Need to replace failing W7 64 bit OS drive

[rocks911]

I have a 2 year old HP PC and the primary 1tb drive is failing. I would like to copy the drive to a 2 tb internal HDD. I have a HDD dock and want to purchase a new 2tb HDD, dock it and copy my current primary drive which is on a 1tb internal HDD over to the 2tb, then swap them.

I have Acronis 2012 that I think would do the job but to be honest I have discovered that its not that dependable.

A couple of questions
1. Can I copy the 1tb information (C drive and OS) to the 2tb without having to partition the 2tb?
2. Is there maybe a better, more reliable cloning program (preferrably free)
3. Anything I havent considered?

 

[ittimjones]

yeah, you can ghost the 1tb to the 2tb w/o having to partition. (did it with my current 120GB SSD and previous 60GB SSD.

Clonezilla is free and is what i used.

 

[RandomSauce22]

2. I used a program called EaseUS Disk Copy. You download it (it's free) and save the iso to a CD or a usb flash drive. You then boot from the cd or flash drive and the rest should be self explanatory.

Download:
http://download.cnet.com/EaseUS-Disk-Copy-Home-Edition/3000-2242_4-10867157.html

Check this link for instructions:
http://linhost.info/2012/05/cloning-a-drive-with-easeus-disc-copy-simple-cloning-utility/

P.S. EaseUS disk copy will create a 1tb partition (an exact, sector by sector copy of your old hard drive) on your new HDD. Therefore, you won't have to partition your new drive. To extend this 1tb partition to the drive's entire 2tb, you will need to extend the partition using Windows Disk Management tool (search diskmgmt.msc in the start menu) or using a free, more user friendly program called Partition Wizard.

Partition Wizard:
http://download.cnet.com/MiniTool-Partition-Wizard-Home-Edition/3000-2094_4-10962200.html

 

[rocks911]

Best answer selected by rocks911.