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Best HDD Clone utility?

A

Ashton

2[H]4U
Joined
Nov 13, 2004
Messages
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I have a windows box who's HDD is on it's last legs (only found out after I spend around 3 days installing all the software and all the downloaded windows updates) So I would like to move it to another HDD without having to spend ANOTHER 3 days setting everything back up.

I have external USB cases, so that's not an issue, I just need to know a good (preferably free) HDD clone utility is so I can just copy the disk, pull the old one, pop the new one inside and the PC be none the wiser.
 
You don't want to clone a failing hard drive, as errors and corrupt data can be copied over without you even knowing it. By cloning I mean a byte ordered 1:1 copy where the drives are identical. You usually do this with something like dd(1). Certain tools do exist to try and minimize copy of disk and filesystem errors such as ddrescue http://www.gnu.org/software/ddrescue/ddrescue.html

The proper way to copy this data is to first do a filesystem check on the partition. Then do a file system level copy of the data. Allow the filesystem structure to be recreated fresh. If the OS has trouble reading certain files it will let you know. Once you know which files have been corrupted you know what to replace and what you need to recover with a more specific tool.

If you drive is going to fail imminently then yes do a low level copy with a tool like dd so you can later do the above method.
 
spent a year cloning with ghost and acronis, but I'm not sure if either are free. Ghost isn't but if you work in a tech industry you might be able to get it, it's my choice, worked wonders in the desert where we were always swapping out drives or computers, or just passing on a straight up image, worked great for anything along those lines actually lol

As for free, I'm not sure, Army doesn't do a lot of free these days lol
 
Scotch77 said:
You don't want to clone a failing hard drive, as errors and corrupt data can be copied over without you even knowing it. By cloning I mean a byte ordered 1:1 copy where the drives are identical. You usually do this with something like dd(1). Certain tools do exist to try and minimize copy of disk and filesystem errors such as ddrescue http://www.gnu.org/software/ddrescue/ddrescue.html

The proper way to copy this data is to first do a filesystem check on the partition. Then do a file system level copy of the data. Allow the filesystem structure to be recreated fresh. If the OS has trouble reading certain files it will let you know. Once you know which files have been corrupted you know what to replace and what you need to recover with a more specific tool.

If you drive is going to fail imminently then yes do a low level copy with a tool like dd so you can later do the above method.
Click to expand...

Right now, I'm randomly finding my PC is frozen or rebooted for no good reason, and my HDD sounds like alternately a telegraph and a jet engine (though both come and go - right now it's silent, but practically everything has been loaded into memory) So I'm scared to take the time and try to fix corupted data. Also when it runs, it tends to run perfectly, so I honestly dont know just waht is wrong with the HDD (I know it's the HDD because I have a seperate HDD I have been using on this PC for several months udner Ubuntu and not had a single hiccup, so the system hardware itself is stable)

What pisses me is the fact this drive is only a year old or so... gonna have to see if it's made by a company that offers "lifetime Replacement" for shipping cost...
 
+1 to dd, it will really help in this kind of situation.

Good luck to you on getting your data off! :)
 
Just FYI, Clonezilla offers a few modes for copying, one of which is a dd copy. It also will perform filesystem checks on filesystems it recognizes, which is most.
 
You could try driveimagexml, I had good luck with it, and it's free. Although with such tools, it often happens that you need to repair the MBR/boot sector.
 
Will have a go at Clonezilla tonight if my laptop decides to work well enough I dont need my desktop. Will be doing the DD copy to make sure there's no corruption.

Also on that note: Anyone tried to run vista in a VM on Linux? The PC is the desktop in my sig, but even with a nice setup like this I'm concerned I wouldnt have the power to run a VM for 3D modeling software like Maya (And all I use Windows for is Maya/3DS Max, Steam, and Paint.net (yes yes I need to just learn GIMP if I'm on a linux box, but I've not had the inclination to tackle that monster) everything else I use Linux for)
 
I run VMs under Linux quite regularly, Windows 7 and Mac OSX. The performance with modern virtualization is quite good, and even 3D graphics acceleration is quite usable. Not a graphics guy, but I'd say it's worth a try. I rarely need "real" Windows anymore aside from gaming, and having VMs on hand is super useful for providing support.
 
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