Trying to replace HDD in WinXP Pro?

[NuovoTech]

I've cloned WinXP Home successfully with 2 laptops, but I'm having problems doing that with XP Pro on my desktop. I want to use a larger HDD, so I imaged old HDD with Ghost 2003, but new restored image will not boot with new HDD(tried cloning a # of times). Is this an activation issue? Any one out there able to successfully clone XPPro on a new HDD? TIA

 

[boomerang]

I just did it yesterday using Ghost 2002. It was XP Home and not Pro, but I really can't imagine what the difference would be.

You didn't leave the old drive connected in the system did you?

 

[xbassman]

I have done it once, but it was the new drive was a Maxtor and I used the Maxtor utility to copy all the data. It booted fine and has no issues.

 

[Jeff7]

Works for me - but it involved a tweak in the clone settings. The default setting may not work - you need to use the option that clones EVERYTHING. If it just clones the partition, it doesn't get the boot information, or something like that. Cloning the boot sector and everything should take care of this. I don't remember offhand which tab this is under; just look through the available options when you run Ghost normally.

 

[NuovoTech]

ou didn't leave the old drive connected in the system did you?

No, I'm aware XP will just boot off old Crive partition.

The default setting may not work - you need to use the option that clones EVERYTHING. If it just clones the partition, it doesn't get the boot information, or something like that. Cloning the boot sector and everything should take care of this. I don't remember offhand which tab this is under; just look through the available options when you run Ghost normally.

I think you're right & I'll give that a try...how does ghost, etc deal with cloning smaller HDDs to much larger new HDD? Obviously some new partitions will be muchlarger, but does it give option on sizing, ie which ones?

I have WDC HDDS, they have they're own cloning SW also, maybe I should try that? Tho, I like using Ghost2003...

 

[chocoruacal]

If you do partition--partition, the boot stuff doesn't copy over. Either do disc--disc, or fix the MBR via fixMBR or a repair install.

Lets say you have:

30 gig parted 10/20.

When you disc-->disc and the other disc is larger (say 120gigs), it'll look like this:

10/110.

Hope that helps.

 

[NuovoTech]

fix the MBR via fixMBR

I understood all the rest & it's all very helpfull. Could you explain the fixMBR a little more...is that a DOS exectuable utility?

 

[NuovoTech]

I forgot to mention I can't get in to the XPPro Recovery Console, I never setup a password(left it blank) when installing XPPro. Now when my XP CD asks me for a password I can't get past that. I do not want to reinstall XPPro since that's too much work. I did set up a password as administrater in SafeMode... Anyone know a workaround for this?

 

[Challenger]

If you are using Ghost and go the bootable floppy option

 

[chocoruacal]

Originally posted by: NuovoTech
I forgot to mention I can't get in to the XPPro Recovery Console, I never setup a password(left it blank) when installing XPPro. Now when my XP CD asks me for a password I can't get past that. I do not want to reinstall XPPro since that's too much work. I did set up a password as administrater in SafeMode... Anyone know a workaround for this?

Do a repair install. It doesn't take that long, won't ask for a password. Do not do the "recovery/repair" option that takes you to the console. Instead, choose to install onto the existing XP part. It will then ask if you want to reformat, or repair the current install. Choose install. XP will go thru the usual install procedures, but it won't take as long since I believe it just recopies over all the system files. Don't quote me on that though.

 

[chocoruacal]

As for fixmbr...do a google...the first result will be MSs page with instructions.

 

[NuovoTech]

Thanx all! You gave me lots of things to try...I printed out that M$ info on recovery console, etc. Still not sure about getting around that no password issue?

 

[corkyg]

All this ghosting, imaging and restoration makes a simple process complex. I do this every week on all my computers (three) using DriveCopy 4.0 by Powerquest run from a bootable floppy set. It takes only about 12 minutes to clone an 80 GB drive. (That is the upper limit for this software) When done - I simply swap the cables and reboot. Never a problem.

 

[NuovoTech]

The MBR setup was the problem, fixed it with the Ghost DOS utility called GDisk.exe...Thanx all!