Copying The Data With The Same Attributes

Question

Hello everyone, 

I need your little help regarding the copying of my data with the same attributes. I have a external Hard Disk of reputable company. This hard Disk has three partitions on it.  I want to make an exact copy of the data of third partition but I don't want to make a clone. I explain the issue to make it clear.

In the past, I had experienced a issue regarding the recovery of BitLocker Encrypted Partition. I had two encrypted Partitions. Partitions on which problem occurred  had sizes of 75GB (lets call this C) and 150 GB (lets call this D) respectively. The output partition (non-encrypted or simple) of C partition had the same size that is 75 GB. The output partition(encrypted) of D had the size of 298GB*.  Kindly note the difference, i.e., output of C was simple and that of D was encrypted.  Lets call the encrypted output as "E". I can make clone of this partition but I have to keep the size of destination equal or larger than this size (298GB). Size of data, in actual, is 150 GB. This is wastage of space. I need more space to store the data.

This was little explanation. Now I come to actual question, i.e., to copy the data with the same attributes. You know very well that each file has its own attributes like date last modified, author name, date created, date last accessed and so on. Now when I make a clone of E, attributes of files remain same but when I copy a folder/file from E to another destination then attributes get changed. For example,  date  of creation of file changes from July 23, 2015 to March 25, 2016 (current date). I want the attributes of copied folder/file same as that of original, i.e., date of creation should be July 23, 2015. Similarly date last accessed should be same so on.       

I look forward to your helpful response which will help me copy the date with same attributes and in turn save space on hard disk. In case there is any ambiguity/question, please let me know.

Thanks in advance. 

*Kindly note that the sizes I am sharing are as per device manager.

Answer 1

Copy always changes the attributes.  No way around it.  If you have an empty partition and copy to it you are in effect creating new files hence the change in creation date.

So which is the problem?  The change in attributes or the change in file size.?

I would be  VERY VERY careful in copying/cloning/moving bit locked data.  You may make it unreadable.  A much better approach is to decrypt bitlocker then copy, then encrypt it

Answer 2

Thank you for your reply. 

I want to make exact replica of files. I am sure there will be a way. I try the softwares that you shared. I will update you in due time.

Answer 3

I am sure there is but which does what you want i do not know.  I would investigate teracopy, xcopy, and sync toys.  Google is your friend

Answer 4

Thank you for your reply. 

Change in attributes is the problem. As due to some reasons, I don't want them to get changed. Any software that can help me ? Please.