Reply to: Drive clone software recommendations (preferably free)?

[gadgetman]

Just a quick update - "Partition Wizard Home Edition" did a sterling job, no fuss and its free!

[Fred Bloggs]

Take a look at Norton Ghost.

It's been years since I used it and it used to be able to image drives but not sure if it clones them.

I have used Ghost v14 for this. I'd say that in my fairly limited experience that Ghost and Acronis are about comparable for this kind of thing.

[Clippy]

Yeah I know all the usual suspects but ideally I'm looking for personal recommendations based on recent use.

I bought that Paragon carp because it was the only app at the time that supported Windows 7 x64 but things have moved on.

If you go to the drive manufacturers website, it is likely that they will have a free customised version of Acronis True Image to down load. I have used the Seagate and the Western Digital flavours without problems.

Another vote for Acronis True Image Home 2011.

I'm sure if you do a search, you should be able to find a 'free' copy of the 2010 version which will do what you need.

Edit: Acronis True Image WD Edition Software.

Amazon average review rating 1 star:

err thanks but no thanks!

[gadgetman]

Yeah I know all the usual suspects but ideally I'm looking for personal recommendations based on recent use.

I bought that Paragon carp because it was the only app at the time that supported Windows 7 x64 but things have moved on.

[Clippy]

Take a look at Norton Ghost.

It's been years since I used it and it used to be able to image drives but not sure if it clones them.

[gadgetman]

Thanks but given the comments on Acronis (above) I'm steering well clear.

And the other drive?

I did another search and found Partition Wizard Home Edition. I think I used an earlier version of this a while ago and don't recall any issues. I can't see explicit mention of "downsizing" support but I think I'll give it a try.

[gadgetman]

Sounds good but under limitations:

"The destination partition must be equal or larger than the source one. "

I use Clonezilla which is free and has never failed me.

[Cliphead]

I use Clonezilla which is free and has never failed me.

[Fred Bloggs]

Thanks - nothing on the Hitachi site though.

And the other drive? You could even temporarily fit a drive from Seagate/WD to use their flavour of the software. The only criteria for using the software is that the machine has one of their drives installed. It doesn't have to be one of the ones involved in the cloning process (at least that's how it worked 6 months ago when I last used the WD version to migate a Seagate drive).

[VectraMan]

Amazon average review rating 1 star:

"Very poor buggy software",
"Avoid this software!",
"Cannot rely on this software",
"unreliable",
"disappointing"
"keep your money"
etc

err thanks but no thanks!

It's okay until you want to do scheduled backups in my experience. I wish I hadn't bought it, and that was the 2010 version. However I did use the evaluation to clone a real machine into a virtual machine, which is something the OP could do.

[gadgetman]

Amazon average review rating 1 star:

"Very poor buggy software",
"Avoid this software!",
"Cannot rely on this software",
"unreliable",
"disappointing"
"keep your money"
etc

err thanks but no thanks!

Another vote for Acronis True Image Home 2011.

I'm sure if you do a search, you should be able to find a 'free' copy of the 2010 version which will do what you need.

Edit: Acronis True Image WD Edition Software.

[Clippy]

If you go to the drive manufacturers website, it is likely that they will have a free customised version of Acronis True Image to down load. I have used the Seagate and the Western Digital flavours without problems.

Another vote for Acronis True Image Home 2011.

I'm sure if you do a search, you should be able to find a 'free' copy of the 2010 version which will do what you need.

Edit: Acronis True Image WD Edition Software.

[TestMangler]

Go on Softonic. There is a free one but can't remember the name of it. Might have been XClone or something.

[gadgetman]

Thanks - nothing on the Hitachi site though.

[Fred Bloggs]

If you go to the drive manufacturers website, it is likely that they will have a free customised version of Acronis True Image to down load. I have used the Seagate and the Western Digital flavours without problems.