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Data from One Hard Drive to Another...

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by peejay 1 view

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To whom it may concern:
I currently have a 9 GB hard drive, which is very close to becoming completely full. I am in the process of purchasing a 20-30GB hard drive to create some more space for myself. One problem, how can I move all of the data from my current hard drive to my new one?

Thanks.

10 replies

by gmscne

The best method is to put the hard drive into the computer along with the other drive. One will be C: and the new one will be D:. Then you can copy all of the data to the new hard drive. Most computers will have a second connector on the hard drive ribbon cable to hook it up and the power supply will have another 4 wire power cable to use with it. Just try it and if it doesn't work, you will have to make the drive a slave drive. Consult your hard drive documentation on how to do that.

by danpiers

The easiest way to do this is completed in four simple stages:
First Stage, make yourself a bootable floppy. To do this, place a blank floppy in the A: drive. Go to "My Computer" and open it up. Point to the A: floppy and click the right mouse button once. From the menu, select "Format." Check the box that says "Copy System Files" and format the floppy. Once it is formatted, copy the FDISK.EXE file and the FORMAT.EXE file (from the C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND folder) to this floppy. Leave the floppy in the A: drive and shut down the system.
Second Stage, with power disconnected, remove your 9GB drive from the system and install the larger harddisk in its place. Turn on the system and let the CMOS Setup identify the new hard drive. Let itre-boot from your floppy disk. At the A: prompt, type FDISK followed by an ENTER key. Change the "N" to a "Y" when asked about large disk support, then hit the ENTER key. Assuming that the harddisk is brand new (and not partitioned), just accept the defaults and let FDISK create one large partition and make it active. After FDISK has created the partition, exit the program and re-boot the system. At the A: prompt, type FORMAT and then ENTER. At the prompt, type "Y" and then ENTER to beginthe formatting process. After the format is done, shut off the system. {Continued}

by danpiers

Third Stage, replace the original harddisk in your system and move the new harddisk to be the only drive on the second IDE channel. (Disconnect anything else from the second IDE channel.) Re-boot the system and let the CMOS Setup re-identify the drives. Re-boot and let Windows start up. Once in Windows, from the START menu, open the RUN command. Type the following command in the RUN text box:

xcopy c:\*.* /e /k /h /r /c d:\*.*

Click on OK, and the copying process will begin. Once itis completed (it will tell you how many files it copied when it is done), shut down Windows.
Fourth Stage, Remove the old 9GB drive again and put the new drive in its place. Re-connect the drive(s) that were on the secondary IDE channel. Re-boot the system and let the CMOS Setup re-identify the drives one final time. Re-boot and let Windows start. Your system has been transferred and you have a backup copy on your old drive. Keep your old drive (and do not erase it) for a week (or two) incase something bad happens to your new drive and you must repeat this procedure. Good luck.

by cybergin

I agree with everything that was said but why not simplify the process? Norton Ghost, a part of Norton Utillities, will make an excat copy of your old 9G drive on the new 20G drive and verify that the copy was done correctly. Also Ghost lets your create a ghost disk that you can boot with and perform the ghosting operation while making sure that Windows is not using any of the files your are trying to copy... Hey, it works for me.

Good Luck.

by grbeckmeyer

There is no need for all the connecting, disconnecting, and reconnecting of drives as mentioned above. I think that is far from the easiest way. I mostly agree with the first answer from gmscne, but would add that many drives come with utilities that will do this process automatically. I know Western Digital and Maxtor both have their own utilities, I would bet most other manufacturers do also. If you did not get this software with your drive, you should be able to download it from the manufacturer. The only thing to remember is that these programs will only transfer data to the specific manufacturers drive, eg. you cannot use WesternDigital Data Lifeguard to copy to a Maxtor drive.

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