Cloned Hard Disk won't boot...

[Intellibyte]

Which floppies are you referring to? I tried the rescuew disks but they dont seem to do much.


I fixed few times similar "blinking cursor" situation (happened also after imaging) by using Drive Image 2002 floppies. It found few errors in drive's partition and offered to fix them, one by one... Something about LBA-CHS translation... Once fixed, drive started normally...

[xsrvx]

Which floppies are you referring to? I tried the rescuew disks but they dont seem to do much.


I fixed few times similar "blinking cursor" situation (happened also after imaging) by using Drive Image 2002 floppies. It found few errors in drive's partition and offered to fix them, one by one... Something about LBA-CHS translation... Once fixed, drive started normally...

I have seen this problem a few times and I have always been able to resolve it by a simple fdisk /mbr

I just boot off a Win98 CD and once at a prompt type fdisk /mbr

Has always fixed it for me if it was a MBR problem.

[+Daemon+]

to lazy to read this thread, but umm ghost works, just ghost the machine to a image or disk to disk them. ghost the image back to the other hard drive and then rebuild windows there your done

[jeradsyn]

Earlier this week, I was working with a failing Maxtor and a new WD hd, and wanted to copy the working partition over to the WD drive. I used the setup software that comes with WD, I think it's called LifeGuard... the copy went smoothly, then it gave me the option to 'reinitialize the MBR' which I declined. I exited, and tried to reboot, with similar results as you described. I reran the LifeGuard soft ware and this time did the reinitialize the MBR. Upon restarting, it fired right up!

[gizmo1_1]

I have seen this problem a few times and I have always been able to resolve it by a simple fdisk /mbr

I just boot off a Win98 CD and once at a prompt type fdisk /mbr

Has always fixed it for me if it was a MBR problem.

This has worked many times in the past for me. From Dos 6.22 up to WinMe
Xp also has a similar feature when in console recovery mode.

[maxadmin]

Thursday 07 October 2004 at 1617hrs [UTC]

Hi...

Here's what you needed to do for future reference:

#1.
On the new drive set the partition to 'active'. Do this using a tool like Partition Magic it's easy

#2.
Use Acronis True Image to copy the old disk to the new hdd (USB / Firewire)

#3.
Fit new disk to laptop and reboot... It Will!

#4.
If you are asked to boot again do so

#5.
System may tell you it has found new hardware, if it does reboot

It really is as simple as that.

If you're really stuck for the progs, shout and I'll stick them on a server for you to download.

My good deed for the day!

Max

Hey folks,

I did something this weekend that I've done at least 10 times to various desktops or notebooks and it's always worked...

Except this time.

This is a Solo 9500 Gateway notebook. The 10GB IBM hard drive inside started to indicate imminent failure. So, we decided to replace it. I bought a new 20GB Seagate drive.

I used Drive Copy to clone the drive.

Now the system won't boot.

What happens is it runs through BIOS, the screen goes blank, a cursor appears on the upper left and there it sits.

Here's what I've tried:

1. Tried a few different options in Drive Copy -- safe copy, etc.

2. Ran FIXBOOT from the Recovery Console. (Note: I CAN access the disk if I run Recovery Console. I can get a directory listing, run CHKDSK (although it says it doesn't need to run), etc.

3. I also tried Norton Ghost, which has worked for me in the past when Drive Copy didn't.

4. I've default-set the BIOS. (The BIOS does recognize the HDD fine.)

If I put the OLD HDD in, the system reports Missing Operating System. This makes me wonder if it's some BIOS-related problem or whether the drive needs to be tatooed somehow.

If I need to, I'll reinstall XP. (Hopefully I can do a repair install.) I'd prefer not to, however.

Any thoughts?

[Kenteth420]

I wasted 4 years of my life as a tech at Gateway, if you have windows XP or windows 2k on the 9500 I was never able to get any kind of drive imaging software to work properly, the same holds true for solo 5300's. And as far as Techs problem with the desktop, if go back is on a system you need to remove it or activate the partition.