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Drive Cloning Software ?


Toppack

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Posted

I still plan to get one of the VelociRapter drives next month

and was thinking about using 'Spotmau PowerSuite 2012' drive-Cloning utility to copy the C: partition of old hard-drive to the new VelociRapter drive,

to make it the W-7 Boot-drive.

Then I can Re-allocate that space, on old drive.

 

Has anyone here used Spotmau Cloning and partition-management software ?

 

I understand it does a True complete Copy,

Not a compressed-Backup, like most copy programs do?

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Posted

Toppack

 

Lucky you. Velociraptor is a great pieceof kit.

I never used 'Spotmau PowerSuite 2012' but when I was looking for a drive Cloning and Backup program I found very mixed reviews for it. I settled for Paragon in the end. It might br worth looking at before you decide.

Posted
Toppack

 

I never used 'Spotmau PowerSuite 2012' but when I was looking for a drive Cloning and Backup program I found very mixed reviews for it. I settled for Paragon in the end. It might br worth looking at before you decide.

 

Thanks for the Info, I did not know about Paragon. :shock:

I have heard of it but thought it was just another Backup program. :-?

 

I have Not seen any bad reviews of Spotmau though ???

(that's with latest 2012 version and Windows-7, I did find some problems with older version and XP, related to SSDs)

 

They Both look Good, do about the same things and similar pricing,

so Now I'm not Sure which to Get ??? :roll:

I may just 'Flip a Coin'. :lol:

Posted

Scannan,

Question - When coping Windows-7, does 'Paragon' clone the hidden-System-partition automaticly with the C: partition or drive?

Or do the copy of C: and the Hidden partition need to be commanded separately.

 

I'm wondering if there is a separate Step to copying the W-7 hidden-System partition, or not ?

Posted

I just remembered that 'Macrium-Reflect' Backup program also has a disk-Cloning function and I have it Already,

but I've never used it for Cloning.

 

It appears to have simple check-box settings to select which partitions to be cloned,

Including the System-partition.

So, I may test it, using another old hard-drive,

before I get the Velocirapter drive,

to see how well it works.

Posted

Hi toppack

 

I do not use W7, but I can say that Paragon has a huge amount of options both Automatic and manual. It also has the ability to clone/mirror the entire drive including hidden partitions. It has incremental backup and partition resizing both positive and negative.

Here is a link which I think may give you a good idea of what you are looking for.

 

I think that testing various packages is the only way to go. I tested about 8 before I settled on Paragon. I found it user friendly and versatile.

Posted

Thanks for the great Info and Link!

 

I find more and more websites with people having Problems with SSDs. :roll:

I know that I have purchased My Last SSD,

until they greatly improve the reliability. :?

Recent Improvements May have helped, but I've not seen any good reviews since then though.

 

But, It seems that All the latest drive designs have a High Failure-rate, including the VelociRapter. :sad:

 

I think Hybrid-drive technology will be the Next Speed improvement,

if they can design those with decent reliability,

and that do not need to be plugged into Mobo.

I would not mind having to use a special-cable but do not like having to mount the Hybrid in Mobo slot. :?

(since they would block air-flow to Video-cards)

Posted

Toppack

 

I think the SSD situation is a case of wishes surpassing practicality. Looking at the history, I feel that developers just got the idea in their head that the obvious next step was to have a drive with no moving parts, as the disc speed was a huge limiting factor on drive performance, due to harmonics of the leading edge and material failure due to centrifugal force.

I think that they pushed ahead with the attitude that it must work better in SSD rather than does it work better with SSD,,

I am quite sure that some bright developer will come up with a more reliable system, especially with the amount of work being done on a quantum level.

The hard part now for users, is curbing the urge to grab an SSD because it is the new toy on the scene, rather than hang back and wait for reliability improvements. I suppose SSD's are really in Beta mode at the moment.

Posted

I tested the drive-cloning utility in 'Macrium-Reflect' and it worked great.

It was very Slow! Took about an Hour to copy about 200.GB,

(that was on a 4-core CPU @ 3.2GHz).

The reason it was so slow is that the copy process used only 1 of the 4 CPU-cores, which seems strange. :shock:

(noticed that when looking at Task-manager)

 

The only other problem was that the Old System-partition ended up being D: drive (no longer hidden) :roll:

and what was C: on old drive became H: drive. :shock:

but with the great partition-manager in W-7, I quickly fixed that problem. :grin:

 

So, I've managed to do the complete 'Boot-drive Cloning' process without buying any new software! :grin:

(since Macrium-Reflect was Free)

Posted

Question - Anyone know what the Maximum Size of the C: drive partition Is,

in Windows-7 64bit?

 

It seems to be limited to 503.GB on this computer, that I cloned?

 

I thought the maximum was 2.TB, but maybe that is in Raid configuration?

 

I've never attempted to make a C: drive larger than 500.GB, that I can remember,

so I have never encountered an upper limit before?

Posted

Okay, Thanks for the great Info links.

 

So, Now I have a Mystery, as to why I can Not Expand the C: drive larger than 503.GB ??? :shock:

 

When I try to 'Expand' C:, the Unallocated space does not even show-up as being available.

 

Not that I really Need it to be larger than that, but I am Curious Why ? :-?

Posted

Thisusually happens because at some point the system was told that the entire drive size is 500GB. So now it does not see any free space as it considers the drive to be 500 GB.

I have seen this happen quite a bit even with nachines from the shop, because the tech gave the wrong info when setting up the drive.

I suggest running a partitioning management tool such as Paragon Partition Manager.

This should analyze the drive and possibily show the true situation.

Posted
I suggest running a partitioning management tool such as Paragon Partition Manager.

This should analyze the drive and possibily show the true situation.

 

:roll:

You are determined to make me Buy More Software :!: :lol:

I'm Not $50. Curious. :lol:

 

I think I'll just leave it the way it IS, on that drive. ;-)

since it's a temporary set-up.

I do have a great Backup Boot-drive Now though, for that computer, that I can just Pop-In the hot-swap-bay, if needed.

 

Maybe when I clone the VelociRapter drive all that partition size stuff will get Cleared-up ? :lol:

Posted
Just curious,,,what actual size is your drive.

 

It's a 750.GB drive, with actual useable space of 698.GB after format.

I got a good deal on several of those 750s on eBay. :wink:

 

I ended up with 193.GB of Unallocated space, so I just made that another partition.

Posted

It really seems Strange that W-7 would Not have a easy way to Restore full drive capacity :!: :?:

 

I plan to get a 600.GB VelociRapter drive,

so if I encounter the same problem with it, I may have to get more software to fix it,

but I'll wait and see how that goes, first.

Posted

Unfortunately the Bios gets set with the wrong info and it is a major job to get windows to change its mind. The MBR also gets set incorrectly. That factory recovery software is very good. I have seen it fix a few drives,

Posted

I encountered one other Minor problem with the cloned C: drive. :?

 

When I tried to connect to the Steam-game-server and run the CallofDuty-BlackOps-II game,

it saw the the game was installed on a different drive and refused to run.

(I tried loading it several ways but No-Joy)

 

I then tried running BlackOps-1 game and it ran with No problems.

 

I then went back and tried BlackOps-II again and It then ran with No Problems. :shock:

 

I've not figured out What Happened, but evidently the Steam-server desided that the Changed drive was Okay. :grin:

(but I may have to run version-1 before running version-II, from now-on)

 

Note - the bad thing about those Steam games is that they automaticly install on the C: drive,

with no option to put them on another drive.

 

BTW - Here's a list of Disk-Cloning software, I had no idea there were so Many:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_disk_cloning_software

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