Cloning hard disk partitions selectively

[max789]

Hi

I've a Seagate hard disk divided into 5 partitions: C, D, J, K, and H. C and D are primary partitions with C as the system drive hosting Windows XP.

I'd like to clone partitions C, D, and J only to a new, larger sized WD Caviar Black drive, and replace my old Seagate with the WD. Ideally, the end result is that the cloned C, D and J partitions will be identical in size to the existing ones, with a large unformatted section on the WD drive.

What would you recommend as the most straightforward procedure to accomplish the above objective using free software tools? I've spent some time reading about DriveImage XML, BartPE and a few tools but none seems to offer the selective cloning feature. Further, there appears to be frequent problems with how to set the OS partition of the new drive active.

Thanks!

Max

[Vague]

Clonezilla.org might be your choice.


I know you can clone partition or disk to partition or disk. I think the new partition or disk has to be at least equal to the source.

You might have to run it a few times, for each partition / disk you want cloned, but it should work for you.

[Vague]

I forgot to mention that it's open source.

[max789]

Hi

Thanks for all your helpful feedback. Still trying to learn as much as possible about cloning and imaging...

Max

[Surly73]

I've done this sort of thing with Clonezilla, give it a whirl.

[InvisiBill]

Drive SnapShot (http://www.drivesnapshot.de/en/) can backup partitions, which you could then restore to the new drive. Partition Magic can move/copy partitions and set the active flags and whatnot, but it hasn't been updated in a while and can have some issues with newer filesystems. XXCLONE (http://www.xxclone.com/index.htm) was also recommended in another thread.