Sector copy vs file copy

[neutralizer]

I have a non-system drive that is going bad and I'd like to clone it to another hard drive. I know that sector copy takes a lot longer than file copy as sector copy will copy everything including the free space, while file copy doesn't. I'm wondering is there any advantage in doing a sector copy over a file copy. I just want to be able to swap the drives and the system should pretend that nothing changed.

 

[SunnyD]

Sector copy (dd, TrueImage, Ghost, etc) will do what you want for the most part. A file copy won't touch most hidden and/or system files, nor will it touch the boot sector of the drive, meaning you won't be able to make a 1:1 copy, and more importantly a bootable copy of the drive.

 

[neutralizer]

I'm just worried about the amount of time it will take to do sector copy as it is a 1 TB drive that may or may not be dying. I thought robocopy will touch hidden and system files. The drive is merely a data drive so it's not bootable anyways so I don't really need the MBR.

 

[corkyg]

The time it takes to clone a drive depends on how much data is stored on it. Sector by sector cloning does not copy blank space. I clone a 500 GB drive in about 9 minutes with Acronis TI using the bootable rescue media.

 

[Maverick6969]

I have a non-system drive that is going bad and I'd like to clone it to another hard drive. I know that sector copy takes a lot longer than file copy as sector copy will copy everything including the free space, while file copy doesn't. I'm wondering is there any advantage in doing a sector copy over a file copy. I just want to be able to swap the drives and the system should pretend that nothing changed.

I agree with the answers given thus far. If you're running Vista/Win7, use Robocopy from the command line to copy everything onto the new hard drive once you get it installed. Make sure you use the /s switch - that tells windows to include the subfolders.

 

[RadiclDreamer]

Also, try RichCopy, its the successor to RoboCopy