Can I Run Windows 7 From 2 SSDs Interchangeably?

[Boris_yo]

Hello,

I received error when migrating to new SSD from Intel SSD using Samsung Migration Software:

"Cloning failed. An error occurred while adjusting partition size. 400180 (061b34)"

I decided to install from scratch that same OS I have on Intel SSD on new Samsung SSD. I will be using new install as a way to "fallback" in case something happens with original drive.

As soon as I install Windows on Samsung SSD, will I receive activation request from Windows 7? I don't remember if it's OEM or retail Windows though and don't know if it's possible to find out that. That laptop had it's original motherboard failed and when I replaced it with new motherboard, I had to call Microsoft license activation line to resume using OS.

Will I see this happening again, should I boot up from new install?

Thanks

 

[atljsf]

the new install will try to activate and surely will do it without much issues, because the only difference is the hard disk ,so the license won't give byou much problems

all you have to do is when it asks for the 25 letters and numbers, write them and activate it when you have internet, it should work fine

 

[USAFRet]

1. Just reinstalling on the new drive should not trigger any activation issues.

2. Having 2 viable, bootable, used-to-be identical OS's on 2 different drives can lead to a bit of confusion later on. I've seen this more than once in here.

3. For your 'fallback' there are much better ways to do this.


What happened with the cloning operation?
What size are these drives?


A better fallback procedure is to use something like Macrium Reflect. On a schedule you set, have it make an image of the whole drive, off to a folder in a different drive. Daily, weekly, monthly...
If needed, boot up from the Macrium Rescue DVD or USB you create.
Tell it which image to use, and what new drive to recover to.
15 minutes...done.

This is a basic cut down version of my whole backup procedure.
This way you have the benefit of an almost realtime backup, that is as current as you make it, and can't be accidentally booted from.

 

[jsmithepa]

Am going to guess you are getting the partition msg because the new SSD is already partitioned, or old SSD has multiple partitions and the cloning app is getting confused, or size differential, new SSD smaller than old SSD? you never divulged size information.

U maybe doing this the hard way. Solid states don't die, they are not HD, specially with brand names like Samsung/Intel, can't guarantee u 100%, nothing can, but for practical purposes that's not something on my radar. What is your concern really? that you have to spend time re-installing the OS if it fails, or are you backing up data?

 

[Boris_yo]

all you have to do is when it asks for the 25 letters and numbers, write them and activate it when you have internet, it should work fine

You are talking about Product ID that can be found in "My Computer" > "Properties" or license key itself located on a sticker? I think I have one in laptop's battery compartment.

2. Having 2 viable, bootable, used-to-be identical OS's on 2 different drives can lead to a bit of confusion later on. I've seen this more than once in here.

You mean when I have 1 SSD with OS as main boot SSD and new SSD with same OS in optical drive caddy, it might conflict with main boot SSD? I have recently bought drive caddy so I could replace DVD-ROM with new SSD. Anytime there is an issue, I would fall back on it to prevent any downtime that main SSD would experience.

What happened with the cloning operation?
What size are these drives?

Intel 535 SSD is 240GB and Samsung EVO 850 is 250GB

A better fallback procedure is to use something like Macrium Reflect. On a schedule you set, have it make an image of the whole drive, off to a folder in a different drive. Daily, weekly, monthly...
If needed, boot up from the Macrium Rescue DVD or USB you create.
Tell it which image to use, and what new drive to recover to.
15 minutes...done.

I wanted to install Macrium Reflect but they claim its for personal use only. I use my laptop mainly for office work and as a mean to operate online business. When I asked what does personal use constitutes, their support did not answer concretely and just referred me to their Terms of Service. So it's vague whether I can use their software for free. I decided to use EaseUs ToDo (free too), COMODO Backup (free) and Veeam (free)

To mitigate the risks of failure upon restoring from backups due to various reasons there might be, I decided to spread my risk and backups using multiple software that I just mentioned. If one fails, I have a good chance another won't.

By the way, 15 minutes for recovery? Not in my case. I have DELL Latitude E6420 with USB 2.0 so no fast recovery for me.

Am going to guess you are getting the partition msg because the new SSD is already partitioned, or old SSD has multiple partitions and the cloning app is getting confused, or size differential, new SSD smaller than old SSD? you never divulged size information.

Source: Intel 535 240GB - Destination: Samsung EVO 850 250GB. Samsung is out of the box and is not partitioned yet. Intel has C:, F: and H: drives. I tried cloning only C: and F: but it did not solve the problem. The process always stops at around ~103GB... See my screenshot above for error.

