Re: Cloning XP Pro (legally)... and failing !


"Timothy Daniels" wrote:

"sai.an" wrote:
"Timothy Daniels" wrote:
"sai.an" wrote:
"Timothy Daniels" wrote:
"sai.an" wrote:
"Timothy Daniels" wrote:
"sai.an" wrote:
- transfered B HDD into B machine, which did not boot
at this stage, but was not a surprise to me given the
different hardware configuration.


How many partitions are there on HDD B?
Which partition has the boot files?
Which partition has the OS?
Which partition is marked "active"?
What are the contents of the boot.ini file on
the partition that is marked "active"?


- created a "slipstreamed" installation CD integrating
B Windows from MSI's original B CD and SP2
downloaded from MSI
- booted B machine from this slipstreamed installation CD,
went into "repair" mode, and encountered a huge number
of situations where "Setup cannot copy the file..." (always
for files contained in I386), which I deliberately "jumped"
(I have tried to copy the I386 folder into the B HDD and
have Windows setup point at it, to no avail)
- succeeded in introducing license key however, and was
able to activate this B Windows, working in Safe mode
and as Administrator
- setup being completed, many deficiencies are visible.

Read this site regarding a "repair installation":

http://web.mit.edu/ist/products/winxp/advanced/reinstall-repair-shallow.html
, especially this:
"Note that this procedure will only work if your Windows XP CD
contains the same version of Windows which is currently installed
on your hard drive."

*TimDaniels*


The amount of verifications to be performed is awesome
and it will take me some time to answer your questions
intelligently...
For the time being :
- I used the word "cloning" somewhat imprudently,
in a generic sense
- In fact, I have been imaging + restoring, not cloning
as you describe it.
[.......]
[..........]

Tim,
[......]
- removed HDD B from machine B, connected it into
machine A (as HDD1, whereas A's proper drive is registered
as HDD0) ; jumpers taken care of ;
- reformatted system partition of HDD B using Windows
disk manager (incidentally, it is partition F:\ and I had been
careful to make it an active primary partition first time I organized
HDD B and it keeps this status although I have reformatted it)


You don't say how many partitions there are on HDD B and how
it is jumpered and how HDD A is jumpered. For example, you
could have HDD A jumpered as Slave on IDE channel 1, and if
it is the only HDD in the system, it will control booting. But as
soon as you put another HDD in the system, no matter how it's
jumpered, the new HDD will control booting because it can only
take a position ahead of HDD B in the Hard Drive Boot Order.
So, you must supply these details:
1) How are both of the HDDs jumpered?
2) How many Primary partitions are there on HDD B?
3) Which partition is "active"?
4) Does the "active" Primary partition contain the boot files?
5) What are the contents of the boot.ini file?

You say you reformatted the system partition on HDD B.
In Microsoft's terminology, the "system partition" is the one
with the boot files (not necessarily the one with the OS).
Is this what you mean?

Why did you reformat that partition, since the cloning operation
will do that for you?


- jumped joyfully to True Image (yes, I had this one also) thinking
to do a good cloning job right away. Alas ! True Image answered
that it cannot identify any hard disk in my machine (code E000101F4)
and this for the first time since I have had this software - put off, I
decided to follow your advice and loaded MaxBlast since both
HDD's are Maxtor made. It installed nicely and then gave me a
message "You must have at least one Maxtor or Seagate hard disk
for being able to use MaxBlast" ; I have 2... but obviously they are
not recognized, which is not so much of a surprise considering that
MaxBlast is an Acronis product like TrueImage.
- needless to say that both Windows disk manager and Partition Magic
recognize my HDD's with index numbers matching the ones I put
in BIOS, with drive letters OK etc etc...

Any understanding of this situation ? Any relation to the fact that I have
now in my machine 2 active partitions, although they are not on an equal
footing as far as booting sequence is concerned ?


Disk Management will only allow one Primary partition on a
HDD to be marked "active", but if there are 4 HDDs, there can
be 4 "active" Primary partitions - one on each HDD - with no
problems. The "active" flag is only checked by the Master Boot
Record of the HDD that is given control by the BIOS, and the
BIOS only gives control to the MBR on the HDD that it finds at
the head of its Hard Drive Boot Order. When you say you put
index numbers in the BIOS, what were the values of these numbers
and what were they for?

