Can anyone recommend a HDD cloning tool for my purpose?

I have Vista Home Premium on a HP laptop and would like to perform a HDD image backup, like I do on my Desktop PC, running Win 7, which lets me save disk images on an external USB HDD that is 320 GB (matching 512 bytes/sector).

Western Digital offers a bare-bones edition of Acronis, which I tried: I used it to create a 100 GB partition with 512 bytes/sector, since my external USB drive is 5TB with advanced format (4096 bytes/sector). But Acronis wants to format the whole USB drive, where I save personal files. In other words, Acronis wants the whole 5TB.

I may need to use the 320 GB drive that I have for the laptop also, since the formatting matches. But the Vista Home Premium does not have the feature to create a Windows System Image file, like in Win 7. I'm hoping a software solution exits. Any program out there that works like the one in Win 7, where the disk image file can be saved on an ext USB without deleting other content on the drive?

 

You could start with a tool like AOMEI to create/manage your partitions in advance. That way all your WD software has to do is create a backup to the partition of your choosing. Or, AOMEI has a very capable backup suite as well.

 

For backup, you can use Paragon Backup & Recovery 14 Free Edition.
http://www.paragon-software.com/home/br-free/

And for partitioning the external HDD, you can use Paragon Partition Manager Express Free Edition.
http://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/paragon_partition_manager_express_free_edition.html

 

Thank you all for your kind responses.

Windows Disk Management worked fine for me to prepare a 100 GB, 512 bytes/sector partition on an external USB drive for storing a backup image; and I opted to install EaseUS Todo, since PC World reports it has an intuitive GUI and is reliable. If you hear a blood-curdling cry coming from Florida, you'll know it's me running into difficulties.

 

EaseUS worked nicely, and I did not need to use any special formatting; so I'll stick to it. Whether cloning (for new HDD) or performing an image backup, I learned the sector-by-sector feature must be enabled, otherwise upon restoration some apps need to be re-registered. Thanks again for the help to all.