Can I clone a Win2k install from PATA to SATA?

September 7, 2005 9:19:33 AM

I have a nice clean install of Win2k on a DVD-R that I created in Ghost for the purpose of cloning to a new system. It was created on a PATA drive and I changed the PATA drivers back to the MS standard 2 channel drivers for compatibility purposes.
I’ve used this DVD-R a number of times to clone or reinstall systems with no problems. However, I’ve never tried to do this with a SATA drive until now.
I can’t get it to work and I’m not sure whether it’s because I have the wrong SATA driver or whether it’s just not possible.
The method I used was to try a repair from the Win2k Setup process and provide drivers for the Promise controller on the Asus A8V Deluxe, when asked.
It didn’t accept the drivers from the Asus CD, so I downloaded what I thought were the correct drivers from Promise’s website which were accepted, but Win2k couldn’t find a disk.
I’ve read that this type of repair is possible on XP but does anybody know whether it works with 2000?

I’m going to try the latest drivers from Asus’s website tomorrow, but I need to go to bed now. So if anyone knows whether I’m chasing up a blind alley then please let me know and I’ll get on with a fresh install first thing tomorrow.

Note. The BIOS is setup to use the Promise Controller in Non-RAID mode and can see the Samsung drive.

More about : clone win2k install pata sata

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blah

September 7, 2005 3:54:19 PM

Right, he's gonna go to bad and the rest of us have to do all the work while he is resting. NOT!

PS: when you wake up, could you provide more info on what is not going well (where does it get "stuck")

..this is very useful and helpful place for information...

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crow_smiling

September 7, 2005 7:01:32 PM

<<Right, he's gonna go to bad and the rest of us have to do all the work while he is resting. NOT!
PS: when you wake up, could you provide more info on what is not going well (where does it get "stuck")>>

Well it was getting late and I’d tried just about everything I knew to do..

It gives a BSOD with the message, “inaccessible boot device”, which is par for the course. I know enough to realise it would fail as the install doesn’t have the SATA drivers to access the Controller. But I was hoping that it’s possible to repair it. I downloaded the latest SATA drives for the MB from Asus and created a floppy. I booted from the Win2k CD and installed the SATA drivers. I chose the Repair option and then chose Console mode as I don’t have an Emergency repair disk.
I can log-on as administrator and do the normal console thing. I tried the Fixboot first and then fixmbr commands with no luck. I’m not sure if that was wise but I couldn’t see what else to do.
I invoked Listsvc and it didn’t list the ulsata.sys Promise driver as being available.
The driver must have been loaded by the installation/recovery process, but it doesn’t seem to be available to Windows.

I think I’m screwed but would be happy to be proved wrong. Unless! What if I clone the DVD-R to a PATA drive. Install the SATA driver once I have booted the PATA version of Windows. Then clone the PATA directly to the SATA using ghost.
On booting the SATA drive, will Windows 2000 be clever enough to realise that it has the driver for the SATA disk installed and use it, even though the source for the clone was a PATA drive?

I’m reaching the point where with all the time spent, I could have installed Windows from scratch. It’s just that this DVD-R is a fresh install with all the millions of updates and many of my regular applications. So close

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crow_smiling

September 11, 2005 10:09:42 AM

It worked

I cloned to a PATA drive from the DVD-R. I installed the SATA controller drivers, shutdown windows, disconnected the SATA drive, rebooted windows just so that it could only see the PATA drive, shutdown windows, connected the SATA, booted to a ghost floppy, cloned from PATA to SATA, disconnected the PATA, booted Windows from the SATA. No problems, attached the PATA, rebooted, no problems.

I’m not sure that it was necessary to disconnect the SATA as I did, but I was concerned that the way that the drives are allocated by the BIOS & Windows may have screwed things if I didn’t.

One you know how to do it, it’s very quick. It’s just a matter of whether you have a spare PATA drive to use. Cloning the PATA to SATA only took about 3 minutes.

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