Transfer windows to another HDD

[WindirBear]

Just got a brand new computer, but it has a 7200 rpm HDD, and i want to switch the OS to the SSD i have just installed....

 

 

Any tutorials??

 

Thanks in advance

[Enderman]

https://www.howtogeek.com/224342/how-to-clean-install-windows-10/

[NebbyNu]

I use macrium reflect to clone drives. Its pretty easy to use and I've never had any problems with it

 

Here's a link

https://www.macrium.com/reflectfree

[WindirBear]

18 minutes ago, Enderman said:

https://www.howtogeek.com/224342/how-to-clean-install-windows-10/

its a prebuilt computer will this work??

18 minutes ago, norrisben8 said:

I use macrium reflect to clone drives. Its pretty easy to use and I've never had any problems with it

 

Here's a link

https://www.macrium.com/reflectfree

but how does it work?? wouldnt i need a key??

[Mr.McMister]

a live linux disk then in a terminal
 

# dd if=/dev/sdX of=/dev/sdY bs=64K conv=noerror,sync status=progress

replace sdX with source disk and sdY with destination disk.

 

However, I would suggest you do a fresh install anyway because there are certain optimizations in partition setup that windows uses for SSDs that you won't have if you just clone directly too it.

[WindirBear]

2 minutes ago, Mr.McMister said:

a live linx disk then in a terminal
 

# dd if=/dev/sdX of=/dev/sdY bs=64K conv=noerror,sync status=progress

replace sdX with source disk and sdY with destination disk.

 

However, I would suggest you do a fresh install anyway because there are certain optimizations in partition setup that windows uses for SSDs that you won't have if you just clone directly too it.

on the command prompt??

[Enderman]

13 minutes ago, WindirBear said:

its a prebuilt computer will this work??

Yeah but just in case you can do this first: https://support.microsoft.com/en-ca/help/20530/windows-10-reactivating-after-hardware-change

You shouldn't need to though, since you're not changing motherboard, only your drive.

 

PS- never clone or migrate your drive.

[NebbyNu]

19 hours ago, WindirBear said:

its a prebuilt computer will this work??

but how does it work?? wouldnt i need a key??

it basically makes an exact copy of your hard drive onto another one. for example when i needed to set up 4 pc's for work i just made a windows install with everything i needed on it and then cloned it to 3 more hard drives. no keys required 

[Mr.McMister]

Just now, WindirBear said:

on the command prompt??

The linux equivalent yes Termainal/Bash Prompt. You'll have to download a live linux distro and boot to it. Something like the dedicated gparted distro would be a good option. Then launch the terminal and run

lsblk

to list the disks so you can see the names of the ones you need. (they'll have names liek sda and sdb etc.) Then run the command I listed earlier replacing the drive names.

 

If your hard drive is larger than your SSD you'll need to resize the windows partition first (you can use the graphical gparted program) so it will fit and then copy individual partitions using the same command with the partition names (sda1, sdb1 etc.) instead of the whole drive.

[WindirBear]

17 minutes ago, Enderman said:

Yeah but just in case you can do this first: https://support.microsoft.com/en-ca/help/20530/windows-10-reactivating-after-hardware-change

You shouldn't need to though, since you're not changing motherboard, only your drive.

 

PS- never clone or migrate your drive.

whats wrong with cloning and migrating??

[Enderman]

4 minutes ago, WindirBear said:

whats wrong with cloning and migrating??

Causes all kinds of issues, including the system not booting, windows updates failing to install, programs not working correctly, disk usage spikes, or like 100 other things.

In the end the only way to fix the problems is to do a clean install, so you save yourself time and headaches by just installing windows properly from the start.

[WindirBear]

18 minutes ago, Enderman said:

Causes all kinds of issues, including the system not booting, windows updates failing to install, programs not working correctly, disk usage spikes, or like 100 other things.

In the end the only way to fix the problems is to do a clean install, so you save yourself time and headaches by just installing windows properly from the start.

can i create this file using another computer??? internet here is slowwwww

 

Spoiler

 

[Enderman]

1 minute ago, WindirBear said:

can i create this file using another computer??? internet here is slowwwww

Yes you can use any PC to make the USB, just make sure that it is the correct version (home or pro) and correct architecture (x64) for the PC you will be installing it on.

[GoodBytes]

I highly recommend a clean install. But if you reaaaly want to to copy form one drive to another, I would go with @norrisben8 suggestion.

You want to do an image backup of the drive, and NOT cloning.

 

What is the difference?

• Image backup is more like doing a copy and paste operation of a file on your PC. You have error correcting as well. The copied data is defragmented (not that it matters for an SSD, but still), correct, and the SSD can place the data and fragment it to evenly use the chip as it wants. If it were an HDD, there would be no fragmented data. The downside of this method is that it takes the most time between the 2.
   
• Cloning will copy bit for bit the HDD to the SSD, including old bits that used to be files. No questions asked. Cloning has no or limited error correction (depending on the method you use) Copying from an HDD to an SSD, 2 drastically different technologies, asks for problem. You'll end up with issues on day 1, or issues that will appear later on as you use feature or software you didn't use before, or Windows update makes thing fall apart. It is asking for trouble. Usually cloning is done only with identical drive, down to the same firmware.

What is used in the IT industry in setting up mass number of identical computers? Image backup.

[Tsuki]

3 hours ago, norrisben8 said:

I use macrium reflect to clone drives. Its pretty easy to use and I've never had any problems with it

@GoodBytes is 100% correct here

i highly suggest against cloning a standard HDD onto an SSD.

It might "work" but it WILL cause problems that you may not notice right away that will lead to having to reinstall your OS anyways.

 

Start fresh.

[NebbyNu]

1 minute ago, Tsuki said:

@GoodBytes is 100% correct here

i highly suggest against cloning a standard HDD onto an SSD.

It might "work" but it WILL cause problems that you may not notice right away that will lead to having to reinstall your OS anyways.

 

Start fresh.

Thats a good point. Ive never tried it between an HDD and SSD. So in this case i think youre correct that a fresh install would be the best option here

[Tsuki]

Just now, norrisben8 said:

Thats a good point. Ive never tried it between an HDD and SSD. So in this case i think youre correct that a fresh install would be the best option here

yea i fully support cloning, especially bit for bit(a lot of people seem to be hardcore against it) as long as you clean things up first and verify both drives. but only if its ssd->ssd or hdd ->hdd.  never hdd->ssd. they read the data completely differently and ive seen so many things go wrong. when i see those weird issues that dont make sense and seem impossible to diagnose, thats usually caused by cloning gone wrong. 

if you HAVE to have the data, create an image, and then restore it on the new drive.

but really, just do a fresh install.

[WindirBear]

16 hours ago, Enderman said:

Yes you can use any PC to make the USB, just make sure that it is the correct version (home or pro) and correct architecture (x64) for the PC you will be installing it on.

So far seemed to work, and is still activated, should i format my HDD?

[Enderman]

7 minutes ago, WindirBear said:

So far seemed to work, and is still activated, should i format my HDD?

I would recommend doing so, so that your system doesn't accidentally try booting from it ever.

First move any data you want to keep to your SSD, then go into windows disk management and delete the partitions on the HDD.

Then click "new simple volume" and it will basically put your HDD back into like-new condition