Can't get Norton Ghost to transfer my op system to new computer

[bwriter]

I acquired a new computer and hoped to move the operating system from my old computer over to it painlessly by creating an image of the old system's hard disk drive and copying it to the new system's hard disk drive using Norton Ghost.

It should have been easy. I hoped to fit the new drive into the old computer as a slave, copy over the image to it and then refit it into the new computer.

Problem: The new computer C: drive is a SATA while the other three (two in the old computer and the slave in the new one are all IDE). This meant I could not hook up the new SATA drive with the old computer since there was no suitable interface to accept it.

Bright idea: If I fitted the old system HDD into the slave position of the new computer, I could create an image there and copy it over onto the SATA drive. But Ghost refused to copy from drive D: to drive C:. It insisted on the copy direction being from drive C: to drive D: (or any other drive as long as it wasn't C:).

All right, then. Bright idea #2. with the new SATA drive still in the new computer as drive C: and the HDD I wanted to clone onto it hooked up as a slave and defined as drive D:, I just needed to enter the BIOS and rearrange the priority setting so that the system booted up from drive D:, the HDD from the old computer.

Although the BIOS happily accepted the new priority settings, it still insisted on booting from the SATA drive and only the SATA drive.

I tried every wheeze and scheme I could think of but nothing I did would get the new computer to boot from anywhere other than the SATA HDD. And that includes a Windows XP system CD. If I disconnect the SATA drive, drive C:, the operating system goes in the huff and refuses to boot, even when the slave drive sits there with a perfectly good copy of Windows XP on it.

Both computers are running Windows XP: the old computer is on the Home edition while the new one is running Professional.

I do not want to go through the pain of reinstalling all my software, drivers, internet setup et all. So, can anyone tell me what I can do?

[Dias de verano]

This one keeps coming up. You cannot copy a Windows installation from one computer to a different one. It won't work. Whether you take the disk out of one PC and put it in another, or whether you use Ghost, it won't work. You need to install Windows afresh on your new computer. That's it.

[stevejohnson1958]

TThis one keeps coming up. You cannot copy a Windows installation from one computer to a different one. It won't work. Whether you take the disk out of one PC and put it in another, or whether you use Ghost, it won't work. You need to install Windows afresh on your new computer. That's it.

"Saviour applauds..."

I couldn't have said it any better.

[Aegis]

I was wondering that, myself...

So when you hear people talking about "ghosting" a drive, they're probably using the utility (or similar software) to image files and / or data -- not operating systems.


To the original poster:  I've used Ghost as a backup, and actually restored the operating system and all files to a drive, but it was the same drive in the same computer.  (I was trying to avoid the hassle of having to reload Windows 2000.)  In that case, Ghost restored everything with no problems.

[Dias de verano]

So when you hear people talking about "ghosting" a drive, they're probably using the utility (or similar software) to image files and / or data -- not operating systems.

You can "Ghost" a drive, with or without an OS on it, in various ways - you can clone one drive onto another, for example when you buy a bigger drive to replace the old one that your OS is on. Often drive manufacturers will give away a cut down version of Symantec (formerly Norton) Ghost for this purpose, and include the CD in the drive packaging.

Another thing you can do is to make a disk image file of a disk or partition on another drive or on a DVD-ROM or RW or a series of them. That way, if anything happens to your OS you can restore it, either to the original disk or to a new one.

I've used Ghost as a backup, and actually restored the operating system and all files to a drive

but it was the same drive in the same computer.

Exactly. It needn't be the same drive, it can be a newer faster bigger one, as I mentioned above, but it has to be in the same computer.

I was trying to avoid the hassle of having to reload Windows 2000.)  In that case, Ghost restored everything with no problems.

That is what it is very useful for.

Another thing that Ghost is used for: say you run a company and have a few, or dozens or hundreds of identical computers, you can set one up just right, with a corporate (no activation) version of Windows, make a Ghost image of the OS disk, burn it to DVD-ROMs, and deploy it to as many PCs as you have Windows licences for.

[bwriter]

Thank you for your help, gents. I will now bite the bullet and do it the long way.

[Aegis]

Another thing that Ghost is used for: say you run a company and have a few, or dozens or hundreds of identical computers, you can set one up just right, with a corporate (no activation) version of Windows, make a Ghost image of the OS disk, burn it to DVD-ROMs, and deploy it to as many PCs as you have Windows licences for.

I'm certain those were the kinds of conversations I used to overhear when people spoke of "ghosting."

[pirosko]

I have a similar situation where I have two hard drives, because one is going to be replaced and is acting up, occasionally. I have Ghost installed on my old drive and use the new drive for backup.  Lots of GB on both drives. 

I should be able to properly install windows xp onto the new drive, recover my backed up system and files from my new drive, and (send it to my new drive, or after I have sent it to my old drive first, and then back to my new drive, confused yet?) 

I would then reconfigure the Bios boot sequence and run from the new drive and use the old drive as a back up.

Does this make any sense? I really just want to use my new installed drive for the operating system and not lose anything. Thanks.

[Aegis]

I'm not completely sure about that -- but mostly because I haven't used Ghost for partial backups.

Now, you should be able to ghost everything from one drive to another if you're going to use the drives in the same computer.  In fact, that may be easiest.

I'm not "saying" don't try it your way, but if you have operating systems on both drives, and you ghost a bunch of applications and data back to one of them, I'm thinking that the operating system won't "know" all the applications are there, because by not being installed, the apps won't have the proper directory links and so forth built.

[pirosko]

A while ago when my hard drive crashed, I had to reinstall windows. Just plain old windows with no applications whatsoever. Thankfully I had Ghost backed up on the other drive. So when I recovered, voila, less than 10 minutes later I was up and running to the last recovery point. So, now in theory, what I want to try should work.  I will let all know if it does.  Thanks.   

[Aegis]

Excellent!  Let us know how it works out, please.