Vanquished

Hey,
Well my HDD started making a high pitched whine tonight, I looked online and the consensus seems to be drive failure is imminent (although not always right away). So I bought a new HDD (had others but I like to have a separate one for movies and tv shows, and install files.
Anyways,
I was wondering if there is an easy way for me to move the windows installation from the dying hard drive to the new drive without a lot of hassle or will I have to reinstall windows and all my programs on the new drive?
-Jack

(Looks like I shoulda waited 1 more day before I spent that $25 newegg credit...)

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dreamliner77

You need imaging software to "image" the dieing hard drive to the new disk. What kind of drive did you get? I know Seagate offers a free download of a scaled down Acronis TrueImage to accomplish this. There are also other apps like Ghost that will do this as well as some free apps. They will also allow you "stretch" the partition if the new drive is larger.

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Vanquished

Cool, yea I got a WD, wasn't quite sure which company was best because I've had both drives fail.
Is this like what you are talking about from Seagate: WD Support / Downloads / MioNet + Other Products / Advanced Format Software

Would that be what I'd want to do, or would i be better off finding something else. The drive that's dying is a 320gb, the new one is a 500, they are both WD.

Thanks!

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Vanquished

I wonder if anybody knows why it seems to be failing, I did some surfing and found that humidity and temperature change can be a factor. I currently am in South Carolina, its got a ton of humidity and my computer sits pretty close to a window that I've had open. Also over the past week we've seen a break from the coldish weather and have gotten 75 degree days with <40 degree nights, do you think this is the issue (I hope not cuz I'll have to use the A/C more if its the case)?

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Xie

If your comfortable with command line linux apps (you can often find this on a linux live CD -- or download/compile it from one) then ddrescue is a good app. I've used it several times to rescue a dying HD. It will also try and re-read any bad sectors instead of just passing it over or giving a stop error like many other image apps do.

*edit* - Just make sure the new drive is bigger then the old is all -- image is sector by sector exact as old version -- Windows should boot right up no problem and just do a quick Chkdsk and away you go.

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dreamliner77

Here's the WD Software: WD Support

PING is also supposed to be good: PING (Partimage Is Not Ghost)

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LeeJend

WD provides a stripped down version of Acronis for free. As long as 1 WD drive (including an external USB drive) is connected to the machine you can use Acronis. I use acronis to image my drives for backup.

The whining is usually a bearing going out. I used to get it on Seagate drives but have never heard it on a WD HD in the 20 years since I switched over from Seagate.

Acronis can do a sector by sector copy or create a compressed file that allows you to image any drive with the partition being copied.

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Vanquished

Thanks guys! Was able to use the WD Acronis, get the drive cloned and am now using the new WD. I feel like I can probably run the dead WD a little longer, since its a green power (which is probably the reason it started going, since I was using it as the boot drive) and it won't spin until its called on, I wonder what I could store there that I wouldn't mind losing...

Thanks again!

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