New PC HDD

[khafan]

Maxtor MaxBlast 3 duplicates your hdd easily for free. get the windows version of MaxBlast 3 from here:
http://www.maxtor.com/portal/site/Ma...&downloadID=58
Run it and go to drive-to-drive copy and select source & Destination partition, hit start.
there's also a dos version of this utility but it takes ages to duplicate hdd under dos mode.

[eakinsme]

to use that maxtor tool, do i need to know an understanding of partitioning? i dont know that much or anything about hdds...
will this work with me knowing next to nothing about partitioning?

[khafan]

ok I think you have only 1 partition on your current 80GB hdd, goto my computer and you should see only 1 hdd drive there (C: ), so the path to source partition will be "C:\" , when you add the new 200GB hdd and format the hdd, another hdd drive will be added to my computer (D: ), so the path to destination partition will be "D:\".
But first make sure that you currently have only one drive (C: ) in my computer.

[eakinsme]

in my computer i have 2 drives, both C: and D: drives!
would you recomend that i just put the new hdd in slot one then install windows and put all my stuf from the 80 gig onto the 200 gig? will it work that way?

[khafan]

Are you sure the drive D: is a hdd drive and not your cd/dvdrom drive?

yeah you can just install the windows on new hdd and then copy your files from old hdd to new one. but first disconnect the old hdd from pc then install windows on new hdd.

[eakinsme]

ok so ill prolly end up doing it that way..
yes i am sure they are both hdd drives! and with the way u say to do it will i need to redownload/install SP2! i have dial up and downloads are a b!tch (no broadband here)!
thanks

[Big Country]

Yes, you will have to reinstall SP2. You have to also reinstall all your programs as you can not copy them from one drive to another. They have to actually be installed as it puts a lot of files in the windows directory. The only stuff you can copy over from your old drive to your new drive are saved game files and other files such as in your my documents folder. Actual programs will not run even if you copy the entire folder over as windows does not have the files it needs to run it.

Remove your old drive and put in your new drive as your primary master. Load windows on it and update it with the SP2. If downloading takes too long you can order a disk from Microsoft. It's free. Add your old drive as a slave and then reinstall all you programs from the disks. You can then copy over all your saved files from your old drive such as your internet favorites and all your document files, as well as any saved game files you have. Keep that old drive as your slave untill you know for sure you have all the files you need transfered over. Could be a few weeks till you know for sure. If you run programs like Turbo Tax or Quicken make sure you copy over the files you need from those folders. I always go through the old drive and start deleting files and folders I know for sure I don't need. Then when your old drive is empty you can remove it.