Apricron DriveWire – Quick HDD cloning via USB

The DriveWire is a box that converts any bare hard drive (SATA, PATA) to a USB drive. It’s quick: you just need to plug your drive in the connector and voila.

It ships with “EZ Gig II”, a (HDD) backup software that can clone a drive (practical for an upgrade) or clone only a partition. If you are using an exotic operating system, you can also boot from a CD and clone your drive from there. I have not tested it, but I assume that it is possible to restore a drive on a larger (and newer) HDD. There are alternatives out there, like the excellent Acronis True Image. Product page, $51 on Amazon