Storage Solutions HDD GONE BAD - DISK IMAGE

chetansha

chetansha

Skilled
Guys my 2TB boot drive has developed bad sectors and i will be sending for RMA. Now i want to create an image of C Drive, so when my RMA comes back i want to put in the new HDD and restore the image. I dont want to go thru reinstalling windows and all my other programs.
So how do i go about it.?
 
You will need a spare 2TB disk and a disk imaging program like acronis or paragon.
Install the new or spare hdd in your computer and run the disk imaging program to clone your current hdd to the new hdd.
 
The thing is I dont have a spare 2 TB HDD, i have an 2 Tb drive with around 400 GB space free on it and my C Drive has only around 89 GB of data , incl windows, program files etc.
 
Then you can install acronis.

There are two ways you can do this.
1. Make acronis take a whole disk backup along with mbr and point it to the drive with 400GB space on it. Acronis compresses files really well and the 89Gb data should compress to about 60GB. You will only get a tib file in this case. Make a bootable pen drive with acronis on it from acronis menu. You can use this pen drive to get data back or clone hdd etc from dos mode.

You won't be able to run pc with windows on it in this method. You could run Linux from pen drive till you get the rma'd disk back.

2. Partition the disk with 400GB space on it and make acronis clone the boot partition to this partition. You can then boot off this drive by removing the bad hdd. Just check in bios which hdd has boot priority first.
Make acronis bootable USB or CD so that you can re clone the os partition to new drive.
 
@OP - Crazy_Eddy is right.

Before you do any sort of cloning, you need to first fix your drive. The below info is with reference to Win XP but the same steps should apply to other versions of Windows as well.

Open Explorer
Right click on C: Drive
Click Properties > Tools > Check Now
In the box that opens, select both options ("Automatically fix file system errors" & "Scan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors")

As C:\ is a Primary Boot Partition, system files are "locked" and Windows will ask if it should schedule a disk check on the next boot. Click "Yes" and reboot your PC. Windows will run the disk check and attempt to recover data from problematic/damaged sectors while permanently mark them as BAD in the FAT.

Note however that If the disk check recovers/marks sectors that contain critical Windows System files as BAD, then you could face issues booting into Windows. IMO this is a risk worth taking as the chances of critical files being damaged is quite low. You can verify things are fairly okay by simply allowing your system to boot normally into the OS once the disk check is complete.

To double check, you can also take a quick look at the Event Viewer to see if any critical system file errors are being reported.

If not, you can proceed to safely create an image of the partition with whatever drive cloning software you like. I personally use and recommend Paragon Backup & Recovery. Its free -

http://www.paragon-software.com/home/br-free/index.html

Backup the Boot partition of the drive you want to RMA to your other 2TB drive that has 400GB free. You can even use "uncompressed" mode (faster) for the backup if you like. Once you do this, wipe your drive (if you have any personal data on it) and send it for RMA.
 
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i Ran HD Tune Pro and i get this
 

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Hmm a count of 1 is not that bad. However it CAN go rapidly downhill from there pretty quick depending on your luck and the drives real health.

I would advise you to do what i stated above and transfer the data to another disk...
 
I will use paragon and make the image. Data is not a big issue. mostly tally and office documents.
But reinstalling os and programs is pain in the you know where.
 
If you use Paragon to make the Boot system image like I posted above, you will not have to install your OS & apps again. When you get your drive back from RMA, use Paragon again to simply restore the image onto it and you're ready to go.

I think you misinterpreted my use of the word "data". By "data" I meant everything you want to backup including the OS.
 
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