Transfer windows from HDD to SSD

[TehCheesus]

I'm hoping to try and transfer only windows and whatever makes windows work onto a 120gb SSD without doing a fresh install and keeping all my stuff on my HDD.

Any advice, things I need to use?

[Metal_Kitty]

there is a free piece of software that will allow you to do this with ease,  https://www.backup-utility.com/free-partition.html and yes the free version will migrate the OS - I used this software at work to migrate 14 PC's from HDD to SSD without a problem.

Tips
Clean out all temp files and run disk clean up - deleting any old installs etc...
make sure you defrag the HDD after doing that
THen run the software and let it do it's magic


make sure both SSD and HDD are in and you can Identify them - then start the process - simple.. 

Alternatively - you can go with a clean build. which is recommended... 

 

[ARikozuM]

You can use Macrium Reflect. You need to remove as much stuff as possible to shrink the partition to the 120GB of the SSD. 

 

If you can't do that, clean install would be best.

[Axeonelite]

Clonezilla has always been my go to. Most are fairly competent and you shouldn't get any issues. One thing to remember before cloning a drive is to make sure you know for a FACT what your driver letters are so you don't end up writing the blank data from your SSD to your HDD. I did that once. 

 

If there is a setting for it in whichever program you use make sure you are using write to end of disk rather then writing all data. If you try to write all data from a 500GB HDD into a 120GB SSD you will end up with nothing but scrambled data. 

 

Because of this it may also be helpful to go ahead and DEFRAG your drive before cloning. 

[Axeonelite]

Just now, ARikozuM said:

You can use Macrium Reflect. You need to remove as much stuff as possible to shrink the partition to the 120GB of the SSD. 

 

If you can't do that, clean install would be best.

 

I disagree. As I mention in my post, if defrag and you don't chose overburning it will turn out fine. And really doing it this way you really have nothing to risk except time, because you can always reformat the SSD and try again. 

[Enderman]

Do a clean install unless you enjoy having issues in the future.

[TehCheesus]

Alright - looks like everyone is telling me to go for a clean build so I guess I'll do that. Thanks!

[Daniel644]

DON'T DO IT, speaking from experience, Windows does certain things differently during an SSD install, if you just clone it, those things are NOT done and it effects the performance of the drive. it also takes LONGER to clone a drive then to install Windows off a USB stick. especially since you want to leave your files on the other drive there is no reason to clone.

[Tsuki]

i almost always support drive cloning. but NOT when you're moving from hdd to ssd.

do a clean install. you'll save yourself a headache later on.

[Columbo]

I use a USB docking station with cloning capability. That way you do a hardware copy with no software to screw up the transfer of data. USB docking station is hardware. All of the software cloning tools are software which can introduce issues in the image. 

[TehCheesus]

Did anybody at all see that I said I'll do a clean install?

[JoostinOnline]

On 9/11/2017 at 6:24 PM, Enderman said:

Do a clean install unless you enjoy having issues in the future.

I agree with this.  I'm a computer technician, so cloning is a standard job, but I also have the equipment to fix problems when something (usually) goes wrong.  It's pretty common for the boot record to be corrupted, for example.

 

If you do decide to go through with it, make sure that when you're done you disable and re-enable restore points.  They won't work otherwise.

[TehCheesus]

why is this still getting replies