Upgrading T41 drive to WD 320gb:Windows XP transfer caveats?

[TKuser]

I'm thinking of upgrading my T41's 2.5" 60gb 7200rpm OS drive to a Western Digital WD3200BEVE 320gb 5400rpm 2.5" PATA drive:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6822136345

I've read through many previous posts on related subjects.

Questions:
1) Will it be easy to transfer my entire Windows XP boot drive over to this new drive? I.e. Can I easily transfer everything, including boot record, without issue, to a drive of different geometry?

2) Will Windows complain about changed hardware, or is my Thinkpad pre-installed version immune to all activation complaints as long as it's run on a Thinkpad?

3) What program is recommended for doing this transfer?

(On this forum I've seen Acronis TrueImage (not free) mentioned, as well as one person who had success with EASEUS Partition Master and EASEUS Disk Copy.)

4) Has anyone used TrueCrypt for full-volume encryption and have any recommendations for/against? I am figuring on trying that with the new OS drive. I've read all their docs, but just curious for any real-world experiences. I am naturally nervous about problems during drive repair situations.

5) I have an external IDE-to-USB enclosure for 2.5" drives, in which I was planning on mounting the new drive until transfer of OS was complete. Might I encounter "large drive" issues with the 320gb drive in that enclosure in the same way that some older 3.5"/5.25" enclosures can't address drives larger than 127gb?

(On this forum people have recommended not putting the new drive into the enclosure, but rather putting it into the computer and putting the old drive in the enclosure. I presume this is mostly because of that issue where the running Windows installation sees the new drive, identifies it by serial number with a new drive letter, and then when the OS is attempted to be booted off that new drive, there are drive letter issues? I guess whatever drive/partition copy software I use will always run from a boot CD?)

I have also learned on this forum that my Thinkpad recovery partition might not t work with the new drive, because the recovery might have Windows XP pre-SP2, which didn't have large drive support. I'll remember to only use a slipstreamed SP2 disk instead should I ever need to do this.

6) How much will I notice the slower drive?

7) I think the WD3200BEVE OEM includes the 3-year warranty from WD. Does anyone know for sure?

Thanks a lot for any help. This forum is really useful.

[sktn77a]

Don't have answers to some of your questions, but see below in italic.

Subject: Upgrading T41 drive to WD 320gb:Windows XP transfer caveats?

I'm thinking of upgrading my T41's 2.5" 60gb 7200rpm OS drive to a Western Digital WD3200BEVE 320gb 5400rpm 2.5" PATA drive:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6822136345

I've read through many previous posts on related subjects.

Questions:
1) Will it be easy to transfer my entire Windows XP boot drive over to this new drive? I.e. Can I easily transfer everything, including boot record, without issue, to a drive of different geometry?

2) Will Windows complain about changed hardware, or is my Thinkpad pre-installed version immune to all activation complaints as long as it's run on a Thinkpad? Shouldn't be a problem - Thinkpads with OEM image don't need activating.

3) What program is recommended for doing this transfer?

(On this forum I've seen Acronis TrueImage (not free) mentioned, as well as one person who had success with EASEUS Partition Master and EASEUS Disk Copy.)

4) Has anyone used TrueCrypt for full-volume encryption and have any recommendations for/against? I am figuring on trying that with the new OS drive. I've read all their docs, but just curious for any real-world experiences. I am naturally nervous about problems during drive repair situations.

5) I have an external IDE-to-USB enclosure for 2.5" drives, in which I was planning on mounting the new drive until transfer of OS was complete. Might I encounter "large drive" issues with the 320gb drive in that enclosure in the same way that some older 3.5"/5.25" enclosures can't address drives larger than 127gb? Upgrade to SP1/SP2 and you'll be fine.

(On this forum people have recommended not putting the new drive into the enclosure, but rather putting it into the computer and putting the old drive in the enclosure. I presume this is mostly because of that issue where the running Windows installation sees the new drive, identifies it by serial number with a new drive letter, and then when the OS is attempted to be booted off that new drive, there are drive letter issues? I guess whatever drive/partition copy software I use will always run from a boot CD?) Someone else may want to chip in here but I think it's just a speed issue (IDE vs USB).