U maybe doing this the hard way. Solid states don't die, they are not HD, specially with brand names like Samsung/Intel, can't guarantee u 100%, nothing can, but for practical purposes that's not something on my radar.

My first Intel i330 120GB died when I tried to clone data on it from Lenovo laptop so I could use it on Lenovo laptop. I left it overnight and in the morning it would no longer be recognized. Tried connecting it to main SATA on motherboard and it just stalled the boot operation because it was unable to be recognized. So SSDs do fail, particularly their controllers which is what I believe happened.

What is your concern really? that you have to spend time re-installing the OS if it fails, or are you backing up data?

I am using a 5 year old laptop still with USB 2.0. Backups and restores take time. To prevent downtime I decided to buy new Samsung SSD to use as a fallback in case something happens to main Intel SSD. I could easily swap them and keep working. I still do weekly incremental backups, monthly differential backups and monthly full backups just in case. Differential backups and full backups take time to create. I use EaseUs ToDo free backup for incrementals and fulls, COMODO backup for incrementals, differentials and fulls and VEEAM Backup for fulls only. To mitigate risk if recovery of one software won't work for some reason I backup with more than one software.

 

[USAFRet]

I mention that having a fully installed and bootable "second OS" may be troublesome, not because the two would interact and conflict, but rather that the system may accidentally boot into the second OS, without you knowing.

I've seen exactly this here a couple of times.
One, the BIOS forgot about the primary drive, and just booted up to the second one.
The other was simply a bad SATA cable. The user was QUITE confused when the system booted up just fine, but everything looked just a little bit off and older.
The BIOS had Drive 1 then Drive 2. Upon not seeing Drive 1 due to the bad cable, it did what it was supposed to do and booted up from Drive 2.

Now...if the two drives are in perfect sync, you may not think this to be an issue.
However...if you do not know that Drive 1 is offline for whatever reason, and you happily proceed for a week or two on Drive 2 (unknowingly), if anything happens to Drive 2...you are then left with "what the hell happened here?!? Where's my stuff from yesterday?"

Secondly, I think you're overcomplicating your backup scheme.
Having the 3 different tools each doing there thing is of no use if it does not actually work.

Thirdly, any backup routine is only as good as the last time you actually tested it.

As for Macrium and free vs paid...the paid one is 'only' $70. You might think that too much, and all the others are 'free'. But how much is your data and your business worth?
The only reason I'm recommending this tool is because it works for me. And I tend to stick with what works.
The others might be fine, I just have no experience with them.

Time to do backups, full and differential? Let me lay out my current scheme.
5 drives, all SSD, 4 of them on this backup routine. (The 5th does not count, it is just there for scratch space for various photo and video editing tools).
Paid version of Macrium Reflect v7.

All drives are backed up to a NAS box, across the LAN, onto slow spinning drives.
On Sunday @1, 2, 3, 4AM, a Full image of each drive in this system. The takes anywhere from 1 to 15 minutes, depending on how much data is on each drive.
Then...every night starting at 1AM, each drive has an incremental image, to that same space on the NAS box. This generally takes 1-2 minutes each.
Every 2 weeks (on Sunday AM), those Incrementals are rolled into a Full image for each drive, and the process repeats.

Every Wednesday starting at 8AM, the entire NAS box does its own backup up to a USB connected 8TB drive.

All unattended.

In the unlikely event of a full system meltdown or massive unrecoverable virus, I could resurrect each of those drive images to new drives, or individual partitions on a single slow 2TB HDD.

Another issue with your current procedure is that everything is in one box, your laptop. 1 ransomware virus, and everything is hosed.
And data loss, for whatever reason, is a far more likely event than a dead SSD.

 

[atljsf]

sticker with the 25 letters, not the other thing

once you have two hard disks and you want to isntall windows again, remove one of them when you want to install on the other

you will need to add the second hard disk to the boot menu later, i forgot how to do it well, when i use a boot procedure like this one, i don't let one os to see the other, no boot manager and i do the boot drive selection by bios menu

i justp ress F11 on the keyboard and select the device to boot from

keep in mind that have two installations is double the problems in terms of os updates, antivirus updates, apps updates

keep it as paln b, but try to move away from this configuration

the only way i have two os is dualbooting linux and that is a whole different story

 

[Boris_yo]

@USAFRet

I assume from your profile name that you were in United States Air Force? Cool.

