Move Everything to New Hard Disk
I currently have Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit on a 1 Teribyte HD, a single primary partition (C: drive). I also have Acronis True Image 2011 Home Edition with the PLUS PACK installed. I have been hearing some ticking going on in my current 1T C: drive. I went and bought a brand new, unformatted, 2T hard disk.
I have backed up my c: drive to an external USB 500 Gig hard disk and have made the recovery CD with the PLUS PACK installed. I have test booted into the recovery CD to make sure it works (yes, it works) and yes, I can see the backed up image on the external USB drive.
What I want to do is I want to restore (move) my entire 1T drive image to the new 2T drive and have the 2T drive bootable just as if Windows 7 was installed on the 2T drive.
I do not intend to change any other hardware, motherboard, cpu or anything else, just an image transfer from the 1T to the 2T and have the new 2T boot as my c: single primary partition drive.
I have read the documentation on Recovering to different hardware but its a little bit difficult to understand so I am just asking for a step-by-step here, in very simple terms.
One question I do have is, does the new 2T drive already have to be formatted NTFS or will Acronis True Image 2011 format my new 2T drive before it puts the image on the 2T drive?
I just need some very simple instructions. I will be booting from my DVD Writer drive and can change it to first boot device in BIOS.
Thanks for the help.
Thank you. I built this computer myself and installed the operating system originally. There are no hidden partitions. It's just one single 1T drive with one primary partition only.
Will the recovery manager show the disk serial number or manufacturer? This should be the same as what I see in BIOS, right?
The 1T drive is a different manufacturer. The new 2T drive is Hitachi.
What do you mean by "ATI makes "active" - what is ATI? I don't understand what that term means. Please explain what you mean.
I only want one active primary partition for the entire 2T hard disk, no other partitions. I have 3 other physical hard disks internal.
I want the entire 2T to be formatted and partitioned as a single partition, is this going to happen?
I don't understand what to do with your last instruction
"finally as the last pass, restore the MBR+Track0, and disk signature"
How do I do that?
Thank you.
James,
Since you have only one partition for sure, and since you don't need to change this, here are the revised, simpler instructions:
Do this:
- install your new disk (touch the frame of your computer very often to avoid static electricty discharges from your body)
- remove the old disk,
- connect your USB disk where the image is,
- boot on the recovery CD
- click on add new disk,
- select your new internal disk (watch out: the drive letters you will see may change from what you typically see in Windows. The labels, manufacturers, S/N, size don't change. Make sure you select the right disk. In doubt, unplug the USB disk)
- a message will tell you this will erase everything. Proceed. Your new disk is now blank.
- then, restore the C:\. Select your backup on the USB disk, choose restore. Select only C:\ (not the whole disk: this will let you resize C:\). The new destination is your new disk.
- ATI will provide you with the opportunity to resize C:\ on your new disk. You will probably see a 1MB offset at the beginning. Leave it at that. If you don't see it, create that offset. Adjust the size of the restore C:\ by moviing the cursor to the right, or entering a size number.
- ATI will probably make the restored partition primary and active. If you don't see the "active", modify the setting,
- click proceed,
- after ATI is done restoring C:\, restart a restore process from the same backup without rebooting, but this time do not select C:\ (what to restore), just select MBR+Track0, and the disk signature to be restored.
- that's it
Pat, I just remembered something. When I installed Windows y, I remember that W7 created a System Reserve partition of 100 MB NTFS. I used computer management and I was astounded! I actually have two of these partitions, one called G partition and the other one created originally by Windows 7, both as 100 MB partitions! I didn't think of this or realize this.
I have one partition on it called SYSTEM RESERVED 100 Mb
I have one partition on it caleld Parittion G, which I don't need!
I have the C: partition on it which is Healthy, Boot, Page File, Crash dump Primary parition
This seems to complicate things a bit for me...what do I do about that SYSTEM RESERVED partition thing?
The last instruction about the MBR+Track 0, is that an option or choice in restore program? I have just not seen that when I checked the recovery CD out. Wish there was a way to post pictures here! It sure would help a lot.
Thanks again...
Which partition is marked system, active? The system reserved one, or the G:\? Hopefully is the system reserved one.
Yes, the MBR+Track0 is an option when you select what to restore. At that point, you should see the name of the disk that has been backed up, and below that, the list of partitions in your backup, then the MBR+Track0 option. If you select all the partition and the MBR+track0, this is the same as selecting the entire disk. When you do that, you don't have the possibility to resize or omit any partition.
Make sure that your backup has ALL the partitions.
When you restore, restore ONLY the partition(s) you want to keep, one by one, in the same order they were. Do NOT resize the system reserved partition. This one should be restored first, with a 1MB offset before. That is the one that should be primary, active. Then restore the C:\ partition. You can extend it. Then restore the MBR+Track0 and disk signature.
Hi Pat Again...ok I went back into the management console.
First - I deleted the G partition because it was redundant - so now it is 101 Mb unallocated and that is ok with me for now
Second - The SYSTEM RESERVED is 100 Mb NTFS Healthy(System, Active, Primary Partition)
Third - Jim1 (C:) 931.32 Gb NTFS Healthy (Boot, Page File, Crash Dump, Primary Partition)
That is the exact terminology from the computer management console
So really, I have two partitions which are Primary, and the SYSTEM RESERVED one is the Active one
Thanks to you, I checked and discovered this, and it sort of surprised me! Anyway, now that you have the exact terminology, does this make sense and if so is there anything else here I need to do?
Thank you again Pat - Jim
OK. With these clarifications out of the way, make sure that your backup includes ALL your current partitions.
We could fix the computer if you didn't have all the partitions (this requires the Win7 installation DVD):
Assuming you have a backup with ALL your partitions (you have create a disk and partition backup, you have selected all the partitions on your system disk), here is what to do:
- install your new disk (touch the frame of your computer very often to avoid static electricty discharges from your body)
- connect your USB disk where the image is,
- boot on the recovery CD
- click on add new disk,
- select your new internal disk (watch out: the drive letters you will see may change from what you typically see in Windows. The labels, manufacturers, S/N, size don't change. Make sure you select the right disk.)
- a message will tell you this will erase everything. Proceed. Your new disk is now blank.
- then, first restore the System Reserved Partition: select your backup on the USB disk, choose restore. Select only "system reserved". The new location is your new disk.
- ATI will provide you with the opportunity to resize the system partition. Do NOT change the size. You will probably see a 1MB offset at the beginning. Leave it at that. If you don't see it, create that offset.
- ATI will probably make the restored partition primary and active. If you don't see the "active", modify the setting,
- click proceed,
- once done, restart a restore from the same backup. This time select only the Jim1 partition.
- ATI will let you adjust the size of the restore C:\ by moving the cursor to the right, or entering a size number.
- This partition is primary only, not active.
- after ATI is done restoring C:\, restart a restore process from the same backup without rebooting, but this time just select MBR+Track0, and the disk signature to be restored.
- that's it