Moving the system to a new HDD

[fishmahn]

I've got an old (well, a couple years - maybe 3) 40gb IDE drive that doesn't like to boot up. Every time I power it up it doesn't get recognized. After pressing the reset button, sometimes once, sometimes 100 times (well, I give up for a while before I get to 100, but I'm sure you get my drift), it will recognize the drive and boot properly. Then I try not to shut down the system (reboots are fine, its just when I power it down).

So, I got a new drive - a Seagate 160gb. Then my brain turned on and I realized that I'm running Win2000 on that PC, which doesn't support 160gb drives in SP1 (the CD I have), but does in SP3 (where I'm updated to on the flakey drive).

So, what I'm wondering is... Is there a method I can use or software to buy to just move the system to the new drive? (hopefully without reinstalling) - I guess it's a combination of the above, and not wanting to reinstall everything (there's a lot of programs - takes me a long weekend of doing nothing but reinstalling and reconfiguring).

I'll put up with another round of waiting for the old drive to be recognized if I can just move the existing installation to the new drive.

Mike.

 

[Flinx]

Lots of tools.

<A HREF="http://62.253.162.19/hiren.thanki/bootcd.html" target="_new">Norton Ghost</A>, Partition Magic (Copy), and also great is <A HREF="http://www.acronis.com/" target="_new">Acronis</A>.

I have had people swear by Acronis (good) as it also handles Linux File system types like Reiserfs.


The loving are the daring!

 

[jammydodger]

Does the computer work fine once it has booted up? Because if not you could have a power supply issue rather than hard disk one.

 

[fishmahn]

Thanks, I'll look into those.

Mike.

 

[fishmahn]

Yep, works fine as long as I don't shut down the power. Nope, couldn't be a power supply issue - have a brand new Forton Source PSU I installed last week hoping it was a PSU issue, but the problem still occurs. If I could get away with never, ever, shutting down power I wouldn't bother replacing the HDD.

Mike.

 

[_WW_]

Here's a freebie you can try:
<A HREF="http://www.majorgeeks.com/download1288.html" target="_new">http://www.majorgeeks.com/download1288.html</A>

Oops...just noticed you are using Win2000. This may not work for you

....WW (5.0)<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by _WW_ on 01/25/05 05:01 AM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[Codesmith]

Windows 2000/XP service packs are designed to let you create an upated installation CD. It is called "slipstreaming" for some unknown reason.

I know you don't need it now, but I would be very nervous running an OS off a drive that isn't supported by my Windows installation CD!

A quick search will give you a multitude of guides/tutorials to chose from.