• Registered: 2011-07-09
  • Posts: 8

Topic: Clone HDD/OS to other PC - is it OK to do?

Hi guys and girls,
Ladies and gentleman,

I have a little question. Maybe/hopefully someone can help me with that. Just give some suggestion, or rather share some know how. smile
Lets say i have 2 different hardwares. One is a PC with P5GD1-VM mobo. And the ther is the PC with the P5KPL-VM mobo.
I clean install WinXP on one hardware, with all updates etc. And a list of Educational programs. Then i take/make an image of it. Before i ever Sysprep it. (some places say its limited some don't, so i don't know anymore, so i just take an image before sysprep and after).
Now, if i want all the same setup on another hardware. The normal thing to do as i would think would be to do whole the process of Clean Installing and updating and installing the list of the software on the second hardware all over again. Or to make an Hardware independant image. What i have already tried some time ago and it didnt work. I did something wrong i guess. Will try again but another time/or not right now.
So what i have actually tried to do is. I have just put that image that i had cloned from hardware 1 to hardware 2. There were off-course a view drivers missing. But i installed them. And and cloned this image to. Now i have as it seems two images for two different hardwares.
The question is, how kosher/OK is it to do this? I dont know anymore if i had first syspreped or not. Before last time i did it.
Lets say that i have syspreped the installation and made an image of it. And then put it on other hardware. Then added missing drivers and made another image of it. And this image seems to work. Is this OK to do?
Or another situation that im thinking about now. Lets say i just clone this image from hardware one to the hardware two. (Which contains all the EDU software). (and offcourse i made a backup before i will install the EDU software). Add the missing drivers. And then make an BackUp image (containig all the Edu Soft and added drivers, and not sysprepped yet, originated on another hardware). And then just before i want to send it to other same hardware PC(s) where i pulled it from. I sysprep it. Will that be ok?
Any info or manuals on this matter are welcome,
Thanks,
Nikolai

  • Registered: 2011-07-09
  • Posts: 8

Re: Clone HDD/OS to other PC - is it OK to do?

Hi again,

I have been googling around while clean installing XP on a multiple different hardwares at the same time. And i have found here:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/828287
information about what does Sysprep not supports. (ea different HALs/Manufacturers).
And then googling further brought me here:
http://www.vernalex.com/guides/sysprep/hal.shtml (again i come across this site^^)
where i see that ACPI PC is the good HAL to chose for a hardware independant image. Bo begin with. Seems like most multi compatible. If u can say so.

As of speaking about my question before. Now after i clean installed XP on both of two different hardwares i was talking about. I saw that one of them has an P4 cpu and the other one Intell Core 2 Duo (well that i knew ofc). And that both of them have ACPI Multiprocessor PC HAL. That would be the reason this image from the one also works on the other. Also this both different PC's are from the same manufacturer. Only the Mobo is different. But then i think if the mobo is different the manufacturer thing is not relevant at all anymore, isnt it? Also i have found info that Sysprep can be done as many times as u wish with VLK. The limited will be for non VLK then i guess.
So can i still think that the not originally installed but imaged PC is kind of slower because the image wasnt installed on it originally? Or not? Because they still have the same ACPI Multi PC HAL. It wouldnt be an issue.
But ok, ill search/test further and see what i dicover.
ty,
Nikolai