Replacing the hard drive containing the OS and programs quickly

[AZTrucker]

The hard drive was shot so last week I replaced it with a good used one, installed Window 7 and all the software.

Now I just found a great deal on a new and much faster drive. I really don't like to go through the whole process of OS and software installation again and I'm thinking about making an image of the current setup on a DVD, swap out the drives and use the image file on the DVD to get the machine going again.

Any suggestions about the procedure or (free) software I can, or should use?

Thanks.

 

[ss202sl]

Just clone the drive from the old drive to the new drive. It will be a lot faster.