Switch C: and D: for D: to be the main disk

Question

I have a PC with Windows 7 Pro with two internal disks:

• C: with 80GB
• D: with 360GB

The main disk (C:) is almost full.

That's why I would like, if it is possible, to copy everything from C: to D: and then make D: the main disk.

Only then I will erase everything on C: and use it as a second internal disk.

I don't have the Windows installation CD, I have a genuine Windows installed but afraid of formatting the disk and erasing it.

Is it possible? Is there any better solution?

Answer 1

Use Clonezilla Live to Copy Your Drive

Customary Warning: Back up ALL your data before doing any of this. If something goes wrong you need a safety net!

1. Back up anything that's important on your D: drive. You'll end up erasing it.
2. Make sure there's nothing on the D: drive the computer needs to boot (e.g. page file, installed programs, etc.). You'll end up needing to boot the computer without this drive for a while.

3. Download CloneZilla (Live version). It's a free and open source program for disk imaging. According to their About page:

   Clonezilla is a partition and disk imaging/cloning program similar to True Image® or Norton Ghost®.

4. Create a bootable USB flash drive for Clonezilla:

   a. Download Tuxboot. As indicated on their website, "Tuxboot helps you to create a bootable Live USB drive for Clonezilla live." If you need help more information about this utility can be found here.

   b. Run Tuxboot and point it to the Clonezilla live file you downloaded previously. It will create a bootable USB drive.

5. Perform a device-to-device imaging operation to copy your C: drive to your D: drive. Complete instructions (including screen shots) are found here, but the basic steps are:

   a. Boot the computer from the USB flash drive.

   b. Press ENTER to use the default Clonezilla boot menu option.

   c. Press ENTER to use the default screen resolution.

   d. Select your language.

   e. Press ENTER to leave they keymap alone.

   f. Press ENTER to start Clonezilla.

   g. Choose device-device.

   h. Choose disk_to_local_disk.

   i. Select SOURCE hard drive.

   j. Select DESTINATION hard drive. !!! This drive will be erased !!!

   k. When prompted, confirm you want to start the clone and overwrite the destination drive.

   l. When asked if you want to copy the boot loader, answer Yes.

   m. Choose Power off PC when done.

6. Once the clone is complete, remove the original C: drive

7. Boot the computer from the NEW C: drive (old D:) and make sure everything is working. It's best to not be connected to the Internet during this step, just in case you have to go back to the original drive (you don't want your computer to update something on the Internet that then pukes if you go back to an "older" version of your OS installation).

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The beauty of this solution is that it doesn't change the contents of your original C: drive, so if something goes wrong when you boot from your "new" C: drive, you can always go back to the original one.

Answer 2

Alternate solution: Prep in Windows, use a Linux LiveCD for imaging, then clean-up in Windows. This predicates some familiarity with the Linux command-line, but gives you very granular control and insight into what's really changing and in what ways.

1. First you'll need to make the existing Windows partition capable of being the active partition on a drive (put boot files on it instead of the system partition you probably have on the same disk as your c: partition). Use the Windows administrator command prompt (search for cmd in the start menu, right-click, run as administrator) to run bcdboot c:\Windows /s c:. (One could recreate or reimage the system partition onto the new disk instead of this step, but it isn't strictly necessary and complicates this process further for little/no objective gain.)

2. Shrink the D: partition with diskmgmt.msc to the desired new size, or delete it entirely (but its data will be gone forever if you delete it).

3. Create a new partition with the new free disk space to be your Windows partition, but don't bother formatting it. It will need to be at least as large as your existing C:.

4. Right-click the new partition and mark it active.

5. Shutdown and boot into the Linux LiveCD of your choice (Debian, Ubuntu, Arch, doesn't matter; the LiveCDs will have what you need).

6. Use dd to image the old Windows partition onto the new destination. This command is destructive if you mix partitions up, so confirm assumptions with gparted, lsblk, fdisk, or mount then umount as necessary. dd if=[old partition device node] of=[new partition device node] bs=4096.

7. Reboot to BIOS and set the boot HDD to the 360GB disk.

8. Confirm you booted to the correct disk. diskmgmt.msc or Windows Explorer should give you enough information to confirm.

9. Use Windows' diskmgmt.msc to extend your new Windows partition and reformat the partition on the smaller disk.

There are many ways to go about this. I chose to keep most of the steps in-Windows, but many could be done in-Linux instead. Twisty's Clonezilla or Ramhound's "re-install Windows step with the Win7 .iso" may be better options for someone who doesn't have the patience for Linux.