Migrate full laptop HD to a new HD

I have a a 60 GB HD inside my Dell Inspiron 8600 laptop that only has 3 GB of free space. I have already removed as many programs/files as I can. So, I am thinking replace the internal drive with a larger one (which I have not purchased yet).

How do I do this? I have read some of the posts, and there is reference to using the Dell provided disks (which I still have), however when I bought the computer, it had XP professional SP1 installed, and I have since updated to SP2 and SP3. Also, I have added many programs since purchasing the computer, some of which were downloaded from disk, and some from downloads. I think I have most, if not all of the disk based installation disks. But, these programs have also been updated via the internet a few times as well.

I assume I want to mirror, or "image?", my existing HD on the new one, correct? Once mirrored, I can simply replace my existing internal drive with the new one. What programs do I need, and do I need a separate external HD (USB) to accomplish this? I have a separate 120 GB HD available, if necessary. Obviously I could download my 10 GB of personal files to my USB HD, but I want my laptop internal drive to contain all of my files, thus I want to replace the existing 60 GB.

Could use help getting started; I have never done this. Thanks in advance.

 

I know you can buy a lead that transfers all your files from one comp to another, so I suppose if you had use of two laptops you could do it that way.

However I am sure there would be an easier way, Maybe buy an external drive and put it on there.

 

Agree with plodr, but if all you want to do is clone the HD, perhaps to the 120 GB notebook HD, then just get the USB adapter and clone it.

There are free cloning softwares out there.