Reusing a master HDD with corrupt OS as a slave...couple questions!

vaidas3 · 04 Dec 2012

whs said:

It will actually not re-designate the original folders. Those will stay put but will be empty - except the Documents folder that some programs use as repository for small files. The new folders on the HDD will be an extra entry in the library which YOU will use as repository for your files.

You'll see, it works very well.

The alternative would be to change the location of reference of the original folders - and that can be messy.

actually changing actual folders for user files after clean isntall isnt so messy.. i always do this on all my systems and no problems so far.

whs · 04 Dec 2012

vaidas3 said:

whs said:

It will actually not re-designate the original folders. Those will stay put but will be empty - except the Documents folder that some programs use as repository for small files. The new folders on the HDD will be an extra entry in the library which YOU will use as repository for your files.

You'll see, it works very well.

The alternative would be to change the location of reference of the original folders - and that can be messy.

actually changing actual folders for user files after clean isntall isnt so messy.. i always do this on all my systems and no problems so far.

An initial move is OK. But when you move them several times, it can get iffy - especially if you moved them to the root. Creating new folders is just easier and it keeps the folders that the programs create (mostely in Documents) seperated from your own stuff.

Lauratron · 09 Dec 2012

Update and a Question(s)!

Ended up ordering the Samsung 830 (128GB) and that one hasn't given us any problems this weekend as we've been reloading everything back on my computer so major relief there!

After we got my files all backed up from my old hard drive, my husband formatted it on his computer. But, when he took it out and tried to restart his computer, his computer wouldn't load anything from HIS HDD. He pllugged my formatted HDD back in to his and started it up and it loaded windows from his HDD just fine. Totally lost on that!

Also, wondering if I should load my fonts on the SSD or the HDD...

whs · 09 Dec 2012

1. leave the fonts on the SSD

2. Regarding your boot problem, I suspect a bootmgr problem. Post a picture of full Disk Management with both HDDs attached and we'll see where this bugger is.

Lauratron · 09 Dec 2012

.....

whs · 09 Dec 2012

This is hard to tell. The OS could be living off either 100MB active partition. I suggest you transfer the bootmgr to C. Then you should not have any problems without the second HDD. Bootmgr - Move to C:\ with EasyBCD

Lauratron · 09 Dec 2012

whs said:

This is hard to tell. The OS could be living off either 100MB active partition. I suggest you transfer the bootmgr to C. Then you should not have any problems without the second HDD. Bootmgr - Move to C:\ with EasyBCD

Thank you thank you! That worked! You are a kind soul, helping out like you do :)

whs · 09 Dec 2012

No problem. Any time.

bigmck · 09 Dec 2012

whs said:

This is hard to tell. The OS could be living off either 100MB active partition. I suggest you transfer the bootmgr to C. Then you should not have any problems without the second HDD. Bootmgr - Move to C:\ with EasyBCD

WHS -- I don't understand what you did. C: already had a System Reserved. When the F: System Reserved was moved, did it overwrite the C: or were there two? Thanks,

gregrocker · 10 Dec 2012

Formatting is not sufficient when you have a booting System Reserved partition on a HD. The drive should be wiped with Disk - Clean and Clean All with Diskpart Command. Then you can repartition it in Disk Mgmt.

If you unplug the wiped HD and the OS HD will not boot then check that it's System Reserved partition is marked Active and set to boot first in BIOS setup, then run Startup Repair - Run 3 Separate Times.
Partition - Mark as Active

If you only copy the boot files to C using EasyBCD then you may have lost System Recovery Options on the F8 Advanced Boot Options as they will not re-establish their hotlink without running Startup Repairs - the reason why we have always used that method here.