Swapping system Hard Drives

My system drive is C, the drive I want to be the system drive is D.

I have created a system image on D, if I install from the system image, will D "become" C?

You may want to post a screen shot of "disk management" so we can see what's going on.

If they are separate disks, or partitions is the question, but it would still be helpful to see disk management.

C:\ is 80GB and E:\ is 500GB, I'm looking to upgrade from the 80GB to the 500GB but keep 80GB as a back up drive, so my desired end result would be the drive letters swapped over, with the system on the 500GB drive and a system image on the 80GB drive.

Cheers

Yes, you have two separate disks. I would open the computer and switch SATA ports so the bigger one is "disk 1" and restore the image to that disk. Whaen you get done, make sure the image is on the correct disk and erase the data on the 80GB disk. (disk 2) then you should have your desired result.

KEEP your image just in case I have given bed advice, but I;m sure it will work fine.

I don'r see disk "D" anywhere, is it an external?

Also. it looks like you have some data on the bigger disk....you might want to salvage that before you restore the image to that disk.

Sorry I got D and E mixed up.

The data on the bigger drive is the system image, is in the right place?

Hmm, this may become a mess. Best would be to install with the installation disk and as a seperate system. That means you disconnect the drive with the current C and make a completely new install on E. If you leave C connected, you will end up with a double boot situation and may have to fix your MBR later.

If, however, you want to install from an image, you'll have to make a clone. If you want to use the E drive for that, I suggest you create a partition for the clone and another partition for the future system. I would then still disconnect C when you roll in the clone (which contains its own MBR). Alternatively you could write the clone to an external disk and go from there.

The fresh install from the installation disk has the advantage that it is simple straight forward. Disadvantage is that you start with a "virgin" system and have to make all the settings and program installations again (including the updates from the time your installation disk was made)
The installation from a clone has the advantage that you get exactly the system you cloned. For that you need, however, a program that can make a clone and roll it back in ( with a recovery CD). Norton Ghost, Acronis, Paragon are examples that have that facility.

Aghh a lot more complicated than I thought, thing is I don't have the installation disk, I downloaded an upgrade from Vista.

Could explain more about the cloaning system, do I just clone my system, unplug C and put E in the disk 1 sata slot? That sound's a lot more trouble free...

If you had the image on an external you would be in good shape, maybe you can copy it to an external.

Or take the downloaded install files and make an iso

I haven't got an external big enough, sadly, and I thought the downloaded files were wiped when the instal completed, I've never been able to find them, plus, it's only an upgrade, not an installable package.

One way I swap system drives is by using gParted on a flash drive to boot the system. First, make sure the new HDD is unformatted and there are no partitions. Then it's simply a matter of copying the partition(s) from the old drive to the new one and afterward expanding them to fill the HDD. Before you restart the system, make sure to connect the new HDD to the primary sata part, and disconnect the old HDD. You may have to do a startup repair with the windows installation disk, but it's a relatively simple and painless way to upgrade your HDD without having to reinstall everything. One thing I would recommend is to have a partition for any media and program installers, personal files, etc, separate from the partition in which you install the operating system. That makes it less likely to lose data in the event of a serious error, plus you can easily change operating systems without losing any files.

OK, you better go the clone route. Here are a few suggestions. the first link (Easeus/Todo) may do the trick. I have never used it myself because I have Norton Ghost (which unfortunately is not free). But Easeus has a good reputation. Sone of the others may do it too.
But in any case, if you want to clone to E, disconnect C whilst you are doing it. And if you want to keep the clone on E, you need a seperate partiton for it - but I am not 100% sure whether that works because I always go via an external disk. You may want to get one - they cost $50 to $80. Deals2buy: Storage Devices deals
And when you are all done, I suggest to make a seperate partition for your data. Here is a little video I made on how to do that. You best do the partitioning before you install the system. That way you have more freedom regarding sizing. Once you have the system installed, you may be limited with shrinking the new C.

PS: I just saw the previous poster also recommends a seperate data partition. And his way via Gparted may be good too if you don't mind doing the startup repair. I dread this, but that may be just me. LOL

Like I said before, I haven't got an installation disk, but thanks anyway.

Is there no utility that will just create an exact replica of the 80GB disk on the 500GB disk and allow me to boot from that?

