need help from fellow techies.

[Taco_assassin]

A little background first. I have an external 160g hdd, totally empty. My primary hdd in my pc is 40g. What I'm lookin to do is take *everything* off the 40g and put it on the 160g so it boots and runs like a perfect copy. Reason being I'd like to remove the smaller one from my pc and maybe use it in the external for trying out other OS's. Anyone know how to so this? I've already tried using the system backup tool, and copying the partition to the external but nothing has worked so far

[RaTix]

Download A copy of Hiren's boot CD from torrents or newsgroups and use the disk imaging software on there to create an image of the 40GB drive and just copy to the 160GB.

http://www.hiren.info/pages/bootcd

[Capthemfoos]

Well, you could Dual Boot your PC. I don't know how to do it exactly, but it could be a good option for you after you copy the 40 GB onto your external drive. It makes it so that you can have 2 OS's on your pc at once, giving you the option to chose whichever one you want to use.

[RaTix]

If your just testing out different OS's, you should look into VMWare workstation. you can install and use right on your main desktop till you make a decision on which one to go with as a secondary.

[Taco_assassin]

I am mostly just testing out OS's. But i also wanna out the 160 inside. Anyways, it almost worked. I dl'd a trial version of Norton ghost and then found some keys in some torrents to make it fully functional. After using their utility to copy the entire drive(which they say is the one to use to upgrade to a larger drive) i went about making the swap. All looked fine except that it hangs on the screen right before it gives a login box. Dunno what could cause it or how to fix it. Anyone with any ideas would be greatly appreciated

[Dioxin]

Taco, this isn't an answer to your question, but I want to propose something.

1 - It's better imo to have your OS installed on your smaller drive. As you're moving around data, movies, music etc on your biggest drive, you're going to fragment it. A fragmented operating system drive is going to slow your computer down. I have my os installed on a smaller drive while everything else is on bigger drives already installed internally.

2 - Why copy your existing drive? I know it may be "easier", but you'll probably have a faster running computer if you just reformat. In undergrad, I used to reformat almost once a month. It clears out the junk that accumulates, expecially if you install a lot of warez or look at a lot of porn.

Just my thoughts. You can take them or leave them. (BTW, if I knew the answer to your original question, I would have directly answered it. I'm stuck on it though.) Good luck!

D

[Taco_assassin]

Dioxin,

I actually found a nice little proggy called migrate easy from acronis. The trial period is fully functional so i didn't even have to pay. It moved literally everything onto the 160g. The reason i don't like reformatting is mostly because i end up having to buy another license for some of the programs I've actually paid for. That and i really don't use a ton of warez. The fragmenting thing I'm not to worried about. I have a nice defrag prog that takes plenty good care of that. Now that that's all said and done., I've managed to put the 40g in the external and set up 2 different partitions. One for PCLinxOS and the other for Linux Mint. Which brings me to my next question....

Anyone have anything they wanna share for a linux noob?

[RaTix]

Why did you go with the external at all? just curious as to why you just didn't install both internally. If you did you could use the smaller HD for the OS and the larger for data and Virtual Memory which will make it a bit faster. I use tat setup on my PC. I use the 40 gig for the main OS and the 160GB I have a 10GB partition that is just used for a paging file and the rest just data. If your gonna be moving it around form place to place then I gues sit makes more sense to go with the external.

Acronis does has some good stuff, I had to use their disk manager for the dedicated server not long ago. As for good Defrag programs, I use O&O Defrag that works as a screen saver defrag. Every morning my PC is completely defraged and ready to go.

2 - Why copy your existing drive? I know it may be "easier", but you'll probably have a faster running computer if you just reformat. In undergrad, I used to reformat almost once a month. It clears out the junk that accumulates, expecially if you install a lot of warez or look at a lot of porn.

There are so many things wrong with that statement. Do you know how many baby angels you just killed by saying that. Warez or Porn are no reasons to format, unless the cops are knocking on your door maybe. In fact, there is never a reason to format in order to fix a problem. Don't mean to sound like a prick, but it just pains me to see people suggest that as a solution.

[Taco_assassin]

Ratix,

i went with the external cuz at some point or another i end up ****ing something up. i tinker with alot of stuff so i figured for some reason that putting the linux on the external may save some annoyance down the line. of course if that doesn't end up being the case, i'll just add a partition to the 160g internal and put linux back inside. I gotta say though, so far i'm lovin it. I should prolly get a good reading list going so i can be just a proficient wtih it as i am with windows. Of course once that happens i may dump windows entirely. I've alrwady managed to get the remote manager working in linux through wine.

[Xannash]

Hey Taco,
I am new to this forum in fact this is my first day on the forum...Do you have any experience with Linux? If not then I would suggest trying out a distro such as Xandros which is most like Windows, well at least out of all the distros that I have tried to date. My personal favorite and what I use currently is Mepis 6.6.

[Zabka]

There are so many things wrong with that statement. Do you know how many baby angels you just killed by saying that. Warez or Porn are no reasons to format, unless the cops are knocking on your door maybe. In fact, there is never a reason to format in order to fix a problem. Don't mean to sound like a prick, but it just pains me to see people suggest that as a solution.

Gee, I remember when they used to just kill kittenz.