Windows 7 system image restore failed

[Tylerr]

So my hard drive is failing (hearing clicking sounds all the time) and i want to move it to another hard drive.

i created the image, came out to about 85gb, booted with the windows 7 recovery disk and tried to load the image onto the drive. But it failed when it tried to find the drive to install it.

Is it because the original disk is bigger? Current one is 250gb, and i'm throwing it on a 160gb disk

 

[mjf]

Is it because the original disk is bigger? Current one is 250gb, and i'm throwing it on a 160gb disk

You cannot do this directly using Windows Inbuilt Imaging. I suggest you use (free) Macrium Reflect.

It definitely sounds like your HDD is failing and I'd backup your user data as the highest priority. You may still be fine for a system image but there are no guarantees on a failing drive.

 

[Tylerr]

yeah its been doing this for like 6 months now and i've just put it off because its such a pain to do.

i've got all important stuff backed up, but having to reinstall windows is always annoying so this would be much better.

does this macrium software not have the same problems as the built in w7 one?

Also is there anyway to install the system image while i'm running windows?

Like i'm running windows on hd 1

the system image is on hd 2

and i want to install the system image on hd 3

 

[mjf]

does this macrium software not have the same problems as the built in w7 one?

Also is there anyway to install the system image while i'm running windows?

The Windows inbuilt is very basic and the Macrium product is far more flexible and it is very reliable.
You make the image when your running Windows but you restore the image by booting to a restore CD/DVD. This tutorial contains a convenient link to a pe disk ISO download. Download the ISO, burn the CD/DVD then boot to it.
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/73828-imaging-free-macrium.html

 

[Tylerr]

looking into Macrium i seem to have to download a huge file, something called WAIK?

my internet is kind of slow so that would take a long time.

would cloning the drive be easier?

 

[mjf]

WAIK stands for Windows Automated Installation Kit and a small part of it is used by the free Macrium version to make your own Macrium pe image restore/boot CD. BUT you don't need to download WAIK. I pointed you a tutorial with an ISO download link for a pe ISO which should be ~160MB. It was made by the author (a member here) to avoid the big WAIK download.