This message concerns a subject that I'm sure many the members of this
list are dealing with
frequently.  It is lengthly, but I believe pertinent.  Alluding to the
statement "PCBuild only works if you contribute". Tim you certainally
went out of your way to contribute!! I certainally do thank you and will
let you know how I make out

John Farrow

Tim Klymkow wrote:
>
> John,
>
> Here's what you need to do for a successful transfer of ALL files to your
> new drive:
>
> This is tricky. Follow the instructions carefully!
>
> Prerequisites: A Windows9x startup disk
> BIOS: Set to AUTO detect
>
> 1) Install your new, blank hard drive as a slave to drive C:.
> 2) Boot with the startup disk
> 3) Run FDISK and setup the max primary partition for FAT16 - approx.. 2.1G.
> FDISK will show the max size allowed (if you have Win95b/98 and want FAT32
> enabled you can set it up with only one partition).
> 3a) Setup a 2nd and 3rd extended partition, as required, if using FAT16.
> This will use the whole drive  and  will result in Drive letters D; E; and F
> for the new drive.  Exit FDISK.
> 2) Format the new hard drive using FORMAT on ALL partitions (drives D:, E:,
> F:).
> 3) Reboot into Windows9x.
> 4) The following will copy the contents of your old drive to the new drive:
>
>   From a DOS WINDOW INSIDE WINDOWS9x (THIS IS IMPORTANT!),
>   type the following command:
>
>         XCOPY C:\*.* D:\*.* r/i/c/h/k/e/y
>
> Notes: If you get a "switch not recognized" error, you're doing it wrong. To
> find out what these switches do, type xcopy /? from a DOS WINDOW INSIDE
> WINDOWS9x.
> This command assumes that your new hard drive was assigned the letter D:\.
> Choose "yes" if asked to overwrite any files.
>
> 5) When copying is finished, turn off the computer, open it up, and
> reconfigure so that the new hard drive is the Primary Master drive and the
> old drive as slave.
>
> 6) Boot to the Win9x startup disk. Using FDISK set the Primary Partition on
> the new C: drive as Active.
>
> 7) Eject the Startup disk and reboot. If Windows9x does not boot from the
> hard drive, put the startup disk back in and boot to it. At the A:\ prompt,
> type:
>
> SYS C:
>
> This will recopy the system files to the new hard drive.
>
> 8) Reboot to the hard drive. It should boot to Windows9x - recreating the
> SWAP file.
>     Within Explorer you will now have your new drive as C: E: F: if
> using FAT16 while the old drive is now the D: drive.
>
> 9) If everything is OK at this point, either keep the NEW drive as C: or
> swap the D:drive (OLD) back to the MASTER and remove the NEW BACKUP hard
> drive.
>
> If removing the NEW drive to keep as your backup, then do the following:
>
> 10) Reboot using the original drive.  It should boot into Win9x.   Repeat
> steps 6-7 if necessary (should not be!) if it did not boot into Win9x.
>
> There are lots of reasons why the above procedure might not work on a
> particular system. You'll be doing a lot of plugging and unplugging of IDE
> and power cables, moving jumpers around, so it's easy to get one of these
> things wrong, i.e., incorrectly jumpered drives, cables that aren't
> correctly seated on the pins, incorrect HD parameters in CMOS, etc.
> Also, the instructions above are a bit tricky to follow, and unless you are
> very careful, something might go wrong the first time you try it.
>
> Hope this helps!
>
> Tim Klymkow
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: johnfarrow <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Friday, November 20, 1998 3:25 PM
> Subject: [PCBUILD] Spare Hard Drive
>
> >Hello,
> >
> >    Suppose you have one hard drive (IDE) and you buy another as a
> >backup.
> >You want to copy everything from the current operating drive to the new
> >drive so that in case of a failure of the current one, you can simply
> >have the backup take over.
> >
> >Question #1
> >
> >   How can you format/fdisk the new drive so that it has an active
> >partion and be ready to boot incase of failure of the current drive.  I
> >have heard that you can only have one active partion in the system, so
> >how do you get around this?
> >
> >Question #2
> >
> >   Do you format the new drive from windows 95 or from DOS?
> >
> >Question #3
> >
> >   What is the best way to copy everthing from the current drive to the
> >backup drive?
>
> >John Farrow
>
>         PCBUILD only works if you contribute. Send your messages
>              to be posted to: [log in to unmask]

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