Cloning a Hard Drive

Procrastastudy

Does anyone have any suggestions for cloning a HDD - freeware ideally please.

Thanks in advance

Xenoronin

Norton Ghost, don't know if you can get it free though...

J-blk

Clonezilla is fantastic:

http://clonezilla.org/

Might seem a bit intimidating at first, but it's pretty easy to use actually - you can create a Live USB too, which will make cloning a system drive very straightforward.

ED E

Acronis TI Home '12 has a 30 day trial, which may be all you need, and is a nice package.

fear corcaigh

I second Norton Ghost or the free EaseUs Disk Copy and DriveImage

Monotype

EaseUS 3.0 is free. If you have a WD drive in your system, you can install Acronis WD edition. Both are very easy to use.

Clonezilla is powerful too but not as user friendly. I was try to get it to work last week with the most recent version and it wouldn't boot no matter how I tried. :mad:
Older versions used to work fine, but maybe it was just the system it was on.

Supermensch

ddrescue. Light-weight and easy to use.

http://www.gnu.org/software/ddrescue/ddrescue.html

Procrastastudy

Thanks for all the replies guys. This thread was started for a different reason but now I've a 128GB Samsung 830 on the way I wondered if I could ask a few slightly OT questions?

Firstly - I broke down my RAID array so I've a single 64GB SSD as my SYS drive now. The second one is being used as my E: (Entertainment e.g. Games) drive until the 128GB arrives.

When it does can I stick it in Format it as Z: copy everything across unplug E: and 'rename' Z: to E: and expect Steam and Origin just to pick it up?

On the Sabertooth Z77 there are 2 6Gb SATA Controllers an Intel and an ASmedia - should I put the SSDs on separate controllers or doesn't it really make any difference?

Also - does anyone know if the copy of Norton Ghost you get with the 830 is locked to a machine with a Samsung drive in it? I'm kind of hoping to resell it with the Corsair P64 I'll have for sale.

Thanks in advance.

Procrastastudy

Is SATA 6 GB a different cable?

ED E

AFAIK no.

stevek93

Surprised no one mentioned Drive Image XML: http://www.runtime.org/driveimage-xml.htm/

Monotype

GCDLawstudent wrote: »

When it does can I stick it in Format it as Z: copy everything across unplug E: and 'rename' Z: to E: and expect Steam and Origin just to pick it up?

You only have 128GB of games? Yeah, that should work fine. The files won't notice that they're on a different drive and registry entries won't be broken as they're still on "E".

Procrastastudy

Someone here was selling a Samsung 830 128GB after trying to do someone a favour so that kind of made be buy - I wasn't planning to. Well that and trying to use the 128GB RAID for OS, Apps and games.

The P64s only have around a 200Mbs Sec read so the plan is to use one for SYS and the 128Mb for Games. When finds permit I'll get a 256GB for games and use the 128GB for SYS. I had planned to replace the P64s eventually as not having TRIM in raid wasn't ideal.

Procrastastudy

Hmm I now have a notion of using the 128GB Samsung as a system drive and using the P64 for caching a hard drive dedicated to games - who do you think?

Monotype

Caching like Intel SRT? I think SRT is best used when you don't have any other SSD - ideally when you have a smaller one that's really no longer up to scratch. You have to use the same programs for it to come into effect and TRIM isn't supported.

If I was in your position, I'd probably just use the 128GB for the OS and keep all the important stuff (i.e., that you're using regularly) on there and stick with a HDD for the other stuff.

Procrastastudy

Doesn't fit unfortunately - 128GB is the set up I have at the moment.

I was going 64GB (200Mb/Sec) drive for OS
128GB(520MB/Sec) Drive for games

Now I'm thinking of swapping that around and using the 64GB as a cache.

Of course trying it means switching to RAID which causes a BSOD Grr!!

Procrastastudy

Right after much messing I have it set up - we'll have to see if the loading times in BF2 and Shogun become tolerable. Assuming the performance reasonable; I don't mind taking a hit in speed for the convenience and cost saving.

One of the P64s is accelerating the 500GB pipeline HD2 I have with all my games on it - leaving the Samsung 128GB (when it arrives) for my system drive. Can't wait should be uber fast! Even if it will be the third reinstall in a week!

I suppose there is something to be said for simply 'thinking' this is faster for my games. Psychosomatic computing