New Laptop Hard Drive

Little_John

Initialize? I dont remember seeing that option.

normally you need to create a partition then format it, all from the drive management screen.

wotnoshoeseh

Yeah I know littlejohn, then I formatted it.
Tried the Norton Ghost but as Windows XP came on it Dell installed, it wouldn't boot up when I replaced it. Looks like I'll have to take your advice and re-install everything. Good news is though that Dell are sending me through the original utilities disks, and XP Home with SP2 on disk, FOC.
I'll then re-install the drivers and Windows and then re-install any other software that I may need, as I believe you said I'd have to do anyway. Don't say "I told you so"!

thirascule

What I have done before is to create 2 partitions on the new drive in the caddy, a Primary partition for windows, say 50% of the drive and then the rest as a extended partition with a logical drive for data, backups etc. Then with the drive in the caddy, create a ghost image of your current C: drive onto the logical drive on the caddy drive. Then fit the new drive into the laptop, boot from the ghost CD and restore the image to the new primary partition. Making sure you tick the boxes for "Restore MBR/disk signature", can't remember exactly what it says, and "Mark partition active for booting" this has worked fine for me in the past.

Cricri

Little_John wrote: »

You can borrow a disk from someone else as long as it is the correct version home or profesional it will install and you use the windows key on the bottom of your laptop.

Except that wouldn't work because your key is an OEM key and won't work with ANY winXP CD, but only one from the OEM manufacturer.

What I do is create the primary partition as small as possible (in your case, 40GB). That way, you'll have more space and thus more stuff on the secondary partition, ywhich will make it less of an hassle if you ever need to format the primary partition again (e.g. to reinstall WinXP for whatever reason).

I myself always create a primary partition of 20GB, which as always been enough for Windows, Office and whatever software I might install. I never store anything else on this partition, so it's never a problem for me to wipre or lose it.

wotnoshoeseh

I have partitioned the new hard drive into 60GB & 60GB partitions. Dell are sending me out the original disks so hopefully that will address the OEM key issue raised above by Cricri.
Incidentally can I move folders/files/data onto the secondary partition on the hard drive now, before installing Eindows on the primary partition, or should I wait until all the drivers, utilities and Windows have been uploaded onto the primary partition on the new hard drive?
I look forward to your response.