which hard drive do i image.

I have an unusual dilema, at least for me with trying to image a hard drive.
I have a Dell Prec. 380 with 2 - 80 gig hard drives and 1 250 GB drive.
I am including a screen shot
of the disk mgmt. screen showing the drive layout. I tried imaging what I thought
was the right drive to have a back up that I could just plug in and go in the event
of a drive failure. After multiple error's from windows trying to place the image from my external hd onto the 250 GB drive, I gave up and decided to have a comp. shop do it.
I took the drive labeled "C" in and after looking at the contents the guy could not find an OS on it, so I then brought in the "R" drive and he imaged it.
I installed it, but my machine will not boot up no matter what config. that I put the
hard drives in. The comp. guy, after seeing the screen shot can't figure it out.
It seems that the computer needs both drives to boot based on the "boot, page file etc. listed on drive "C" and the 100 mb partition that windows 7 includes upon initial install shown on disk "R" which is necessary to boot.
My goal was to place the new image on the 250 GB drive and store which ever 80 Gb drive for emergency backup.


Thanks,

It looks to me like you have to image System Reserved partition on Disc 0 and C partition on Disk 1.

Is that what you think you did---and later restored?

Normally, you wouldn't restore to some other drive in anticipation of a failure of the existing C.

WHS, disk 2 contains nothing, it is just waiting for the image to be placed on it.
It is in a hot swappable tray right now. I tried using the program within windows to image. I think the comp. guy
used Acronis.

WHS, I have the program installed, thank you by the way. I am reading the help section, but I am wondering
if you could walk me through it. I am a little nervous that I will make a mistake and render my computer useless.

Thanks

bayflyer said:

WHS, disk 2 contains nothing, it is just waiting for the image to be placed on it.
It is in a hot swappable tray right now. I tried using the program within windows to image. I think the comp. guy
used Acronis.

Your picture says disk 2 is only 78 percent free. Something is on it.

WHS, yes i know it is only a few clicks and simple. I went ahead and ran the utility and then went back to
check disk management. It appears that it changed the boot order and because I did not take disk 2 out of the
tray it made that the main disk.
I took that disk out and ran the program again and nothing has changed but there is now no disk 0, which means
the computer will not boot, unless i change the boot order, correct?

I believe so, but I am sending a current screen shot. The computer will not boot unless I have all 3 drives connected.
I would not boot without having the current setup shown, the 100 mb partition is now called "F" and is on the drive shown at bottom which has always been "R".
I also had to change the boot sequence to start with drive /sata 2
I was very happy to see it boot up but I have not solved the problem.
Keep in mind, i am just learning. Not all things are obvious to me and I appreciate all the help being given.