duel boot/2 drives to new drive

Greetings.

I am running a PC that has a 40gig drive (C) with partition (D, empty). Also have a 2nd drive (E) which is an 80gig.

Drive C is boot drive, has old windows 98SE on it and D is empty. Drive E has XP home on it. I changed the boot to just go to XP.

I need to put XP onto a larger drive, 120gig. I bought Acronis True Image 11 Home. At first I thought I only had one drive but I don't, its on my sons computer. I know I can't change drive letters, at least from what I've read.

Is it possible to move both drives onto the one New drive? Of what would be my best option? I don't want to reinstall as the system runs great and there are things on it that can't be replaced at this time.

Thank you.

 

There is a neat freeware called XXCLONE that can copy your existing XP install to the new drive and render it bootable.

 

When you say make the new drive bootable, you mean I wont need the Drive C (40gig) drive at all? That Drive E (XP drive) will become C by using XXCLONE?

I went to the XXCLONE site, read entire user guide. It sounds as if I can do this with making the MBR and other files as it describes.

thanks.

 

Yes, when you slave the new drive and XXCLONE the XP system partition to it and then reconnect the new drive as a master, it will become the C: drive.

XXCLONE initializes the drive's first sector and make it ready for full stand alone booting, if that be your desire. OR, you could leave both systems connected and dual boot them, as I do. That gives me a "Test Dummy" copy of XP for experimenting with software. When used in that fashion, whatever drive I choose to boot automatically becomes the C: drive and the other drive is renamed accordingly. Read the help Files and you'll be aware of all of the features that you may need. I don't mean to overcomplicate it for you but just wanted to mention that feature. Keep it simple at first and just do the basic cloning and reconnecting as they outline in the Help files.

I have used it extensively and can likely answer any question that you can't easily find in the help files.

As with any powerful tool, double check all setting before you make the final click. Be sure you have the Target and Source set correctly. Understand that all existing data will be wiped from the Target and replaced with the data from the Source.

EDIT, Rereading your first post, I see you have Acronis 11. I would recommend using it to make a compressed image of the XP partition before doing other work. Store that image on some other media that will not be involved in the cloning. That will give you a higher degree of protection in case something untoward happens.

 

Ok, so far it seems to have worked. The screen I got when it booted up after the transfer was the XXCLONE background. Also the boot.ini lists xxclone as booted too.

Drive letters have not changed, it copied drive letter as well. Question tho, can I change drive letters so the XP is C and old drive is D or will that mess things up?

Seems also I can't install my mouse software. Logitech LX7 cordless mouse, tries to install to C:/, gets half way, reboots comp but does not finish install.

Thanks again

 

No, you wouldn't want to change the drive letter since that would render all the shortcuts pointing to the wrong target. Besides, Windows won't allow you to change the drive letter of the system or the boot drive.

As for the mouse problem, be sure you are installing it to the drive that you are currently logged on to. If it says it's installing to the C: drive and you're booted to the d: drive, I can see where that would lead to errors. It may be as simple as editing the default target line in the installation process.