Restore image after replacing HD

OlderBloke · 20 Aug 2010

My Win 7 64 box has a failing Seagate 1.5TB C: boot drive (Seagate utility confirms). I want to image this drive, remove it and replace with a new Samsung 2TB drive I already own (PCSpecialist.co.uk aren't so helpful after you've paid them it seems...)
I actually bought Acronis True Image Home 2010 but despite 30 years of daily computer use I am completely unable to get to grips with it. Their tech support situation is abominable BTW. AVOID!

I see that Win 7 has a capacity to perform an image/restore function. There doesn't seem to be much in the help file about this however.

a) Can someone confirm that I can do this with a different size/manufacturer drive?
b) can someone direct me to a place where the procedure is intelligibly described?

Go easy on me, I'm almost a pensioner and I have a heart condition! Assistance gratefully received.

Roy

Petey7 · 20 Aug 2010

A) yes
B) Backup Complete Computer - Create an Image Backup
System Image Recovery

OlderBloke · 20 Aug 2010

Thanks. Quick!!
I omitted to say that I am trying to avoid reinstalling a horribly complicated set of applications and utilities - so they need to be included. I'm pretty sure this is part of the process, but just to be sure.
BTW I looked t several threads on similar topics but didn't see anything exactyly the same.
Roy

madtownidiot · 20 Aug 2010

You can restore from a system image to any HDD with sufficient free space.

Lemur · 20 Aug 2010

I'm assuming you've seen this:
http://us1.download.acronis.com/pdf/...e7.0_ug.en.pdf

You can restore to a drive the same size or larger (but obviously not smaller).

whs · 20 Aug 2010

If you want to make your life easy, use this: Imaging with free Macrium It is all explained - the easy way.

Petey7 · 20 Aug 2010

Yes, all programs and files are included

OlderBloke · 20 Aug 2010

Hi again
I have marked the tutorial thread for use tomorrow.
re: Acronis. I have found the manual user hostile. Why I should have to read every detail when a simple decision tree would enable most users to navigate to a subset of the information... well, I don't know. The online tech support is poor and they delete any post that seems critical of their documentation or UI. Not just mine either.

OK one more general question. If backing up to an external drive (in this case my eSata box with the 2TB Samsung drive in it) I assume it's impossible to make this target drive just a replica of the boot drive and then swap? Too easy I suspect.

Very tired now. Back tomorrow. Thank you all for quick and helpful comments so far.
Roy

Petey7 · 20 Aug 2010

For what you describe in your last post, you will need something along the lines of HDClone: Miray Software - HDClone - Hard disk copy, hard disk backup, hard disk rescue!

Lemur · 20 Aug 2010

It's better to keep a couple of images - and here's why. Let's say someone is in the middle of cloning their drive to another drive, and the host drive fails. The target drive could be useless as well.

A long time ago on another planet ...

This woman knew nothing about servers, but she was hot. The VP (who - let's say was very fond of her) made her the network administrator. She dutifully made backups on her server every day - but to the same dang media. Never changed it. And, as luck would have it, in the middle of a backup that sucker failed.

Wait, there's a happy ending.

So the drive and backup (singular) were useless. I installed their network for them and provided consulting when requested. They had lost critical data and called me. I just shook my head in wonder. I purchased an identical drive, swapped the controllers on the drives, and the stupid drive booted up just fine. I explained to the "adminstrator" why it's important to do incremental and full backups, and archive the data off-site.

The happy ending? It was a sweet invoice.