Windows 7: how to backup system drive

Hello all... recently i hear my HDD ticking... im not sure which hdd is it because there are 2 HDD being installed... but i assume its the system disk that is ticking because the other HDD was recently bought.... but will check it again one day...

my question is... if its a system drive.. i dont have personal files in it... its just the softwares installed on it... but its quite tiring to reinstall them one by one...



is there any way i can clone the whole files on that drive to a new hdd that im gonna buy soon thus making an exactly same on the inside and easily replaced so i dont have to go through all the hassles and the computer will just run fine?

if there is please help me... so i can proceed before the ticking got worse... oh the ticking appear random times usually when opening an application.. and when it ticks everything stop responding for a while until the tick is off... so is this means that system drive is problem or the other drive? the other drive only have music pics and etc.. no softwares are installed on it..

Hello mate,

Your best bet is to image your drives to an external USB drive using this tool:

Imaging with free Macrium

and

MACRIUM REFLECT - Create Bootable Rescue USB Drive

That way, should the drive fail, you can simply install the image you made, back to a new drive. Straight forward.

Post back if you need more help.

Regards,
Golden

hi thanks for the quick response... for the methods u mentioned above.. should i get either one of them or should i do both?

and for example i get a new drive... its not yet formatted... how do i install the image if there is no OS installed on it? sory im quite new to this..

Hi,

It works like this:

1. You install MACRIUM REFLECT to your existing drive.
2. You run MACRIUM to create a RESCUE ISO on a USB flash/thumb drive (you can also use a CD if you like).
3. You run MACRIUM and create a Macrium image of your drive to your USB drive.

If you existing drive fails, you do this:

4. Install the new blank drive with no OS or anything else on it.
5. Boot your PC/laptop from the RESCUE ISO or CD you created in Step 2
6. Your PC will now have booted into a special mini-Linux OS, and from there you can browse to the image on your USB drive you created in Step 3.

Macrium will restore that image to the new drive you installed, and everything will be exactly as it was when you originally created the image. The restoration takes about 20 minutes depending on how large the image is.

Regards,
Golden

okay.. i get it so basically i format the new drive with the image created by macrium?... so everything will be intact and perfectly the same right? so its gonna backup my itunes files... my save games and restore them as if nothing is happen only in the new drive correct? sorry to ask so many.. im quite a worried person when it comes to backing up everything

Hi,

Yes, that's correct - your new drive will look exactly like the old one, at the time your image was created.

Regards,
Golden

Imaging programs such as Macrium back up EVERYTHING on the chosen partition.

You most likely have a C partition and also a small "System Reserved" partition. If that is the case, you would have to include BOTH of those partitions in the image file that you make with Macrium.

You can confirm you partition setup by looking in Windows Disk Management.

Golden mentioned a Linux recovery disk that is made with Macrium. It is very important that you test this recovery disk to make sure that your computer will boot from it and load Linux. After Linux loads, make sure you can see all of your hard drives and the image file that you want to restore.

Imaging isn't foolproof. It may fail.

If I were you, I would immediately find out which drive is making that ticking noise. And I would back up my data to another drive without using an image.

Hi im quite sure that the ticking is coming from my primary drive... well actually for this primary drive there is nothing to backup as i have my personal data on the secondary drive... but i just want to avoid hassle of reinstalling windows, updating the softwares and so on... is there anyway i can do that without image? is there anyway i can clone my primary hdd? as for you mentioned about system partition.... i already removed that during installation of OS... i increased the size and install OS on the same partition...

EDIT: just by any chance, if anybody knows how to remove the welcome screen? i have stated in this -> http://www.sevenforums.com/general-d...ml#post1883418

A screenshot of Windows Disk Management might clear up any confusion, but.....

There is no way to back up Window itself without using an image.

Unusual noise is never a good sign. I would download the hard drive manufacturer's hard drive utility and run it to see if it says your drive is in bad shape. Even if it passes the test, unusual noise is concerning.

The good news is that you have no personal data on this noisy drive. All you can lose is Windows and that can always be reinstalled if necessary.

Imaging and cloning are different processes.

If you were to get a new drive, you could move Windows to it by imaging or by cloning. Imaging is the most common choice.

Imaging is best thought of as a way to recover from a disaster, such as a failed drive. But it can also be used to move a system to a new drive even if there was no disaster.

Cloning is most often used when you want to move to a larger hard drive, when there has been no drive failure and things are working OK. But imaging can be used for this same purpose.

If the Linux disk can't see your backup drive you will need to create a Windows PE disk for Macrium. This is easy to do as there is a wizard in Macrium but it does involve a 1.7GB download of the WAIK so best to try Linux first but the PE disk has a lot more features and driver support.