Moving to another HD in Vista . . . ?

[sturob]

Hi,

I've got what is a very basic question about HD management in Vista/Bootcamp.

I have spent the requisite time getting Vista onto my MP, and I have it all running very smoothly. HOWEVER, I have kind of decided that I want to change what HD it's on . . .

Can I clone the BOOTCAMP drive onto another drive and then just shift to that one? I guess I'd rather do that than reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeinstall Vista and everything onto the new drive. Is that not recommended?

I would just like to get the stock WD out of the machine. I guess I'll keep it around as a spare or something.

If I can just clone-and-shift, is there a particular piece of software I should use? I've never set up a hard drive from within Vista. Nor have I cloned a drive.

Thanks for your advice!

Stuart

 

[ksz]

If you've installed Windows on its own hard disk and want to move to another dedicated hard disk, you could try with Acronis True Image or Norton Ghost to completely clone the source disk.

Depending on how the boot manager works, (1) you should then be able to replace the original disk with the new one (i.e. remove the old disk and install the new disk in the same physical location as the old one) or (2) install the new disk in any available drive bay without removing the old one.

Option 1 has a higher chance of working.

I just installed Windows Vista Ultimate (32-bit) this weekend on a dedicated hard drive via Bootcamp, so my knowledge of the finer aspects of Bootcamping is limited.

 

[Consultant]

Winclone

There is a OS X app "Winclone"
Search on macupdate or versiontracker

 

[sturob]

Thanks for the information.

Acronis True Image claims to make a bootable clone within Vista. I was planning on doing exactly as you say: clone the drive, then shift it into the same drive bay in the Mac. I know Windows/Vista care more about which slot a drive is in than does MacOS.

Stuart

 

[sturob]

More help . . . if you would!

OK, so . . .

Winclone has been a bust. It seems to hang when it's trying to clone the Vista drive. I say "seems to" because it has like 1 thread going for an hour or more (via Activity Monitor), and it just didn't seem to work.

Acronis True Image whetted my appetite. Downloaded it, but it won't work because it sees the Mac HDs, I assume, and just tells me it's detected unsupported hard drives. It's too stupid to ignore these drives: if I try to do anything, it tells me it detects said unsupported drives. Quite annoying.

Should I try Norton Ghost, or bite the bullet and reinstall stupid Vista on the new stupid HD?

Stuart