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From: John Doe on 15 Mar 2010 17:32
"Don Phillipson" <e925(a)SPAMBLOCK.ncf.ca> wrote:

> Warned by the signal "Hard drive failure imminent" on
> a 10 year-old Maxtor, with a second drive with enough
> space, I want to clone all onto the other drive (WD,
> 5 years old) to save configurations as well as data
> files. The PC is 10.y.o. so I am thinking of a traded-in
> faster IBM ($200 locally) but then I should want to transfer
> everything a second time.
>
> What is the best software for this?

You do not want to boot into Windows and install software. If the
drive is already running, you might want to leave it running
without accessing it. I suspect Paul's advice in a recent thread
is the safest. Following is part of the text. Personally, I would
consider taking the latter advice about skipping over bad sectors
when doing the copy. You want to put as little strain as possible
on the failing hard drive, starting immediately. But of course, it
all depends on how important the data is to you, that is entirely
your decision.

Paul wrote:

> I'd boot a Linux Live CD, and try to copy the old disk to a new
> disk. The "dd" command can do this in one shot. All it requires,
> is the new disk be slightly bigger than the old disk. Since the
> "dd" command does a sector by sector copy, it places the least
> stress on a failing disk.
>
> The Linux Live CD, doesn't install any software. It only
> requires the CD/DVD drive be in working order. I can use such a
> CD as a test of the computer hardware. If the CD won't boot to
> completion, I could then start disconnecting other hardware bits
> and pieces, and look for a change in symptoms.
>
> Examples of Linux Live CDs, are Knoppix (knopper.net) and Ubuntu
> (ubuntu.com).
>
> If the disk is damaged (has bad sectors), there is a procedure
> for that. The "ddrescue" at the bottom of this page, has the
> ability to skip over sectors that cannot be read, and preserves
> the maximum amount of information from the original disk. (The
> regular "dd" would run slowly, or fail completely, on a disk
> with errors on it.) Once you've made your best copy of the
> drive, you can then attempt data recovery, run chkdsk or
> whatever, on the *copy* you've made.
>
> http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/Damaged_Hard_Disk


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