Can't recover drive image to another computer

Does anybody know if it possible ( and how) to recover a HDD drive image from one computer to another one?
I have bought a 2nd computer which I am keeping at a different location in my house . Since I have a lot of programs installed on it, I don’t want to do a fresh Win 7 installation and then re-install all the programs. It would be too-time consuming. So I thought of taking a drive image of the 1ST computer with the latest Acronis T.I. program, put it on an external USB drive and then recover the image on the new computer. I know that there are often problems with transferring drive images to another computer, but Acronis claims to have a Universal Recovery module ( Plus module) built in their latest True Image version, which is supposed precisely to allow image recoveries between different computers/HDD and I hoped it would work. Unfortunately it does not: when I boot the computer drive supposed to contain the recovered image, I get a message saying “ autocheck program not found, skip autocheck ” and then the computer keeps re-starting in and endless loop with the same message. Here is what I have done sofar:
1. Run a Windows boot-repair disk : it shows the recovered OS with the image, but it is unable to repair.
2. I have run the Fixmbr, Fixboot, Rebuildbcd and CHKDSK commands on the command prompt, but it doesn’t help either.
3. Somebody has suggested a missing file called mountmgr.sys. The file is there. I have re-copied it with Dos, just in case it was corrupt, but the problem persists.

What puzzles me is that the OS with the recovered image is there. The Windows boot-repair disk shows it. Why am I unable to boot? I have even tried keeping the destination drive in the same computer instead of installing it on another machine. It still does not work.
Could it be because the backup image was from a larger drive ( 460 GB) than the destination drive ( 250 GB). If so, I am out of ammunitions, because I wouldn’t want to buy another drive . Should it matter, though, since the physical space taken up by the image is only 40 GB and the rest is empty (unallocated) space. Curious to see if the recovery process sees 460 GB or 40 GB. , which would be more logical.
Am I asking for the impossible or is there a way out? I’d appreciate any suggestions.

Ittiandro

 

If these aren't the exact same computer models. You will have lots of trouble with drivers and so on, clean install is best.

 

As you are copying from one pc to another you will find that the key for your windows operating system is no longer valid (unless you have a key for more than one PC).

The key for the OS is normally for 1 PC only and if you change a motherboard it requires a new key.

My best suggestion is that you do a fresh install of the OS and then copy all your programs to an external drive and use the external drive to copy them to your new PC then all you will have to do is install shortcuts on your desktop to start them.
It's a bit unconventional but it works (i have done it several times)

 

Hi,

Never used it but have you considered Files and Settings Wizard in System Tools? Look it up in Help and Support. (XP?)

Jim