New Hard Drive

Clone the hard drive asap  if your PC ever starts clicking, then the hard drive is normally on the way out.

Surely you should be moving onto a SSD by now ?

do i need another HD to clone too?

what the hell is SSD?

Solid State Drive, prices are coming down every week. They are very fast compared to a normal hard drive.

If you can still access your HD... do not turn off the computer! Get a replacement HD asap and copy/clone your important stuff or entire drive to it. The Click of Death is a warning your HD is about to die. The click is caused by the disc reader arm banging back against the stop position when it cant access the sectors. If the HD dies it'll cost up to £500 to get the info of it. Some sites offer disc recovery for £99 but thats cr@p... it always cost more.

Do you have a USB drive? Drag the stuff onto that. I ordered a new USB drive last week for about 11 quid and I was amazed to find that it holds 2 Tera bytes

If you have another system e.g. a laptop, you could use Teamviewer software to drag the files over (File transfer using your wireless network)

if it's a tower pc- not a laptop. - I recommend Western Digital for a new drive.

when the new drive is installed and working. You can then configure it so that the second drive is a SLAVE drive (an extra storage device) you can then search out your files and transfer them over.

there is also a hub you can buy - £30 where you can slot in old hard drives and this lets you do the same thing without working out master/slave settings on the drives.
example - http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Dual-2-5-3-5-IDE-SATA-HARD-DRIVE-DISK-HDD-DOCKING-...

I agree with the advice to get a solid state drive.  They are bit more expensive but fast.
My new PC (November) has an 500 GB SSD and a 1000 GB hard drive.
If your PC is a bit old just buy a new PC.
I also have two external drives for safety.  Every week I copy all my data files to these and keep one in my car.

Depends if you want to re-install your Operating System or not.

Why would you do this? A fresh install will get rid of the years of crud that builds up, so your system should work faster and better. Realistically I would only do it if you have had any serious problems with your system (eg, blue screen of death, etc). I would DEFINITELY do it if you have upgraded from (say) Windows 7 to Windows 10 - a fresh install of W10 will be much better for your PC.

If you are keeping what you have now, make an copy of the partitions on your PC. I think you can do this in Windows if you have a decent version, like the pro version, otherwise go onto a software site (eg. file hippo) and get a free image software. Copy your whole partition to an external drive (or a USB stick, but you will need a biggish one - or you could copy it to a NEW hard drive - btw, get an SSD, they are massively better).

Copying it to a new drive in the PC with the old HDD makes things much easier (unless you are fully re-building). Once copied onto the new drive, just remove the old drive.

But the most important thing is to back up your files to an external drive NOW, because when your HDD goes, it is game over.

jeez what a pain in the a$$ i thought this would be easy.

ok i am not to fussed about keeping the stuff i already have on my desktop as most of it is now backed on a usb stick.

all i want to do is replace the hard drive.

i think it is 3.5 inch but is the only way to know by measuring it.

can somebody please suggest a replacement.

the case is 4 inch so i guess this means the hard drive is 3.5?

this is the one(i think)

http://www.pcworld.co.uk/gbuk/computing-accessories/components-and-upgrades/internal-data-storage/wd-mainstream-3-5-internal-hard-drive-1-tb-21651936-pdt.html

i know there are better but i just want a straight swap.

If you have just one hard drive or for your main drive with your system files on it, it has to be SSD now, they're such a big improvement, don't worry about bay sizes, just stick it in there.

DO you have the original Windows DVD (and licence number -- probably on the case)? If not you will want to go down the cloning route rather than just unscrewing the old one.

These is a freeware program Speccy that will give you plenty of omfo on your system
I have three hard drives on my old PC
This is info from one (the / is something I put in to remove tabs from their output report)