I have also learned on this forum that my Thinkpad recovery partition might not t work with the new drive, because the recovery might have Windows XP pre-SP2, which didn't have large drive support. I'll remember to only use a slipstreamed SP2 disk instead should I ever need to do this. Only if you recover from the hidden partition. Does the cloning software copy the hidden partition?

6) How much will I notice the slower drive? I could tell the difference between a 100GB, 7200RPM drive and a 160gb, 5400RPM drive, but these newer ones have even higher arial density so you may not notice it.
7) I think the WD3200BEVE OEM includes the 3-year warranty from WD. Does anyone know for sure?

Thanks a lot for any help. This forum is really useful.

[jsmit86]

I'm thinking of upgrading my T41's 2.5" 60gb 7200rpm OS drive to a Western Digital WD3200BEVE 320gb 5400rpm 2.5" PATA drive:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6822136345

I've read through many previous posts on related subjects.

Questions:
1) Will it be easy to transfer my entire Windows XP boot drive over to this new drive? I.e. Can I easily transfer everything, including boot record, without issue, to a drive of different geometry?

2) Will Windows complain about changed hardware, or is my Thinkpad pre-installed version immune to all activation complaints as long as it's run on a Thinkpad?

3) What program is recommended for doing this transfer?

(On this forum I've seen Acronis TrueImage (not free) mentioned, as well as one person who had success with EASEUS Partition Master and EASEUS Disk Copy.)

4) Has anyone used TrueCrypt for full-volume encryption and have any recommendations for/against? I am figuring on trying that with the new OS drive. I've read all their docs, but just curious for any real-world experiences. I am naturally nervous about problems during drive repair situations.

5) I have an external IDE-to-USB enclosure for 2.5" drives, in which I was planning on mounting the new drive until transfer of OS was complete. Might I encounter "large drive" issues with the 320gb drive in that enclosure in the same way that some older 3.5"/5.25" enclosures can't address drives larger than 127gb?

(On this forum people have recommended not putting the new drive into the enclosure, but rather putting it into the computer and putting the old drive in the enclosure. I presume this is mostly because of that issue where the running Windows installation sees the new drive, identifies it by serial number with a new drive letter, and then when the OS is attempted to be booted off that new drive, there are drive letter issues? I guess whatever drive/partition copy software I use will always run from a boot CD?)

I have also learned on this forum that my Thinkpad recovery partition might not t work with the new drive, because the recovery might have Windows XP pre-SP2, which didn't have large drive support. I'll remember to only use a slipstreamed SP2 disk instead should I ever need to do this.

6) How much will I notice the slower drive?

7) I think the WD3200BEVE OEM includes the 3-year warranty from WD. Does anyone know for sure?

Thanks a lot for any help. This forum is really useful.

I just did installed the WD3200BEVE in my T42. It all went smoothly.

You can easily use Acronis TrueImage 2009 Home to do this. The trial version is free for 15 days, and works great.

> Make sure that you are up to date preferably with SP3
>Download and Install TrueImage.
> Reboot
> Put the new HD in a USB case, or connect via USB adapter.
> Start TrueImage
> Use the Tools Menu ---> Clone Disk Option
>Follow the prompts. I suggest the Manual Option so you can minimize the Hidden Partition. to do this just resize the hidden partition down so it's close to the original size. If you don't do this, the auto settings will up-size it in proportion to the new drive, which wastes space.
> This will probably take a few hours, just keep following the prompts.
> At the end of the process the ThinkPad will power down.
> Unplug the power adapter, remove the battery, and remove the hard drive.
> Place the new drive in the holder, and insert into the ThinkPad
> Power up and enjoy.

[TKuser]

I did the upgrade. I'll reply to my own questions:

I'm thinking of upgrading my T41's 2.5" 60gb 7200rpm OS drive to a Western Digital WD3200BEVE 320gb 5400rpm 2.5" PATA drive:

Questions:
1) Will it be easy to transfer my entire Windows XP boot drive over to this new drive? I.e. Can I easily transfer everything, including boot record, without issue, to a drive of different geometry?

