I want to move my windows 7 install currently on an 80GB HDD to a larger 1TB HDD. I've researched around alot and though the easiest method was to use windows 7 built in backup and restore. Unfortunately I cannot get it to choose where to install the windows 7 image to, doesn't give me an option. So, now I'm looking for alternative methods or a full solution as to how to use win 7 backup and restore and be able to choose where I want to clone the system image to exactly.
Acronis image the drive. Put it onto the new drive Should then be able to format remainder of hard drive and expand windows partition to the new unallocated space. Sorry for lack of detail, iv done this, 120GB IDE to a 160GB SATA and it works fine (that was in XP but the principal should apply for windows Vista and 7)
No, it's a hitachi 1tb drive older model. However, I have a brand new 2tb WD EARS drive sitting next to me, although intended for storage, I'd like to hear the issues you were about to raise.
Ok then usually Acronis or Ghost. Personally I like Ghost because whenever I wanted to restore the system and booted either the disk or the build in thing my wireless keyboard and mouse did not work at all. I also noticed that I could not browse my backups on a USB HDD either. IDK why.
Thanks peeps. Ended up using Acronis True Image 2010. Ran into one issue when attempting to clone but a quick google resolved it. Basically after I chose the source HDD to clone it kept saying "Processing, please wait", it never stopped. Fix was to go into services and disable "Distributed Link Tracking Client". Anyway the process completed successfully and I was able to boot from my new HDD.
Another vote for Acronis True Image, without a doubt. The drive can even be moved to another computer if you choose to do so, just use Universal Restore (add-on) to strip the system drivers.
Yeah, its worth a try, but the success/failure rate is pretty much 50:50, so theres no guarantees. People who dont feel like experimenting can just use Windows Backup. This will preserve the alignment in any case.
Well here's the funny the thing. After using the method above a few time I decided to check the alignment without running the MBR fix. I checked the alignment several times with Diskpart after restoring the partition and it was always in alignment. Acronis was getting a lot of heat because of the problem, I'm running the newer version just wonder if it was corrected at some point. I was just doing some experimenting, I don't even have SSD's. Just wanted to see what it was all about and if I would see any performance gain. In the end my drives were just too old, guess its time for an upgrade. Take care.
Paragon Software in general is the best around, they have all the features plus other server based stuff that are only important to advanced users. They are one of the few companies that have a tool that will turn dynamic disk back to basic, not the crazy complicated dynamic just the one disk dynamic disk. Trust me, dynamic disk sound great but, are a nightmare. Many will say why they will give you a semi raid.... Well,"dynamic disks are not supported on fail-over clusters although it will provide software raid volumes." Why would you ever have a raid where if one disk fails your whole system is destroyed. If you want raid, do it the real way with hardware raid cards unless you do not care about your data.
I wouldn't use that - I started it before I went to bed & in the morning it said: "no OS" . that was pretty much it. I tried with recovery software, but the whole hd was/is screwed.