Tech Question : Hard Drive Images

WSOPWinner2005 · #1 01-14-2005, 07:19 PM

I assume this is similar to copying the image of a DirecTV card for those of you familiar with such experimenting.

Here is my problem, I am using a 4 year old 20 Gig hard drive in my computer I upgraded myself. Like a moron I set my 40 gig drave as a slave.

Anyways tonight I am going to buy a 80 Gig + Hard Drive as this current hard drive is REALLY bogging my system down BADLY.

How would I go about copying everything over including the OS/Settings? And to think I am working on my A + Certification... If anyone could even refer me to a site that discusses this that owuld be great.. I can handle most tech talk just don't ask me to remember how many damn pins are on each generation of processors.

AncientPC · #2 01-14-2005, 07:22 PM

No offense but A+ certification doesn't mean much. Hook up both hdds to your computer and use Norton Ghost to copy one hdd to another.

WSOPWinner2005 · #3 01-14-2005, 09:28 PM

Thanks for Norton Ghost comment.

As far as A+ I have to have the A+ and Net + as prerequisites it seems nowadays most employers look at them as rounding you off essentially.

I'm attacking them before I start my MCSE and possibly CCNA after that... Getting into Cisco is where the money is, network security is where I would like to end up at so covering every aspect of the IT field is going to be important including some cert's I don't want to mess with at ALL.

AncientPC · #4 01-14-2005, 09:48 PM

Sounds good, but yeah A+ is just the beginning.

WSOPWinner2005 · #5 01-14-2005, 09:58 PM

Believe me I know, my 8 books I have with 1,000 + pages each for the MCSE alone gave me that thought [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

The A+ is a joke, seriously it is nothing but memoring useless crap like how many pins were on the first generation processor... How many pins were on DIMMS, SIMMS, RIMMS, etc..

Is this really something I need to know as long as I know what to do with them? lol

ir1337 · #6 01-14-2005, 10:15 PM

Come on, every damned day I have to remember what was the standard I/O location for the hard drive controller. Oh, and remember this: you WILL need a lot of that crap early on in the industry, as you will likely languish at the help desk (kill yourself now) for a while.
me <-- <barely> living proof.

JAque · #7 01-14-2005, 10:23 PM

In my opinion , Acronis is better than Ghost.You can schedule it to do an incremental image everyday while you are using you PC without going into DOS commands, etc.

Read the reviews in PCWorld

JAque

mosta · #8 01-17-2005, 06:08 PM

there are a few competing utilities out there. ghost, drive image, partition magic, acronis true image, casper xp, xxcopy. keep in mind there are 2 diff ways to back up a drive. you can make an image that has to be restored through a utility (so you need a boot disc). what I prefer to do is clone my HD onto another drive. I can put a 2nd drive in a modular bay (thinkpad), and use norton ghost (available on shareaza if you were so inclined), to copy it. then I swap the drives to confirm that my backup is bootable, and it is.

fatherofmany · #9 01-18-2005, 09:02 AM

If you don't want to go the route of software based ghosting, many hard drive vendors include utilities with their drives and/or available by download that will let you transfer the old drive's contents to the new. Boot the floppy, setup the transfer, set the new drive as bootable, etc.

Everyone who invests any amount of time on their pc's should take the initial setup time to clone/ghost their system drives regularly, but as a quick fix, those utilities usually do the job.

frank_iii · #10 01-18-2005, 11:01 AM

If you're looking for free and you're able to configure an ftp server on another machine, try g4u:

g4u

It's a bootable cd that can clone harddisks and send the image off to an ftp server. It can also restore an image from an ftp server.

I have used it for some time and it's great.