Thanks for all the help guys, really appreciated!

whs said:

OK, you better go the clone route. Here are a few suggestions. the first link (Easeus/Todo) may do the trick. I have never used it myself because I have Norton Ghost (which unfortunately is not free). But Easeus has a good reputation. Sone of the others may do it too.
But in any case, if you want to clone to E, disconnect C whilst you are doing it. And if you want to keep the clone on E, you need a seperate partiton for it - but I am not 100% sure whether that works because I always go via an external disk. You may want to get one - they cost $50 to $80. Deals2buy: Storage Devices deals
And when you are all done, I suggest to make a seperate partition for your data. Here is a little video I made on how to do that. You best do the partitioning before you install the system. That way you have more freedom regarding sizing. Once you have the system installed, you may be limited with shrinking the new C.

Click to expand...

I just said basically the same thing.. have you ever hear of gParted? It's a free partition editor that can be burned to a CD or installed on a flash drive as small as 256 MB with another free program called uNetBootin. The biggest advantage of gParted over the others besides the fact that it doesn't cost anything is that it loads up without mounting any HDDs and can create and edit partitions in over a dozen different file formats, it can clone partitions and it sets a flag to run whatever variation of chkdsk (depending on the OS the file system is based on) at the next startup. It can also read S.M.A.R.T. data. Try it sometime

Spoonology said:

Like I said before, I haven't got an installation disk, but thanks anyway.

Is there no utility that will just create an exact replica of the 80GB disk on the 500GB disk and allow me to boot from that?

Thanks for all the help guys, really appreciated!

Click to expand...

See my earlier post with the links.

madtownidiot said:

whs said:

OK, you better go the clone route. Here are a few suggestions. the first link (Easeus/Todo) may do the trick. I have never used it myself because I have Norton Ghost (which unfortunately is not free). But Easeus has a good reputation. Sone of the others may do it too.
But in any case, if you want to clone to E, disconnect C whilst you are doing it. And if you want to keep the clone on E, you need a seperate partiton for it - but I am not 100% sure whether that works because I always go via an external disk. You may want to get one - they cost $50 to $80. Deals2buy: Storage Devices deals
And when you are all done, I suggest to make a seperate partition for your data. Here is a little video I made on how to do that. You best do the partitioning before you install the system. That way you have more freedom regarding sizing. Once you have the system installed, you may be limited with shrinking the new C.

Click to expand...

I just said basically the same thing.. have you ever hear of gParted? It's a free partition editor that can be burned to a CD or installed on a flash drive as small as 256 MB with another free program called uNetBootin. The biggest advantage of gParted over the others besides the fact that it doesn't cost anything is that it loads up without mounting any HDDs and can create and edit partitions in over a dozen different file formats, it can clone partitions and it sets a flag to run whatever variation of chkdsk (depending on the OS the file system is based on) at the next startup. It can also read S.M.A.R.T. data. Try it sometime

Click to expand...

Yeah, I know Gparted. It once messed up my whole system (was probably my fault). Since then I stay clear of it. But when properly used, it may be a good program to have.

Hey sorry, I hadn't noticed the thread had gone to a new page, and how do you mean "disconnect c while cloning to e"? surerly C needs to be plugged in so the program knows what files to copy?

Yes, you have to be careful with gParted. It will mess up your system if you use it to shrink a bootable operating system partition without first compacting it as much as possible. It used to have problems with NTFS, and that may have been your error too. I personally prefer it because it also works on Macs and Linux based machines and can be used to set up a HDD for multiple operating systems a lot faster than anything else I've tried.

This is a lot more complex than I assumed, I may just leave the 80gb as the system drive and have all my documents on the 80 drive.

Still, I will look at the cloning method, thanks guys.

Spoonology said:

Hey sorry, I hadn't noticed the thread had gone to a new page, and how do you mean "disconnect c while cloning to e"? surerly C needs to be plugged in so the program knows what files to copy?

Click to expand...

I think you misunderstood. You first clone C to an external - or possibly a partition on E. (cloning is just copying your system and the MBR to somewhere). Then you disconnect C. Change the boot sequence in the BIOS and load the recovery CD (the documentation of the cloning program will explain how to do that). The recovery CD installs the clone on the designated partition on E (should be bigger or same size as the original C. If it is smaller, some cloning programs have problems).
By "cloning to E" I meant installing it from the clone image. So let me repeat:
1. you make a clone image to somewhere
2. you disconnect C
3. you install the clone image with the help of the recovery CD on E

Right I get you, sounds so simple now .

How big does the recovery disk need to be?