I do not intend to use both drives at the same time and the one that will serve as a fallback drive will be disabled in BIOS to avoid any data conflicts.

"Secondly, I think you're over-complicating your backup scheme.
Having the 3 different tools each doing there thing is of no use if it does not actually work."

I haven't had time to test each backup. I should find time and do that but I do not have a spare HDD drive for that. I think it must be internal laptop drive rather than external because there were times I tried to boot from cloned HDD and boot failed every time.

Having so many backup tools on the market it feels reluctant to pay for a tool that does same job as others. Compared to others Macrium seems to be more expensive. I wonder if added expense worth it.

If Samsung data migration didn't do it, maybe I should try cloning with Macrium? Migration is same as cloning, correct?

I don't have NAS box but it seems it's central to your backup plan...

"Another issue with your current procedure is that everything is in one box, your laptop. 1 ransomware virus, and everything is hosed.
And data loss, for whatever reason, is a far more likely event than a dead SSD."

What do you mean that everything is in my laptop? I backup to external WD drive. I also have an older TravelStar internal hard drive that came with my laptop which I connect externally. Until it has developed a few bad sectors I used to keep copies of full backup that I had on WD drive.

 

[USAFRet]

Migration is sort of the same as cloning.
It is meant to move everything to a new drive, and then use that new drive.
And it will generally take up the whole target drive.

Imaging is different. Create an image of the full drive (or parts of it), somewhere else.
And you can have multiple, different, images of Drive A over in Drive B.
In case of need, fire up the rescue tool, select the image you wish, and the drive to apply it to. Go.

In my case, I use the NAS because I have it. An external USB drive would work just as well. As well as a whole different PC.
Previously, the house server/HTPC did this duty. A very low end PC running Windows.
The NAS is not a critical component.


As far as paying for Macrium (or whichever)....I rarely buy something where the free version, or a free legal alternative, works just as well.
IME, Macrium rose to the level of 'buy it'.

It falls into the category of Adobe Lightroom vs the free alternative, Windows vs Linux...some things are that good to warrant buying it.

 

[Boris_yo]

I just found out that Macrium has Rapid Delta Cloning which is like incremental versus full backup. You clone to existing target drive that you cloned to earlier again but software only finds and adds the difference. I read it here: http://knowledgebase.macrium.com/display/KNOW/Rapid+Delta+Clone+-+RDC

What I don't understand is why data is being overwritten to target if it has modified data. If this data is newer it will get overwritten with data on source?

 

[USAFRet]

What I don't understand is why data is being overwritten to target if it has modified data. If this data is newer it will get overwritten with data on source?

Not sure what you mean by this.
Source writes to target...not the other way around.

But with imaging, I can have images from 3 different systems, 8 different drives...all living in different folders on one drive.

Either way would work. I guess it just depends on your acceptance of a little downtime while it writes back out to a new replacement drive.

 

[Boris_yo]

Success! Thanks to Macrium v6 free version. The "Intelligent Clone" failed at first which is purposed to copy only sectors with data. I then tried the other option which copies even sectors with no data (the real 100% clone) and it was successful. Made several restarts, shutdowns and standbyes without hitch. I will be using this Samsung SSD as my main drive and the previous Intel 535 I will have laying on the side as a fallback drive that would allow me to quickly resume operation with no downtime.

I think I will invest in Macrium in order to use rapid delta cloning. Once or twice per month I will use that option to clone data on Samsung drive to Intel drive to keep it updated. I have found website selling Macrium Home Edition at 30% less than official Macrium website ($69.99) This website claims to be registered partner: https://www.thetechnologychefs.com/macrium-reflect/macrium-reflect-7-home-edition

When I inquired them and told them I did not find them in official list on Macrium website, they told me that they are waiting for Macrium to update that list as they recently changed names and previously were registered under "End Data Loss": https://www.macrium.com/partners

Do you think I should check with Macrium?

Thanks

 

[USAFRet]

Do you think I should check with Macrium?

Thanks

Absolutely, yes.

Of course they're going to tell you they are a registered partner.
Only Macrium knows for sure.

 

[Boris_yo]

Got reply from Macrium about reseller. Macrium is selling 4-pack license and said that reseller misinterpreted it by selling each license individually. The end user who would purchase will not own that license to his name because it's only who owns 4-pack license is the registered owner. So it seems that had I purchased single license from that reseller, they would be registered user. While it would work I would have to go through them and provide their registration details should I require customer service.