Upgrading the HHD w\o recovery disk ... Will this work ? [ Edited ]

[DeathHawk152]

Can I move the old HHD (c:\ ) and replace it with the new one and after restart hit the f10 to go into system recovery off the org. drive ? Will this work. I Dont have the recovery disk and this Idea just poped in from no where. Since the org. hhd is partitioned into two drives ie: C:\ and E:\ (recovery pationtion ) should this not work ?    Errrrrrrrrrrrrrr..... That brings me to another question , if this is workable, How will I be able to move the recovery patition to the new drive so I can re-format the old (C;\ & E;\ ) drive. Thanx in advance to all those that post a reply.

Message Edited by DeathHawk152 on 07-16-2009 01:21 PM

Message Edited by DeathHawk152 on 07-16-2009 01:21 PM

[TheOldMan]

You can make the recovery DVD's before you upgrade the original drive to the new one. OR make a image of the old hard drive and use that to transfer the OS and everything else to the new HDD.  I do not think you have a choice as to where the recovery will go when you hit the F10 to go into the recovery.  On my HP the active partition is C:\ and the recovery drive is D:\ .  If you can make the DVD's and then install the new HDD, you will get everything on the two partitions just as it came from the factory.

[DeathHawk152]

Thanks for such a quick reply. The problem is that I bought this pc for my Adult Daughter and when she starting using it she failed to Make the recovery disk and Low and behold a short time after she had a problem and I had to walk her thru doing a System recovery. I failed to ask her if she made the recovery disk. Her fault , my fault ? Don't matter now , huh? But anyway , the system recovery from hhd still works cept it DOES NOT restore the pc to factory settings , the Make Recovery CD's menu Item is not there. :-\ . Everything else is good. She just needs to swap out the hd to a Faster , Larger one. I do have a dilemma don't you think ?

[RoyalSerpent]

I'd order a set of recovery CDs from HP to restore the PC back to factory condition.  Add another hard drive and format it as an extended logical partition.  1TB Cavair Black is $100.  It's on sale today at Newegg for $90 + free ship and no tax in many states.

http://promotions.newegg.com/NEemail/July-0-2009/72Hour17/index-landing.html?nm_mc=

[TheOldMan]

The fact that you did not make the Recovery DVD's may or may not be fo concern.  You do not say what model PC this is, at least I did not see it.  So if you are looking to try that and the computer still boots, then look under programs, PC Health & Tools, then HP PC Recovery CD-DVD Creator.  Click on that and it should lead you thru the creation process.  If the click responds with the Recovery set was made, then just order the CD or DVD's from HP. See here:

http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&docname=bph08097

There is a link to ordering if the Recovery set Creator will not work.    You could also give this a look, but I take no responsibity for their recommendations.  Look over the questions and answers down the page from other users and how it worked or did not work for them.

http://www.coderetard.com/2008/08/12/how-to-reset-hp-pavilion-recovery-cd-one-limit-restriction/

[DeathHawk152]

Well , I got on ebay and ordered the disk , arrived the next day. WOW... So I installed the NEW hhd (320gig) as a slave and partitioned it into 2 partitions , 160 gig each. I then switch it to Master and ran the recovery disk. Everything ran smooth untill it was compleated. After re-boot, I checked the he disk managment and low and behold , the recovery disk turned it back into one disk (320 Gig ) and after it created the recovery partion (E) it made the (C) drive 295 Gig. I wanted two drives each 160 gig. OK , Want did this Dummy do wrong ?

BTW ... The PC is a HP 513n. :-)

Message Edited by DeathHawk152 on 08-08-2009 02:47 PM

Message Edited by DeathHawk152 on 08-08-2009 02:50 PM

[Vaika · Accepted solution]

So long as the recovery finished successfully and the operating system is properly installed, we can work with this.  You need to use diskpart or a utility to remove the recovery partition (unnecessary if you have recovery media) and then extend the C partition to fill out the rest of the drive.  The recovery media is supposed to overwrite everything on there-- so you have to work in the partitions post-recovery, not prior to it.

If you're comfortable poking around in Diskpart, feel free to-- but you may need to rerun the recovery.  You may instead want to use a utility like Partition Magic, but most of those are pay-for.

Edit: Or remove recovery partition, reduce size of C, then create another partition to fill out the rest of the drive space.

Message Edited by Vaika on 08-08-2009 03:05 PM

[DeathHawk152]

And Vailka ,  what you suggested is what I did. I now have it the way I wanted . HHD part. into 3 drives ( didnt have to del. the recovery part. ) C:\ Primary D: Lodgical E: Recovery . Only Problem now is 20 gig not showing ( not recognised by Bios ?)  Guess I"ll have to try the Bios update if there is one.

Thanks all for your time in replying

Message Edited by DeathHawk152 on 08-14-2009 04:37 PM

[c0rnel]

No. It's got nothing to do with BIOS or BIOS. update.

Just restart pc and check Disk Management.

Maybe there's hidden partition or an unformatted partition.

Also Windows will sometimes show the hd space less than it should be.

[DeathHawk152]

guess its windows , the program I used to part. the hhd shows  the whole 360 gigs .... Thnx