*TimDaniels*


Tim,

Again, thank you for the time spent and the dedication !
This time, I post for telling you that I succeeded in reaching the end point
of your post of June 28 / 12:14am. So, all is well.
But for academic purposes and for passing experience to others, I can
explain a little bit as my previous descriptions have been too vague.
I started the cloning operation having in machine A :
- a HDD that I call "A", known of BIOS as HDD0, hooked to IDE 0
channel as a "master" ; it contains two partitions, one being C:\
(primary and active) carrying the system that I intend to clone into
machine B ("cloning" being this time used in the sense that you taught me)
- a HDD that I call "B", known of BIOS as HDD1, hooked to IDE 1
channel as a "slave" (master is CD drive on this channel) ; it carries 5
partitions (for "historic" reasons), one has been pre-formatted by me
as an active primary for receiving the clone ; actually I formatted it for
getting rid of the "image + restore" rubbish that I had put into it in my
previous experimentation ; the other 4 are all logical partitions, grouped
into an "extended" primary
- the boot sequence is as follows : CD drive, then HDD0, then HDD1.
Am I sufficiently explicit ?


It would be nice to know what the partition numbers are in order
to know what the correct entries in the boot.ini file should be, but
I think that it is safe to assume that the "C:" partition on HDD A
is partition 1, and the single Primary partition on HDD B is also
partition 1, and that the boot.ini file is correctly set up in partition
1
on HDD B.


Anyhow, the story is now as follows :
- TrueImage refused to recognize my hard drives (see earlier post)
- I tried MaxBlast and it told me that I did not have in my machine a single
Seagate/Maxtor HDD, which made me laugh as you can imagine...
- I asked for help from the Seagate/Maxtor people, they did not deliver in
time
- I downloaded the 30 day-trial version of Casper and...
- IT WORKED FINE !!!


The only restriction on the free 30-day trial version of Casper
is that it will not re-size the partition that it is transferring - the
clone's partition size will be the same as the size of the source
partition. In your case, this seems not to be a limitation.


- As taught by you, I stopped machine A, removed HDD A and
booted on HDD B : the result is 100% OK, the clone works
to my satisfaction
- I extracted HDD B and restored machine A to its original condition.

So, I have now this HDD B on the corner of my desk and machine B
is waiting to receive it.
Let me remind you of a few facts :
- machine B has a slightly different environment (same mobo as A,
but different version of Athlon XP, different DRAM)
- for machine B I have already acquired a supplementary XP Pro
license, and in the course of my previous "experiments" I managed
to go far enough for activating this product (which means that my
machine B configuration had generated an equipment ID which has
enabled me to obtain from Microsoft a Confirmation ID) ; I have
kept on a USB key a copy of the last wpa.bak and wpa.dbl files
that could be obtained from machine B.

I don't think that I could add anything else that would be relevant.

Your guidance for transplanting HDD B into machine B will be highly
appreciated.

And again : best greetings.

Claude


Good going, Claude, and now you have hit the limit of my
knowledge. I'll try re-posting your inquiry in this same NG
with this, the 2nd half of your question.

*TimDaniels*


Tim,

As sometimes happens (even with computers) things are much simpler than
thought initially !
I bravely plugged my HDD B into machine B and booted (as Administrator),
thinking that anyhow nothing wrong could happen to me since I know how to
populate system partition in HDD B.
Soon Windows stated that hardware modifications make it compulsory to
re-activate, and I had the Activation window in front of me (you have to be
patient, it is slow coming out). Activation window has a button called
"Change product key", and this is what I had to use in order to activate the
cloned OS under the license key of my Windows XP "B". Once done, I got a
new Equipment ID number, and the rest was business as usual with a call to MS
activation center for a confirmation ID etc.

No "repair installation" needed, and this is important !!!

In summary : I ACHIEVED WHAT I WANTED TO ACHIEVE, i.e. a second computer
with the same work environment as the first computer, and without the
harassment of having to recreate everything from scratch. Of course, I did
not cheat on MSI and this might differ from the perspective of some people...

Your help was insturmental in obtaining this result and I thank you very
much for it. Best greetings,

Claude
.

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