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What to consider now when recovering later to smaller disk?

Thread needs solution

Just one (possibly stupid) question:

I plan to set up a new system containing Win7 Home Premium.
Harddrive (500 GB):
• Partition one (C:) Operating System
• Partition two (D:) Stuff

I'll purchase the newest TrueImage and create an image of the complete disk on an external backup drive. Later on, when I can afford it, I want to replace the harddisk with an 160 GB SSD and use the bigger HD for other stuff.

What brings me to my question:
is it possible to recover to a drive (the SSD in my case) that's smaller in size than the source disk?
Example: Source HD: 500 GB, Target SSD: 160 GB.

What do I have to consider when setting up the HD so that it can later be restored to the smaller SSD?
Should I only create partitions up to 160 GB? Or should I only take care that the data on the HD at the time of the restore doesn't exceed 160 GB in size? Is it possible at all with TrueImage to recover to a smaller disk?

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Mick:

When TrueImage creates a backup archive, it copies only the USED sectors on the disk into the archive. When you restore this archive to a target disk, you are given the opportunity to resize the partition either larger or smaller.

Therefore, what you want to do is possible. As long as the used space on the source disk is smaller than the size of the target disk, you should be able to restore to a smaller disk. Check out the guides by GroverH for details. These guides are located at the top of the forum postings in the Sticky section.

Hello,

Did your operation below work?
*** Source HD: 500 GB, Target SSD: 160 GB.

I will have to do the same soon, with about 60 GB of data...

Regards,
Fabrice