getting a new hard drive... questions...!!!

[jac006]

Aight, so I found out that I'm an MSDN subscriber and I can download vista, and I want to install it, just not on my main hard drive. Problem is, I want to get a new hd, because this one is crap. I'm thinking about the new segate 750gb. Is there some software where I can just create a complete copy of everything and transfer it onto the new hd? Again, I've never had to deal with this issue, so, help would be appreciated greatly. if not, should I just back up everything and do clean installs? I'm thinking it would be better, but would also be a pain in the arse. I have an old 14.7 gb hd, but it's slow, at 5400 for a deskstop, and vista is best on 16gb or more. Anything at all?

 

[joxley1990]

Im pretty sure Norton Ghost can do it
http://www.symantec.com/home_homeoffice/products/overview.jsp?pcid=br&pvid=ghost10

Or, you could buy this new hard drive, copy all the files over, and repair XP - I think that works. Or, just back everything up, and reformat.

 

[Deathstar1]

What I did was, new raptor 10,000rpm SATA drive for my XP os, clean install, I believe a clean install is always the way to go, partitioned my 120GB ide drive to have a 30GB partition for Vista, then partitioned the rest for Vista "bits" (Office 2007 beta 2 and driver d/loads etc) I have had to reinstall Vista several times now through trying software that ends up being incompatible so a 30GB partition is quick enough.

If you do a clean install on your new drive you can use Windows "File and Settings Transfer Wizard" or altenatively a programme like Ghost or Acronis True Image if you do not wish to do a clean install.