Moving an Installation

[matulike]

Hi,

 

I've got a bit of a complicated setup as it is...now this is just making my life a misery!!

 

I use Acronis OS Selector at boot time to select Windows XP or Mac OS X to boot. The reason for the use of Acronis is just because I've used it for ages, it's always been good and handy to have if I want to install any other OS's (eg SuSe 10.1 once I have a bit more room - on the new drive!) as I plan to. I also use it on my laptop and it works really well triple booting SuSe 10.1, Mac OS X and WinXP.

 

So anyway, I want to move from the tiny 40GB hard disk that my OS's are currently stored on to a nice new 250GB drive. I also want to resize the partitions so that I have 100GB OSX, 80GB WinXP and 50-odd-GB spare to play around with (SuSe 10.1 probably).

 

I've gone through this in several different ways, using several different tools but it has become apparent that no one single tool is going to 'cut-it', I dont think.

 

First, i used Ghost to copy partition by partition on to the new drive which was plugged into another IDE channel. So I ghosted a 20GB OSX partition to a 100GB partition. OSX boots afterwards, but only sees the original 20GB.

Then ghosted the 20GB WinXP partition to the 80GB NTFS. But Windows wont boot. I get the Windows XP splash screen with the progress bar thing but then it just power cycles and goes into a reboot loop. I've looked up this issue, and seen a few things which could relate to it, possibly Windows having the wrong drive letters assigned in the registry, I'll give the regedit 'solution' a go later.

 

I then tried Ghosting the drive again, this time Drive to Drive. It allowed me to select a new size for the NTFS filesystem, not for the 0xaf one tho, of course! That completed, again, OSX boots fine, but I cant resize that partiton with Acronis (or anything else it seems). And Windows XP still doesn't boot. Same problem.

 

So, I've now come to the conclusion that Ghost alone will not do what I need.

 

I got a Mac prog called Carbon Copy Cloner. I wiped and repartitioned the new HDD. 100GB 0xaf, 80GB NTFS, 50-odd-GB ext3. I used CCCloner to clone OSX to the new disk, which it completed successfully. however, I still havent found a solution for booting Windows. I have a few ideas to try when I get home - I'm going to make a boot floppy and try that, also the registry fixes I'll try using Bart's PE to get access to the registry.

 

I've been very tempted just to reinstall XP with a fresh installation. I like to do that at least annually anyway. But I'd like to resolve this issue anyway, just so I know!

I would be happy to try something other than Acronis, maybe GRUB could be used instead - I guess I'll need to install Linux first and put GRUB on the MBR then go from there. I just had problems with OSX and GRUB before I remember... Or even if Darwin could be used to boot all OS's. How it's done doesnt really matter - just as long as it works!!! ;o)

 

Any suggestions? I know there is stuff in here that verges onto Windows but I think the whole topic of multi boot systems and how people facilitate that is definitely worth exploring! Anyone got any multi boot useful experience that they'd like to share?? Or more specifically: moving multi boot systems onto different hardware!!! ;o)

 

Thanks!

[hecker]

I think moving installed systems around is always a little tricky. Specially since windows is quite sensible to changes in the existing partition/drive structures. More so if you have many systems on one drive.

 

I would try the following:

- Clone OSX using SuperDuper (it's free and better than CarbonCopy IMO) to the new partition. Reboot and check if you can boot from the new drive normally.

 

- Clone your windows partition over to the new drive via Ghost using partition to partition. You will of course have to fix your windows afterwards.

OR: Make a full system backup of your XP system via windows, reinstall windows from scratch on to your new partition and then recover the backup.

Check this site for instructions on how to make a full system backup (IGNORE THE FORMATTING STEP!): http://www.homenetworkhelp.info/index.php?...dition&mn=a

 

You need to make your windows partition active before you can install windows. This can be done with OSX via fdisk.

 

hecker

[matulike]

hi,

 

Thanks for the input... I will try 'SuperDuper' out, but I have already cloned the OSX partition OK anyway. And it worked fine with Ghost as well (only wouldnt re-size it, which I suppose was the point of the exercise, so suppose 'worked fine' is a bit of an over-statement!)

 

But I now have OSX on the 100GB partition (0), and XP on the 80GB (1) and 50-odd-GB spare (2). Havent tried booting OSX this time (used CCC rather than ghost so should have the full 100GB available) but I know XP doesn't boot.

 

You said << 'You will of course have to fix your windows afterwards' >> What exactly did you mean? Do you mean fix the drive letter allocation bit in the registry? Or do you think if I'd done the start of an installation on that XP partition first, then Ghosted the image after the XP CD had written the filesystem etc, it might've worked / might work?

 

Thanks for any help anyway... And yes, moving installations is a tricky business. To be honest, I like to rebuild my XP partition every 6 - 12 months anyway, so now will be as good a time as any (better actually, seeing as I have the new drive!). And I have been wanting to try out 10.4.8 now I've got the SSE2 DVD. It wouldnt install on my Core Duo laptop, so will try it on my P4 PC.

I think fresh installs of both would be nicer...

 

Thanks again!

[hecker]

Thanks for the input... I will try 'SuperDuper' out, but I have already cloned the OSX partition OK anyway. And it worked fine with Ghost as well (only wouldnt re-size it, which I suppose was the point of the exercise, so suppose 'worked fine' is a bit of an over-statement!)

SuperDuper works really well and it won't screw up the size of the partition.

 

You said << 'You will of course have to fix your windows afterwards' >> What exactly did you mean? Do you mean fix the drive letter allocation bit in the registry?

Yes, that is what I meant.

 

Or do you think if I'd done the start of an installation on that XP partition first, then Ghosted the image after the XP CD had written the filesystem etc, it might've worked / might work?

It should work, since windows "should" set everything correctly during the installation process. You can then recover your files via the backup tutorial I posted before.

 

Thanks for any help anyway... And yes, moving installations is a tricky business. To be honest, I like to rebuild my XP partition every 6 - 12 months anyway

You probably won't need to do that with OSX. Unless you break it of course.

 

, so now will be as good a time as any (better actually, seeing as I have the new drive!). And I have been wanting to try out 10.4.8 now I've got the SSE2 DVD. It wouldnt install on my Core Duo laptop, so will try it on my P4 PC.

I think fresh installs of both would be nicer...

I agree. That is always the safest way to go.

 

I would strongly recommend setting a medium to small partition (maybe 15-20GB) for OSX backup purposes. SuperDuper has the hability to clone a partition over another without having to boot from another drive and with it's "smart copy" feature you can update your backup partition in minutes! You could also use your old drive for that. I call mine "MacRestorePoint".

 

Good luck,

 

hecker

Edited February 28, 2007 by hecker