Backing up? Which way to go?

The primary HDD in my simulator comp is now too small to be really useful, and an upgrade to a 500GB HDD is in order. The OS (XP Pro) came installed on the comp, and there is a label with a key, but no disc. What I would like to do is copy the entire HDD, I can take it out and put it into another comp, then copy it and then insert the new HDD and copy everything back onto it. The question is, how do I make it bootable, so when I put it into my simulator comp, everything will work as before, except I'll have a bucket load of free space.

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[www.mediafire.com] Some say you should click it, you know you want to. [www.gp4central.com] <----GP4 Central

If you've got a Western Digital hard drive you should be able to get Acronis True Image for free.

Basically, backup your current hard drive to a backup file on a 3rd hard drive, then restore that image onto the new hard drive. It'll do all the hard work for you.

If you can't get that, there'll be other free programs, but none will be as user friendly, or frankly as good, and as I stick religiously with Acronis, I'm unable to recommend any.

Ooh OK, that sounds good. Brilliant advice, thanks Gav.

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[www.mediafire.com] Some say you should click it, you know you want to. [www.gp4central.com] <----GP4 Central

[cobiansoft.com]

Cobian Backup

Imho, this is a nice piece of software. It's easy to configure, can do Volume Shadow Copies, easy to recover (just copy files to destination) and it compresses the files with 7zip if you like.

From what I've seen so far, I'd recommend it.

Also it uses a mushroom icon, who can say no to that?

From what I can see, Cobian Backup doesn't do a system image or drive clone, and if that's true, it should be able to copy and restore all the files to a new drive, but you'll have to create the bootsector manually.

I'll point to a guide if that's needed.

I have seen some recommendations of Cobian though, so it seems to be a popular free solution.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/01/2011 10:54PM by gav.

Acronis is the way to go with this one



GPGSL WDC Season 4

Yes, I will get Acronis, thanks everyone for the help.

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[www.mediafire.com] Some say you should click it, you know you want to. [www.gp4central.com] <----GP4 Central

Backing up? Which way to go?

Reverse I suppose.

beep beep beep beep beep.....

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[www.mediafire.com] Some say you should click it, you know you want to. [www.gp4central.com] <----GP4 Central