I purchased a Western Digital EIDE 320GB hard to replace existing Toshiba 100GB hard drive. I cloned the old hard drive using Acronis software from Western Digital and when I placed the new hard drive in the laptop (after cloning) and started up computer nothing happens; no errors messages at all, just will not boot to it. I can place the new hard drive in an external case and see all of my files, but cannot boot to it.

For the past few upgrade cycles I have upgraded by purchasing the best value new computers with the OS installed. I connect the old computers to the new via a home network. The newest has Win-7 and is much faster, however, the learning curve is steep getting all the old stuff to work. So for some stuff I still rely on the older machine. This has given me the best results.I still use Vista and XP, but if you feel compelled to upgrade do to security reason I would follow the following outline.

1. Back up on an external USB drive all important documents. You must do this if not Murphy's rules will apply and it can be a train wreck!!
2. Down load Acronis from Western Digital website. Make a Boot disk.
3. Create a clone copy of your master C:/ drive on an external USB drive.
4. Purchase a same or larger internal PC master C: drive "It must be a Western Digital for the free version of Acronis to work"
5. Replace current drive with new.
6. Using Acronis boot disk boot up and connect USB drive
7. Clone new drive from USB with vista OS using the Acronis boot disk and confirm all is well
8. You now have a way to go back. Your original drive still has the Vista OS with all your Junk and the new drive should have the same.
9. Using the new drive go to the Microsoft website and go for OS seven. Keep your clone copy of the vista OS on the USB drive in case the seven blows-up during install.
10. Retain the original C: drive with the vista OS in case you get into difficulty with the new drive.(mark the drive with date etc)

I have successfully done this for computers and keep a drive loaded with a known good OS for the day it all goes bad.

Sync-toy is the backup program that I use to keep everything up to date.

Hope this helps?

WD has a courtesy Drive cloning tool from acronis. It's on their web sit under drivers. Don't worry about the "My Book" thing the file is labeled Acronis True Image WD Edition Software download.
http://support.wd.com/product/download.asp?groupid=132&lang=en

The PS2 has a replaceable hard drive. If you would like to keep the information/games from the original drive, Sony uses a special file system. You need to perform a 1 to 1 clone using HDclone or Acronis cloning tools.

Transfer an Operating System to a New Hard Drive

When replacing an old hard drive, a process known as cloning is the easiest and most thorough method for transferring data between the old and new hard drives.

A cloning utility takes a snapshot of your current hard drive and then re-creates that snapshot on your new hard drive.

The process clones everything, including the operating system, installed applications, settings and personal files.

Create a system restore disk so that you can return your system to its previous condition if an error occurs.

You can use a backup and restore utility provided with your operating system, or find one for free or for purchase on the Internet.

Many cloning utilities can also create system restore disks.

Shut down the computer and remove power.

Physically install the new hard drive.

Restore power and boot up the computer.

Ensure that your operating system recognizes that the new hard drive has been installed.

Pick the cloning utility that works best for you. (See Below for some options.)

http://www.easeus.com/disk-copy

http://www.clonezilla.org/

http://www.runtime.org/driveimage-xml.htm

All freeware

http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/products/trueimage

http://www.symantec.com/norton/ghost

Purchase

Base your decision on your operating system and the cost and complexity of the utility.

Install and launch the cloning utility on your old hard drive.

Follow the instructions included with the cloning utility.

Keep the old hard drive as a backup, or reformat it for additional storage space.

Cloning a Notebook Hard Drive

Create a system restore disk so that you can return your system to its previous condition if an error occurs.

You can use a backup and restore utility provided with your operating system, or find one for free or for purchase on the Internet.

Many cloning utilities can also create system restore disks.

Pick the cloning utility that best fits your needs. (See Above for some options.)

Base your decision on your operating system, the cost and complexity of the utility, and whether the utility can clone notebook hard drives using bootable media, such as CD-ROMs, DVD-ROMs or flash drives.

Install and launch the cloning utility on your old hard drive.

Follow the instructions included with the cloning utility.

Keep the old drive as a backup in case the new hard drive fails.

or
Copy an OS to Another Hard Drive

Copying an OS or operating system to another hard drive can serve several functions.

Some simply want to move their current operating environment to a new PC, while others are replacing an old system hard drive with a newer one and want to avoid the hassle of updating and reinstalling.

The process of copying your operating system to another hard drive is a very easy one, in fact, and can be accomplished by anyone with nothing more than some software and some time.

Install Acronis True Image and launch it from its installation icon.

A link is provided below for the Acronis free 15-day trial.

http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/download/trueimage/

http://www.feyrer.de/g4u/

Support free software or g4u WILL die!

http://www.macrium.com/reflectfree.asp

Macrium has a free also pay options

Click the "Utilities" button from the left menu bar.

Click the "Clone Disk" button from the right pane of the main program window.

This will cause a dialog box to appear.

Click the "Next" button on the bottom-right corner of the dialog box.

Select the disk with the operating system you wish to copy from the drive list and click the "Next" button.

This will begin an examination of your hard disk that will finish in a few minutes.

Select the destination disk from the hard drive list and click the "Next" button.

Choose the "As-is" option for how you would like to handle your partitions.

This option merely lets you decide whether to keep all partitions on the drive or copy just the data onto one blank partition on the new drive.

Click the "Finish" button, and Acronis will prompt you that your system needs to be restarted to begin the cloning process.

The restart will happen automatically when you click the "Finish" button.

Allow the computer to restart, and Acronis will launch prior to the operating system and begin the cloning procedure.

This process may take several minutes to several hours, depending on the size of the operating system and whether there are any installed applications.

Restart you computer once again after Acronis has completed the cloning procedure.

The software will notify you when the cloning has finished.

Boot into your operating system and use your new operating system installation as normal. You may now remove your old operating system drive or format it as you desire.

Hope this helps.

DID YOU GO COMPUTER MANAGEMENT AND RUN THE WIZARD? THERE YOU CAN FORMAT SO IT WILL BE RECOGNIZED. HOPE THIS HELPS

Just use one of the cloning disk tools (Norton Ghost, Acronis e.t.c.) to make a copy from the one you have to the new one. Google for a program. I suggest you Acronis but it's not free.

Stelios.

Purchase a solid state drive, 2.5" for laptops 3.5" for desktops (or use an adapter for notebook drives with a 2.5")

Connect your IDE cable (and power cable on desktops) to the drive, install Windows and you are done!

If you want to keep your existing data, get an external enclosure for the appropriate sized disk and use a program like Norton Ghost or Acronis True Image to clone the existing drive to the new one, then swap the two drives (SSD from enclosure to internal, other drive out to enclosure)

Comment if you need more information!

you need to resize the partition with a partitioning tool like partition magic or acronis disk director, or clone the drive with acronis true image. these tools are downloadable here. That site has a bootable cd, which is loaded before windows starts.

Use this mate (Acronis True Image vol 9)
http://www.acronis.com/ let me know when you've downloaded it. in fact **** it hear mate :KEY
LACLE-EKG3V-8AVQS-H4UFD-Q7WFD

USE THE CLONE TOOL. This is **** hot for backing up your hole computer aswell.
If you get Stuck E-Mail me

Halarious, I had the same problem yet I used norton ghost. At least you still show 160 gb. Mine went all the way to 60 gb. Here is what I had to do to reclaim the lost. I downloaded something called "Magic Boot Disk" It gave me the whole 320 back yet have not found good cloning software yet. Magic Boot Disc is freeware avaliable at http://hddguru.com/content/en/software/2006.02.10-Magic-Boot-Disk/ Good luck cloning