Need Help/Advise on old IDE equipment

I

Icestation

Weaksauce
Joined
Aug 6, 2008
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73
I need an offline clone machine for 2 IDE drives (1 source - 1 Target)

I have some old Machines (CNC mills) that have NT 3.51 on them
as some know you can not hook up a NT 3.51 drive on Windows XP or newer as it will auto update the file system and make it not bootable. So cloning software other than a Ghost boot disc is out, and that is a pain to deal with, I need something the boss can easily use on his own.

Now I have been searching and searching for a offline clone/dupe machine that are not some astronomical $1,000 plus box. I have found the kingwin ez-clone for 40 bucks or so, but that only allows a IDE source, target drive is SATA only.

So any help, on a used box or anything, I have been searching ebay but most of it is these china made usb boxes that use the host OS, or $1500 dupe boxes.

Or if you know a good IDE to SATA converter so I can use SATA drives in these old machine that would be the best solution as IDE drives are becoming harder and harder to find. But I have heard nothing but bad stuff about those.

Thanks for any help.
 
Oops forgot to ask if anyone has any experience with the KANGURU SOLUTIONS KCLONE, it looks like it would work but never heard of them.

the startech one that goes for about $175 has some horrible reviews when using IDE so that one is out.
 
Greetings

Is it possible for you to locate an old working 80486 PC with a floppy drive? I used Ghost that was around at the time and it was a two stage process as I would simply just boot DOS and then insert the Ghost disk (which occupied pretty much the entire floppy disk) and I would copy everything from there, other than this suggestion I can't really help you in this regard.

As far as IDE disks go then although actual HDD's are becoming rare then kindly note that IDE SSD's are actually quite common and presumably this is due for reasons similar to yours.

IDE SSD's for laptops are available from Kingspec and can be bought on Ebay from Hong Kong but you will need an adapter that will convert the pins from the smaller laptop size to regular IDE pins and also there will be a molex connector added to the adapter to supply power, you can also get them from Aliexpress e.g.

http://www.aliexpress.com/item/2-5-...l-Solid-State-Disk-Flash-Drive/245602476.html

Another option is a plug in module that can be either a female or male connector that can attach directly to an IDE cable or plug straight into the IDE connector but kindly note that if you plug directly into the connector then you can't have a second device on that channel. e.g.

http://www.aliexpress.com/item/Free...KDM-44VS-2-032GMS-MLC-Disk-On/1814457692.html

These are very reasonably priced, just be aware that I have tried IDE SSD's with laptops that had IDE HDD's and its a 50/50 chance whether they will work or not and if they don't they just lock up the entire PC and prevent it from booting so I suggest you just buy one or two of these devices and test them out first, why this situation exists I have no idea as I'm guessing the SSD's are not 100% compatible.

That's about all I can help you with, hope it helps somewhat

Cheers
 
That is the way we do it now, and it is a little complicated for the boss to do, but thanks for the thoughts, I have a few IDE SSD's I am currently testing on one of the machines.
Not a fan of the kingspec ones, but the Transcend one I have has been working great on NT 3.51 on that old hardware.

I did find a Logicube Echo Portable cloner, I used Logicube brick burners way back in my Army days with excellent success, but they are spendy, the used old portable one I found for sale is not bad at $250 bucks.

Do any of you old timers ;) have an old logicube they want to sell? I don't need a 10 drive one or anything but if the price is right I will take it.
 
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