I wound up using an obscure program (mentioned on this forum) EASEUS Disk Copy from a bootable CD. Although it seemed to work both when new drive was in Thinkpad and when it was in external USB drive, I ultimately stuck with keeping the new drive in the Thinkpad, based on various recommendations.

One person suggested that BOTH drives should be in computer, i.e. save image of old drive into an image file, then move new drive into machine and use the saved image to create the drive...but this was impractical and I determined probably overkill. This person suggested possible geometry issues that may crop up later at the end of partitions. I decided this didn't apply, but here's the thread (about Thinkpads and drive geometry peculiarities):
http://web.archive.org/web/200710051243 ... 8609708#14

I had to remember to remove the hard drive password from the old drive while the drive was still in the machine, of course.

Regarding the IBM recovery area, I spent many hours reading and experimenting and ultimately figured out that it's not practically possible right now to copy the IBM pre-desktop recovery area, in my situation. Keep in mind that I have a T41, which uses a different scheme than the T42 the last poster used.

Here's the essential article about this:
How to transfer the Hidden Protected Area of a modern Thinkpad between Harddisks using Linux

In short: On a T41 that uses HPA, if you're moving to a drive of identical size, it's pretty easy: Disable boot area, then do full disk copy, then go back to normal or secure boot area for old and new drives), and it should work. (If you don't first disable boot area, then the disk copier won't see the HPA.)

But if the new drive is bigger, this won't work, because the recovery area needs to be at the very end of the physical drive. So you need to use this third-party tool that can move it. EXCEPT, that third-party tool doesn't properly handle drives larger than 120GB (or 127GB?). So, you can't use it to position HPA onto a 320GB drive.

Lost a lot of time figuring that one out, for a feature with marginal use anyway (although I sometimes liked being able to easily get to PC Doctor without a boot CD).

2) Will Windows complain about changed hardware, or is my Thinkpad pre-installed version immune to all activation complaints as long as it's run on a Thinkpad?

No re-activation on a Thinkpad OEM Windows.

3) What program is recommended for doing this transfer?

(On this forum I've seen Acronis TrueImage (not free) mentioned, as well as one person who had success with EASEUS Partition Master and EASEUS Disk Copy.)

I used the EASEUS programs, and a host of other tools to experiment, including various things under Knoppix, Fiesta (to study the HPA issue and make an image of my HPA should I ever come up with a way to use it), and a few things via UBCD/BartPE.

4) Has anyone used TrueCrypt for full-volume encryption and have any recommendations for/against? I am figuring on trying that with the new OS drive. I've read all their docs, but just curious for any real-world experiences. I am naturally nervous about problems during drive repair situations.

I'm working on this now. I'm leaning towards system partition encryption, system partition only (vs. whole disk), with TrueCrypt Boot Loader. With the Rescue Disk, it seems normal repair situations are possible.

5) I have an external IDE-to-USB enclosure for 2.5" drives, in which I was planning on mounting the new drive until transfer of OS was complete. Might I encounter "large drive" issues with the 320gb drive in that enclosure in the same way that some older 3.5"/5.25" enclosures can't address drives larger than 127gb?

Never came up. Wrote new drive while it was in the Thinkpad.

(On this forum people have recommended not putting the new drive into the enclosure, but rather putting it into the computer and putting the old drive in the enclosure. I presume this is mostly because of that issue where the running Windows installation sees the new drive, identifies it by serial number with a new drive letter, and then when the OS is attempted to be booted off that new drive, there are drive letter issues? I guess whatever drive/partition copy software I use will always run from a boot CD?)

I have also learned on this forum that my Thinkpad recovery partition might not t work with the new drive, because the recovery might have Windows XP pre-SP2, which didn't have large drive support. I'll remember to only use a slipstreamed SP2 disk instead should I ever need to do this.

Covered above.

6) How much will I notice the slower drive?

Covered by previous poster.

7) I think the WD3200BEVE OEM includes the 3-year warranty from WD. Does anyone know for sure?

Confirmed via WD's site, my drive has 3-years beginning with the date I bought it from the reseller.

Yet to try: Resizing my partition (it's still 52gb on my new 320gb drive), and then using TrueCrypt to encrypt-in-place this system partition.