Fitting a new hard drive into a system is a task that most people who can wield a screwdriver and unplug/plug in a couple of connectors can handle. The job is made far easier if you've bought a retail hard drive kit as opposed to the OEM kit (the retail kit will contain screws, cables, drive rails and instructions - pretty much everything you need except the Phillips screwdriver).

However, when it comes to cloning the contents of one drive onto the other, many people get nervous, especially when faced with the prospect of being faced with a system that won't boot up and lost data.

Here I'll show you how to use Acronis True Image 11 (free trial) to clone a drive (True Image 11 can do a LOT more than just clone drives - it's by far the best backup/imaging tool that I've used).

In this piece I'm going to assume three things:

• That you are running Vista (although the steps will be virtually identical for XP)
• That you already have Acronis True Image 11 installed
• That you've already fitted the new drive

OK, let's get started.

First, confirm that the new disk is installed properly and being seen by Windows. Click Start and type computer management into the Start Search box and click on Computer Management, then click on Disk Management under Storage will show you that both drives are being seen:

If you see the drive, you're ready to move on to using Acronis True Image 11. Fire up the application and clock on Disk Utilities:

Click on Clone Disk to start the Disk Clone Wizard:

Click Next on the Disk Clone Wizard screen:

Keep Clone Mode on Automatic, and click Next:

The next screen shows the hard disk structure. Click Next to confirm that this is acceptable (if you only have two drives, this is simple):

Click Proceed if you're happy and ready to go:

Click Reboot if you're ready to go:

From her eon in the process is automatic. Just sit back and be patient while Acronis does its stuff (this process took me some 15 minutes to complete, it could take a lot longer):

Done!

OK, at this point if you're swapping hard drives and are ready to boot up off the new one, disconnect the power to your system, open up your PC and swap the data cables over for the two drives (the small, flat ribbon), close up the PC, reconnect the power and boot up. When the system has loaded up you should see both drives show up in Computer Management. 

Done!

If you no longer want the data on the original drive then you can right-click on the old drive as shown in Computer Management and choose Format ..., and work through the wizard. Remember that formatting is a one-way process, so take care!

Acronis True Image 11 - $49.95 - 15 day free trial

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This entry was posted on Friday, June 6th, 2008 at 14:37 and is filed under PC Doctor Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.