Move an entire Windows installation. Table of contentsfor this article. Recreating. One way to . This involves reinstalling the operating system and all software from scratch, but at least on Windows XP it is helped by the Files and Settings Transfer Wizard. With it you still have to reinstall all software, but at least you can easily transfer your data files and particularly most settings. If, however, you want to move your entire installation without reinstalling anything, please read on. Simple boot diskette. If your computer still has a diskette drive, you can follow these instructions to keep it bootable. If not, the computer will likely be able to boot from an USB memory module and from a CD. In that case have a bootable operating system ready, such as Bart. PE or some version of Linux. Assuming a diskette drive, before you begin to copy your installation, create and test a simple boot diskette. This can be very helpful, for example when you have the wrong BOOT. INI but cannot get at it because it's on NTFS or when the system doesn't boot from the hard disk because of partition or boot sector problems. Create a boot floppy disk and test it, so you can manipulate BOOT. INI and other files more easily (on any other computer) if you cannot get the machine to boot. To do this, format a floppy disk from NT or Windows 2.
BOOT. ININTDETECT. COMNTLDRand possibly: NTBOOTDD. SYSBOOTSECT. DOSReboot your computer with this diskette in the drive. Windows 2. 00. 0 or XP should boot from the diskette. If that works, you know that you can boot from this diskette and also modify BOOT. INI on this diskette if necessary. How to Copy Windows 7 Image to Another Hard Drive. Migrating/copying boot partition to another. Disk 1 had no partitions when windows. 17344 This is my basic spread prime contains a win 7 installation. Copy Windows Installation Another Disk CleanupNote that BOOT. INI is normally copy protected. To change it, you need to remove the write- only flag first. After each Windows installation make a copy of the new BOOT. INI, so you can later merge these files and make a new BOOT. INI that allows you to boot any spare installation or the main installation. General information. The two fundamentally different methods of copying an operating system installation are: Copy one installation by using another. Copy an installation while it is running. Both methods will be explained and discussed below, but the main point is that the second method is more difficult and less reliable. The difficulties arise because the running system has some files permanently open, for example, the registry, which cannot normally be copied. Another fundamental problem, which is, however, common to all methods, is that you must not fail to copy all hidden and system files. Therefore simple copying, for example using the COPY command, will not be sufficient. Fellow MVP Pegasus pointed this out in many of his messages. Since it has become much easier today to have a third, independent installation to use for copying, like Bart. PE, Knoppix, another Windows installation, or a bootable partition copy program, this is now the clearly preferred method. The Windows Vista install DVD also offers a complete small and temporary command line Windows that can do everything you need. Please see the following blog article, but add an /XJ (e. Xclude Junction points) switch to the robocopy parameters when you copy Windows Vista: Howto: Duplicate any Windows installation to a new hard disk using only a Vista DVD (!) http: //geekswithblogs. Copy one installation by using another. Warning. Dave Everett wrote the following warnings after struggling with a system move that went astray. He was successful in the end, but it was not easy. Thanks, Dave! His first warning echoes what has been written above already. Do not try to copy the operating system partition from the currently running partition to another drive—hook both drives up to a different computer as data drives, and copy it there. Do not use a hard disk that has already been previously assigned a drive letter other than C: \ as the destination drive of a system copy—unless you go in and delete the GUID of the destination from the Dos. Devices tree in the registry first before the copy is made. EASEUS Disk Copy is a. Windows 7 Installation. I purchased a retail copy of Windows 7 Home Premium Edition which included both the 32. Do not hook up both hard drives to the old computer at the same time after the system has been copied. If, for any reason, you do end up with the wrong drive letter, check the problems chapter below. Create the new partition. Be sure not to create the new partition with Windows Disk Manager. The thing creates unbootable partitions every other time. Instead create the partition as if you would create a new Windows installation from the install CD, then break off the installation at any point, like the first dialog box, then copy the existing installation. If you use Robocopy (see below), the you can use the /MIR (mirror) switch, which will also remove any leftovers from the started installation, so you don't even have to delete those. You can also use a partition tool to create partitions, but the Windows installation CD has the advantage of creating a partition that is indistinguishable from 9. Windows installations and is therefore