Replace HD on T61 with larger HD

I've got an 80G HD on my T61 running Widows Vista Ultimate and want to replace it with a larger HD. Can I use the Vista Ultimate Complete PC Backup and Restore tool for this or would I be better off with Acronis? Thanks.

 

Yes, the Vista complete PC backup will work great. I have Vista Business and used the PC backup to upgrade my 120GB drive to a 320GB drive. I just used an external USB drive to store the backup image. I was surprised at how easy it was to do.

 

Personally I like Acronis better than Rescue and Recovery, which can be a bit farty and bloated, though it will work. If you have a Seagate drive you can get a free download of DiscWizard from Seagates website. It's a limited version of True Image, but does what I need it to. Clonezilla is a freeware option. I like to do a clean install with my data on a second partition. Then I make a image of the install partition and can put it back at any time.

 

I just used the Vista Ultimate Complete PC Backup and Restore to my new 320G HD bia USB and it completed. Just tried to swap the old HD for new HD and the computer went into Lenovo Rescue & Recovery mode. Chose "Restore My Entire Hard Drive". Then it asked to "Choose backup to restore from" - it did not give my newly installed HD as an option though. Seems to only want to use DVDs. Ran the PC Doctor for Rescue and Recovery on the HD and everything passed. Any suggestions? Thanks.

 

You will need to boot from a Windows Vista DVD and initiate the restore from there. I doubt you can do it using the Lenovo rescue options as you created the image using Windows' own tool.

I completed the above process already. When booting with the Vista DVD you can choose to restore the image you created. You should then connect your USB drive and Windows should find the backup you created.

Note that it will restore the exact same partitions you had on your old drive (same size, etc). After I restored the image I still had to resize my partitions the way I wanted them on the bigger HD.

 

Thanks for the advice. Only problem is that when I purchased the T61 from Lenovo it did not come with a Vista DVD or any OS DVD - it was preloaded. Would that be on the supplied Recovery Disks?

 

There is a Vista distribution that you can order, from Lenovo I believe.

 

Thanks all - I'll give it a shot.

 

I've been trying to order that dvd from Lenovo today. Nobody I've been able to reach over there seems to know anything about it. What should I actually be asking for ? Anyone have a link ?

Thanks! Mal

 

So ZaZ - I took your advice, got Acronis from New Egg. Ran it to clone the HD on USB - swapped drives and voila! A brand new 320G HD complete with everything that I originally had on the 80G HD and it works perfectly. Much, much easier than the Vista Ultimate Complete Back Up and Restore. Thanks for the suggestion!

 

I'm still playing with this on my setup. You say that you cloned to the new drive on USB - I'm guess that means you mounted the 320 in a usb enclosure for the cloning ?

 

I use the complete pc backup all the time from windows vista business, you dont need the dvd, you just need to hit F8 when you boot up after the bios screen, then it gives you the option to restore the pc. You dont need any extra other backup software.

 

4mal - that's exactly what I did. Sorry I didn't make it clearer.