Help with trying to clone my hdd with Norton Ghost

[LoadWB]

What version of Ghost?  I used 2003 frequently without setting any options, no problems with bootable drives.

Try booting from the XP CD, go into the Recovery Console, do FIXMBR and FIXBOOT.  That fixes a lot of boot problems.  Otherwise you may need to do a Repair Installation.

[EDIT]:  I just realized a big problem: you changed drive controllers.  You will most likely need to do a Repair Installation to get Windows to recognize the boot device on a different controller (PATA to SATA move.)

Remember when doing this that you will blow out all updates past the SP level of the CD.  You will probably also break Windows Update, but that's easy to fix (do a Google search for "windows xp repair installation break windows update" -- probably too many words, but it will find it) with a regsvr32 command.

[LoadWB]

Here's the KBA about the Windows Update problem after a Repair

"Updates are not installed successfully from Windows Update, from Microsoft Update, or by using Automatic Updates after you repair a Windows XP installation"
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/943144/en-us

[LoadWB]

Mike_Amiga wrote:

*edit* BTW I really don't want to reinstall, the whole point of getting ghost was to make a complete copy of all my existing stuff so i don't have it reinstall and configure everything all over again.

A Repair Installation isn't really a full reinstall.  It copies all of the critical Windows files to the installation, but leaves drivers and installed programs intact.  It's a little time consuming, especially since there's another 295MB or so of updates to download again after the installation, but it works.

I'll be doing that when I replace my Soyo motherboard with one that doesn't have swollen caps.