the least problematic. If you foresee the next move or want to use similar methods to do backups, leave some 4 to 8 GB at the end of the hard disk for a second partition where you install an extra Windows for such purposes. If not, put a minimal Windows like Bart. PE on a memory stick or a CD and make sure you can boot from it. Set the target partition active. You can do this before or after copying. Copy Windows Installation Another Disk ManagementComputers boot only from a partition that has been set active. You can do this with Disk Manager or with a third party tool. Put a boot sector on the new disk. Find or download the bootsect. It should be in the boot folder of Vista installation CDs. It is also attached here. Use the /nt. 52 switch for Windows XP, /nt. Vista and presumably for Windows 7. Note that this step can be done at any time later just as well. For example, you can still do it after copying all the files to the new hard disk. Without it, however, the disk will most likely not be bootable, unless it already has a boot sector, like from an earlier Windows installation on it. Pre- copy. This step is entirely optional. It serves only to keep your computer with the old hard disk workable for as long as possible, while you copy the whole installation and all data. Connect your new hard disk to the computer running the old one and copy everything over. Make sure you copy all access rights with the folders and files. Connect both disks to another computer. One quick and easy way that saves you the extra helper installation is to temporarily connect both the old and the new hard disk to a third computer. Make sure to have the master slave jumpers set properly to avoid conflicts with other devices, but you can temporarily disconnect all other devices you don't need and use their data cable connectors for the two hard disks. For 2. 5 inch laptop disks you need two adapters that allow you to connect them to a standard IDE cable. These adapters aren't very expensive. They contain no active electronics. Connect the new hard disk to the old computer. If you want to avoid the complications of copying a running system, you need another independent operating system installation. You can use Bart. PE or Knoppix for that or use a bootable partition copy program. If you have no other possibility, you may have to ignore one of the warnings and connect the new hard disk to your old computer directly or over the network. In that case you have to back up and restore the system state, however, because some crucial files cannot be copied from a running system. You can use the Windows backup program for this purpose. Skip down to the next chapter for detailed information. And you may have to rectify the problem later that the new drive gets a different, wrong drive letter. See the problems chapter below for the solution. Fellow MVP Ron Martell has these good hints, which apply in any case: If you choose the temporary hard drive install option then I suggest you connect the temporary drive as master on the secondary IDE channel. In most computers this is best done by unplugging the power lead and data cable from the CDROM and using these for the temporary hard drive. This avoids jumper setting complications, such as also having to remove the main hard drive to change the jumper on it because it happens to be a brand that uses different jumper settings for . In that situation it can happen that the two drives will just not function properly when connected as master & slave. I have encountered this several times in recent years, most recently with a 4. Western Digital drive and a 3. Maxtor that just would not work as master & slave. But putting them both as master drives on different IDE channels resolved the problems. Copy using Robocopy or XCOPYNow copy everything over using Robocopy from the resource kit or XCOPY with all the appropriate switches. Example: XCOPY D: \*.* E: \ /E /C /H /K /R /O /X /YIn Windows NT and later you have to use ROBOCOPY or SCOPY (NT only) from the resource kit, because its XCOPY cannot yet do this. With SCOPY use the /O switch if you want to keep ownership information along with the access rights which are always copied by SCOPY. For ROBOCOPY, which is the best choice, put the program into a folder, open a command line window, move to that folder using the CD command, then enter something similar to the following example, all in one line: robocopy c: \ f: \ /mir /copy: datso /r: 3 /w: 2 /zb /np /tee /log: robocopy. This copies everything from c: to f. Instead of /mir /copy: datso you may have to use /e /sec for older versions. Make sure you have administrator rights on all involved machines. I don't know exactly what that means, but it could mean that robocopy uses backup manager rights. This is useful to check the progress, but it can slow down the copying process a lot, so minimize the window when you're not watching. The /log switch is optional. Making a Copy Of My Windows 7 Installation Disk. I would like to know if it is OK to make a copy of my Windows 7 Installation Disk for: * Archival Purposes in case I lose or damage it? If you acquired the software on a disc or other media, you may make one backup copyof the media. You may use it only to reinstall the software on the licensed computer.
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