From: Michael Geary (Mike_at_Geary.com)
Date: Thu Feb 01 2001 - 13:15:20 EST
Folks, there is a *big* problem with using XCOPY to clone a drive. It does
not guarantee that you'll get the same short filename aliases on the new
drive.
Why does this matter? Setup programs often use the short filenames, not the
long filenames, in the registry entries they create.
Here's an example. On my ThinkPad, the C:\Program Files folder has two
subfolders that both begin with the word "microsoft". I'll list the short
and long name for each:
MICROS~1 "microsoft frontpage"
MICROS~3 "Microsoft Office"
Windows assigns short filenames by taking the first six characters and
appending ~1, ~2, ~3, etc. until it finds an unused name. (There's a bit
more to it than that, but that's the basic idea.)
Now if I use XCOPY to clone this drive, it's guaranteed to do the wrong
thing. The new drive will have either this:
MICROS~1 "microsoft frontpage"
MICROS~2 "Microsoft Office"
or this:
MICROS~1 "Microsoft Office"
MICROS~2 "microsoft frontpage"
depending on what order the folders get copied.
Either way, note that "Microsoft Office" no longer has a shortname of
MICROS~3. (Why did it have MICROS~3 in the first place? I must have once had
some other folder called "microsoft something or other" which used up the
MICROS~2 shortname, and after I installed Microsoft Office I deleted that
other folder.)
But my registry has numerous references to the short pathname of this
folder:
C:\PROGRA~1\MICROS~3
All those will fail if I clone the drive with XCOPY.
Mark, you said you've used XCOPY a number of times successfully. You've been
very lucky that you haven't gotten bit by the short filename problem. But
keep at it and you will... <g>
To get a completely usable clone drive, you really need to use a program
that preserves the original short filenames. Ghost, Drive Copy, Partition
Magic will all do the job.
If you like using the XCOPY approach, try XXCOPY instead. It keeps the short
filenames intact, and it's free for personal use from:
http://www.datman.com/xxcopy.htm
(I haven't used XXCOPY myself, but I've seen good reports about it.)
-Mike
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