saying so. Then turn the machine OFF completely. Disconnect the external drive, and remove the bootable CDR. Boot the system to your old drive. This simply confirms that your ace in the hole backup is good to go.

Power down and remove the old drive. Remove the rubber rails and the drive from the caddy. Put the new drive in the caddy, replace the rubber rails, and install the new drive.

Power up and you should be good to go with the new 200 GB drive. It will likely find new hardware and ask for a reboot. That's all.

This way you do not need to use any recovery tools or restoration. You now have two good drives for your laptop.

I have refined this process by getting an eSATA PCMCIA or PCExpress card and a 3.5" external case with a 200 GB drive. I then clone the internal drive to that external big drive. The eSATA link is about 5 times faster than the USB link.

I also got a second Thinkpad caddy with rubber rails, and that holds my #2 drive. So, once a month, I clone the active internal drive to the big external. Then I switch drives, and clone from the external to the second internal - and thus I always have two good drives ready tio go, and I rotate them monthly. I always have a ready-to-go spare drive with everything on it. It's great insurance.

 

[TemjinGold]

Thanks for the response. My question was more "Am I disadvantaged if I just use the Recovery DVDs (already made) on the new drive clean" rather than "How do I clone"

 

[corkyg]

If you are talking about the Lenovo provided recovery DVDs, the disadvantage would be losing all programs and data that have been installed since day 1. Some folks are OK with that - they dote on clean installs. But for me, that means up to three days of work instead of a 1 hour clone job.

If you are talking about Recovery DVDs made from the existing, current drive, then you should be OK. As long as you have a way to restore them on a non-bootable cherry drive. Are they bootable?

I always prefer cloning to back up and restore. It is more efficient for me.

 

[TemjinGold]

They are. I had to burn them myself as Lenovo wanted 50 bucks for a set. One more question: Why proportional? I can't really "use" the hidden service partition so wouldn't proportional be a big waste of space or do I need that partition to be larger due to the drive being larger?

 

[corkyg]

The alternative to Proportional is "As is." That would result in the exact same size drive you presently have. (In the cloning operation.)

No, you don't need the Lenovo unmounted special drive to be bigger - but it doesn't hurt. It allows for better optimization of that drive. You can also adjust those partition sizes afterwards.

Are your recovery DVDs bootable?

 

[TemjinGold]

They are bootable.

Actually, there's one more alternative that I selected (forgot the name.) It allowed me to set the exact size for each partition. I did 10gigs for the special partition just in case you had a reason for proportional.

The migration is complete and the old drive is in the 2.5" enclosure that the new drive came in. Thanks for all your help.

 

[corkyg]

Glad it all worked out. Down the road, you m,ight want to acquire the Lenovo Ultrabay SATA HDD adapter. You pop out the DVD/CD drive and put it in, and you then have two internal SATA drives, and can copy stuff much faster.
UBay

Then, if you desire to clone, you will need to get Acronis TI ii, install it, and create the Bootable Rescue Media on a USB flash drive. That works much faster than the USB external.

Or - you can simply use another drive to archive data such as digital imagery, etc.

 

[gpgofast]

FYI.

There is a really good clean install guide for Vista/lenovo here:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=144783

I am also a great fan of Acronis and use it regularly and religously.

 

[TemjinGold]

Awesome, thanks!