Storage
Hard drives
ST3120026A ATA Device
Manufacturer / Seagate
/  /  /  /  / Form Factor / 3.5"
/  /  /  /  / Heads / 16
/  /  /  /  / Cylinders / 14,589
/  /  /  /  / Tracks / 3,720,195
/  /  /  /  / Sectors / 234,372,285
/  /  /  /  / Device type / Fixed
/  /  /  /  / ATA Standard / ATA/ATAPI-6
/  /  /  /  / Serial Number / 3JT3LR8A
/  /  /  /  / Firmware Version Number / 3.16
/  /  /  /  / LBA Size / 48-bit LBA
/  /  /  /  / Power On Count / 3781 times
/  /  /  /  / Power On Time / 2437.3 days
/  /  /  /  / Features / S.M.A.R.T., AAM
/  /  /  /  / Max. Transfer Mode / Ultra DMA/100
/  /  /  /  / Used Transfer Mode / Ultra DMA/100
/  /  /  /  / Interface / ATA
/  /  /  /  / Capacity / 111 GB
/  /  /  /  / Real size / 120,000,000,000 bytes
/  /  /  /  / RAID Type / None
/  /  /  /  /  / S.M.A.R.T
/  /  /  /  /  /  / Status / Good
/  /  /  /  /  /  / Temperature / 23 °C
/  /  /  /  /  /  / Temperature Range / OK (less than 50 °C)
/  /  /  /  /  /  /  / S.M.A.R.T attributes
/  /  /  /  /  /  /  /  /  / Attribute name / Real value / Current / Worst / Threshold / Raw Value / Status
/  /  /  /  /  /  /  /  / 01 / Read Error Rate / 0 / 65 / 61 / 6 / 000C06A791 / Good
/  /  /  /  /  /  /  /  / 03 / Spin-Up Time / 0 ms / 97 / 96 / 0 / 0000000000 / Good
/  /  /  /  /  /  /  /  / 04 / Start/Stop Count / 9,242 / 91 / 91 / 20 / 000000241A / Good
/  /  /  /  /  /  /  /  / 05 / Reallocated Sectors Count / 0 / 100 / 100 / 36 / 0000000000 / Good
/  /  /  /  /  /  /  /  / 07 / Seek Error Rate / 0 / 74 / 60 / 30 / 00019CCD5F / Good
/  /  /  /  /  /  /  /  / 09 / Power-On Hours (POH) / 2437d 6h / 34 / 34 / 0 / 000000E47E / Good
/  /  /  /  /  /  /  /  / 0A / Spin Retry Count / 0 / 100 / 100 / 97 / 0000000000 / Good
/  /  /  /  /  /  /  /  / 0C / Device Power Cycle Count / 3,781 / 97 / 97 / 20 / 0000000EC5 / Good
/  /  /  /  /  /  /  /  / C2 / Temperature / 23 °C / 23 / 42 / 0 / 0000000017 / Good
/  /  /  /  /  /  /  /  / C3 / Hardware ECC Recovered / 0 / 65 / 60 / 0 / 000C06A791 / Good
/  /  /  /  /  /  /  /  / C5 / Current Pending Sector Count / 0 / 100 / 100 / 0 / 0000000000 / Good
/  /  /  /  /  /  /  /  / C6 / Uncorrectable Sector Count / 0 / 100 / 100 / 0 / 0000000000 / Good
/  /  /  /  /  /  /  /  / C7 / UltraDMA CRC Error Count / 0 / 200 / 200 / 0 / 0000000000 / Good
/  /  /  /  /  /  /  /  / C8 / Write Error Rate / Multi-Zone Error Rate / 0 / 100 / 253 / 0 / 0000000000 / Good
/  /  /  /  /  /  /  /  / CA / Data Address Mark errors / 0 / 100 / 253 / 0 / 0000000000 / Good
/  /  /  /  /  / Partition 0
/  /  /  /  /  /  / Partition ID / Disk #0, Partition #0
/  /  /  /  /  /  / Size / 47.0 MB
/  /  /  /  /  / Partition 1
/  /  /  /  /  /  / Partition ID / Disk #0, Partition #1
/  /  /  /  /  /  / Disk Letter / E:
/  /  /  /  /  /  / File System / NTFS
/  /  /  /  /  /  / Volume Serial Number / 00CC49F0
/  /  /  /  /  /  / Size / 111 GB
/  /  /  /  /  /  / Used Space / 57 GB (51%)
/  /  /  /  /  /  / Free Space / 54 GB (49%)

western digital i found is very good.

if you want cheap try the local CeX shop - dvd's and electronics for sale.
They sell hard drives usually. They guarantee them for a year?
I bought one and it was ok - cost me £12.
Ebay was wanting £60.
maplin over a hundred? FFS.

nobody even looked at the hub to take out files?

Jeez this is a fecking nightmare.

I've bought a new Hard Drive.

I have cloned my existing hard drive to a usb stick using this free software

http://www.easeus.com/disk-copy/index.htm

I can boot my pc from the usb stick but it always loads the easeus software so io cannot load windows.

Please please can someone show how i can clone my old hard drive to my new hard drive in VERY SIMPLE steps.

At this rate the pc is going in the bin. Doing my fecking head in.

SSD are a must for a laptop nowadays .. got 256SSD on my new Dell & boots on & off in around 5 seconds

ffs you dik i never asked for a recomendation! i asked for simple steps!!

ok Steve ... in very Simple (easy learning) Steps ...


1:  BIN


2:  IT









That way you'll avoid Blowing any Fuses!

http://kb.easeus.com/art.php?id=10011

Right, so I assume you have your new HDD in the machine but it is completely blank.

I can boot my pc from the usb stick but it always loads the easeus software so io cannot load windows.

Why don't you just do this, then use the Easeus software to copy your partitions onto the empty, new HDD disc? Then reboot with the USB stick removed, meaning the HDD copy of the partition will be booted. It might just work.

You don't say what operating system you use or if you bought a hard disk or solid state drive.

I googled and found these
http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/five-apps/five-free-and-reliable-cloning-tools/

Taken me over a month but i'm back you B1tches

So simple when you know how.

In the end i tried numerous cloning software but they all failed. A clean install of windows 10 and my pc is now back and lightning quick

Thanks for the comedy.

if it's a tower - you can change master slave settings on the drives. install the old drive as a slave drive. take out files, reformat the old drive. get the pc to scan drive for errors. use it as a storage drive or take it out and bin it. you should be able to retrieve your files.If you need to?

Steve, Can you show how to clone an old hard drive to a new hard drive in VERY SIMPLE steps... please?

Good to know you got it sorted.
Sorry I was no help.