Cannot boot from cloned disk

[atomik]

Hey,

I'm having a small problem:

- I have to make an exact copy of a disk which contains MS Dos 3.3 and has some programs in it. If I the PC boots from this original disk, it automatically starts a program (with a link in the autoexec.bat file).

Now, I made an exact copy of the disk using DriveImage 5.0 (made sure the destination disk had no allocated space, and selected all the partitions from the source disk).

DriveImage tells me that the process is succesful, and I verify and the data is on the disk.....BUT

the drive doesn't want to boot !

Do I have to conclude that DriveImage doesn't copy (or write) the Master Boot Record ??

And is there anyone with an idea on how I could get this issue fixed ?

thanks a lot !

 

[gsgleason]

is this a 1.44 floppy or a cd?

 

[Nodsu]

If it is a floppy, the DriveImage is really not the right thing for copying it. Use the standard windows program called diskcopy.

If it is a hard dirve, you have to make sure that you are booting from the first primary partition of the first hard disk. Also, DOS 3.3 being very ancient, it may not support big hard drives.

 

[atomik]

Sorry I forgot to mention.... the disk I'm trying to clone is a Hard Drive (from a 81 MB drive to a 2.1 Gig drive)

 

[Nodsu]

Whoa!

Different DOS versions have serious issues with hard drive sizes and I'm pretty certain 2.1 GB chokes that OS. You should try smaller partitions. For some reaosn I made my DOS partition 400 megabytes. I can't remember why, but I had a good reason at a time . You should do some research into DOS HD size limitations.

 

[rroll]

Use FDISK and make certain that the partition that you're trying to boot from is "ACTIVE".

I had the same problem a few days ago when I tried cloning a HD for the first time
(I used Symantec's Ghost utility).