Clone and resize NTFS GPT partition

clonegpartedgptntfsvmware-converter

I have a ntfs partition, GPT, of 5.6 TB containing only 200 GB of data, that I need to fit onto a 1 TB partition (of a vmware ESXi guest).
Vmware converter does not support GPT.
Acronis disk director does not support GPT.

As I am not very familiar with the Windows operating system, I would rather not copy over "network shares", ftp or similar – I foresee too many problems with that. (correct me if Im wrong!).

I could dd/parted/gzip the raw partition, but unpacking it to a smaller partition might cause problems. Anyone know if problems like that could be resolved by running CHKDSK or similar?

What wuld you do?

Best Answer

I'd mount the filesystem and copy it at a file level rather than trying to disk image it. I suspect it'll end up being faster for you and you won't have to contend with disk partitioning issues.

The built-in (at least in Windows Vista and newer) robocopy command can copy all the files, metadata, and ACLs pretty easily.

You could use a Linux distro with GPT support and the ntfsprogs ntfsclone to close the filesytem.

I wouldn't copy the filesystem raw at a block level, though. I'd have a hard time trusting it after doing that.

Related Topic