# Put Your Desktop On Your Laptop



## LateralG (Feb 11, 2006)

My goal was to take EVERYTHING contained in my 3-year-old Gateway desktop with me on my new Dell Inspiron E1705 laptop. In other words, clone my desktop to my laptop.

SUCCESS! And it was said that it couldn't be done. HAH!!

Thanks to Jim, and a top-notch techie at Future Systems Solutions, the publisher of CasperXP, the mission has been accomplished.

1- Purchased 100 GB Hitachi 2.5" SATA hard drive & USB external enclosure.
2- Using CasperXP, I cloned my 3-year-old Gateway C: drive to the external Hitachi.
3- Set the Dell to boot first from the D: drive
4- Removed the 100 GB Samsung HD that came with the Dell Inspiron, and installed the Hitachi which contained my Gateway clone.
5- Booted to the Windows XP Home disk (Same version as my Gateway).
6- Went to "repair" mode. There was a snag here. The initial screen asks if I want to install XP, or repair previous installation. I selected "repair, & was sent to an indecipherable DOS screen.
7- Walked across the room to retrieve my mouse. (I leave it to the reader to infer what step 6-A was)
8- Re-booted to the D: drive then selected "Install XP". This took me to a screen that had essentially the same options as the first one, but selecting "repair" made all the right stuff happen.
9- Booted to the C: drive, and WHOA!!! it looks like my desktop! And all the software works, & has retained their original settings.
10- Still had some work to do. The Dell thought it was a Gateway, & none of the features unique to it, worked.
11- A few calls to Dell support clued me to the fact that I had to download & install all the Dell drivers for this unit.

I give Dell support VERY high marks. Three times during one call the power went out here & disconnected us. Each time he promptly called me back. And after we got past the "YOU DID WHAT??", and accepted my situation, we were a team.

I also had essential help from a friend at LLSOC (Lincoln Luxury Sport Owners Club)


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## California Jim (Dec 11, 2003)

Congrats Gary on the successful transition. It's a shame that it takes so much effort to move from one machine to another. I dread the few times I have done it.

You would think that the geniuses at Microsoft would build in a "Move To New Computer" option in windows, then use an ethernet peer to peer connection to move your stuff. Sounds easy right!

Nice work


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## Lmbevard (Mar 18, 2006)

Defently unque way of doing it. I'm glad it worked, I would not of thought it would have let alone that Dell would be willing to set with you to make it work. I would have cloned to drive in the desktop and then just used the clone drive, booting off the regular drive. That way, I could have the same info on both computers by connecting the cloned drive.

Larry


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## 2500Ram (Oct 30, 2005)

Great news.

The only problem I see with cloning the drives is you take over the bad stuff with it. If your only trying to move user data not applications or programs plug both computers into a hub or router. Set one of the computers C drives to share. go to start\run type the IP of the shared computers c drive \ share name of the c drive and then copy and paste to the new computer.

Or easier yet if your comfortable removing the cover of your desktop computer. Turn off the computer. Unplug the cd rom power supply and IDE ribbon cable and plug in the old computer hard drive. Boot the computer and copy and paste the new D drive used to be your cd rom drive to the C drive. Reverse the procedure to reinstall the cd rom drive. You can also do the same thing with laptop to desktop drives. They make a 3.5" to 2.5" adapter for about $10 with power supply.

Bill.


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## LateralG (Feb 11, 2006)

2500Ram said:


> Great news.
> 
> The only problem I see with cloning the drives is you take over the bad stuff with it. If your only trying to move user data not applications or programs plug both computers into a hub or router. Set one of the computers C drives to share. go to start\run type the IP of the shared computers c drive \ share name of the c drive and then copy and paste to the new computer.
> 
> ...


My need was to move applications, their settings, and all data. Are you sure that your proposal would do that?


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## 2500Ram (Oct 30, 2005)

It would not. As I stated "If your only trying to move user data not applications or programs plug both computers into a hub or router" or the other methods I suggested_* IF *_you have access to reinstall the applications.

Didn't mean to confuse anyone.

Bill.


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## campmg (Dec 24, 2005)

It must be nice to be retired.


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## vdub (Jun 19, 2004)

That's an interesting approach and one I'm going to have to try simply to satisfy my curiosity. Typically, what I do when cloning is to SysPrep (Microsoft freebie) the first system, then ghost it (casper same) to a new hd. With the SysPrep the first boot will come up like the first boot of an OEM system.


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## LateralG (Feb 11, 2006)

campmg said:


> It must be nice to be retired.
> [snapback]105180[/snapback]​


Been retired since 1991. It's vastly underrated.

Lest you think I'm in fogeyville, I'll meet you in a swimming pool or on a bicycle in order to clarify things..


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## Oregon_Camper (Sep 13, 2004)

Glad it all worked out for and you have things working the way you want them.


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