New hard drive won't boot

[Honkycat]

Hi,
I backed up my intire (250GB running XP) C drive on my Dell Dimension 9100 to an external drive. I then put in a new 750 GB WD 7500AACS drive and did a restore from the external drive using Acronis. It took about 9 hours to do this.
When I tried to start up I got the message:
Windows could not start because of a computer disk hardware configuration problem. Could not read from the selected disk. Check boot path and disk hardware.

Any ideas what might be wrong? I did the F12 setup thing and the hard drive diagnostics which said "pass". I've done a restore data to the old hard drive using exactly the same method and external drive before and it worked fine.

I've put the old drive back and it works as normal. Surely as the new one has exactly the same windows and settings copied to it, it should work too?
Btw, I don't have an XP disk or anything... I don't think the dell came with one, and I'm not that savvy with changing registrys and that sort of thing

I'd be really grateful for any advice

Cheers,
Steve

 

[sanya]

You need to install, but not just copy windows at the new HDD.

 

[blackjack]

Did you check the drive was formatted for the right OS ie Mac or PC? then like the above said you will need to install windows first as the back up you made will have been configured to that drive and so by copying it onto your new drive it will be set for your old drive not your new one, when I added a new drive I had to reinstall windows as well.

 

[Celegorm]

If he used Acronis there is a chance he is restoring from an image (which is why it'd take so long) and he could have done it right.

What were the techs of the hard drive? If the old one was IDE and the new is SATA I think I know what's going on.

If both were IDE, check the jumpers on the new drive.

 

[Honkycat]

They are both SATA. The data on the external was done as "backup" so yes, maybe that's the problem. I tried to do a "clone" to the external, but it doesn't seem to have worked. I suppose I can't install windows if I don't have a disk can I? If a clone is transferred to a new disk, is it then a working drive or is there still installation to do?

I thought it would be a working copy of the original drive, as you say Celegorm. Alas, it appears not..

Also, I don't think I can format the new drive now (I thought Acronis did this too) as any time I switch on it just goes to the error message screen

Thanks for all you input! I really need to do this!

 

[Celegorm]

Is your motherboard set to RAID instead of IDE/Legacy mode for the SATA controller? If so, you may need to make a 1-disk array for it to take properly. Otherwise you will probably need to get a disk and just reinstall.

 

[Honkycat]

OK, here's the latest. I looked at the way I did the Acronis backup to the external and realised that I hadn't ticked ALL the boxes... ie, I just ticked C drive, not FAT 16 etc. So, I ticked them all, backed up again and did a new restore to my new 750GB drive overnight. I got up, "operation completed" and woohoo windows started!. BUT, I then went to My Computer expecting to see 500GB free but discovered that it's the same as my old drive....3GB free!!. Has it done some sort of partition or something, and if so, how do I get to use the rest of my new drive??
Thanks ,
Steve.

 

[amp27]

dude just pick up a copy off norton goast. make a exact copy and boot stuff to. a clone

 

[Celegorm]

Acronis is better than norton IMO. What you can do is get a copy of G-Parted and use that to expand your partition into the rest of the free space.

 

[Honkycat]

Sorted! Thanks. I found a free programme calle Easeus which did the job. Cheers for all your advice.

Steve.