Question First try at cloning a drive.

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axlrose

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Jun 11, 2008
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Just looking purely for opinion.

I have a 1/2tb boot m.2. I have a 1tb m.2 for my games.

I got a new 2tb m.2 for Christmas. I'd like to wipe my 1tb drive. I'd like to clone my 1/2tb boot drive on to it and make it my boot drive. I'd like to install my 2tb m.2 for games.

Any suggestions for wiping my 1tb drive before cloning onto it?

Any suggestions for what to use my first time cloning a drive?

I had planned to wait another week to do it, but I want to install Nightingale an I don't want to do that until I have my drives settled.

Thanks.
 
More details, please.

Which specific drive?
What motherboard?

The clone operation will (probably) clean all partitions on the target drive.

Please show us a screencap of your Disk Management window.

See next post for specific cloning steps.
 
-----------------------------
Specific steps for a successful clone operation:
-----------------------------
Verify the actual used space on the current drive is significantly below the size of the new SSD
Both drives must be the same partitioning scheme, either MBR or GPT
Download and install Macrium Reflect (or Samsung Data Migration, if a Samsung target SSD)
If you are cloning from a SATA drive to PCIe/NVMe, you may need to install the relevant driver for this new NVMe/PCIe drive.
Power off
Disconnect ALL drives except the current C and the new SSD
Power up

Verify the system boots with ONLY the current "C drive" connected.
If not, we have to fix that first.

Run the Macrium Reflect (or Samsung Data Migration)
Select ALL the partitions on the existing C drive

[Ignore this section if using the SDM. It does this automatically]
If you are going from a smaller drive to a larger, by default, the target partition size will be the same as the Source. You probably don't want that
You can manipulate the size of the partitions on the target (larger)drive
Click on "Cloned Partition Properties", and you can specify the resulting partition size, to even include the whole thing
[/end ignore]

Click the 'Clone' button
Wait until it is done
When it finishes, power off
Disconnect ALL drives except for the new SSD. This is not optional.
This is to allow the system to try to boot from ONLY the SSD

(swapping cables is irrelevant with NVMe drives, but DO disconnect the old drive for this next part)
Swap the SATA cables around so that the new drive is connected to the same SATA port as the old drive
Power up, and verify the BIOS boot order
If good, continue the power up

It should boot from the new drive, just like the old drive.
Maybe reboot a time or two, just to make sure.

If it works, and it should, all is good.

Later, reconnect the old drive and wipe all partitions on it.
This will probably require the commandline diskpart function, and the clean command.

Ask questions if anything is unclear.
-----------------------------
 
I still haven't made time for this. Hoping for this weekend.

Because there are two drives involved, can I be clear that I don't need a thumb drive or anything? Download Macrium onto the current C drive and follow the directions?

Once I dig into my pc and see what it's going to take to remove and swap drives, does it matter which of my two m.2 slots the boot drive is in?

Thanks again.
 
Okay, partially through. I'm up to the partitioning sizes part, but reading ahead.

I'm using m.2 drives only. I have two installed. I am going to start digging around and seeing how much of a tear down is required to get at the two m.2 drives. It sounds like after I clone from the boot m.2, to the soon to be boot m.2, I need to go in and physically remove the original (smaller) m.2 boot drive before powering back up to see if the pc can boot from the newly cloned boot drive.

1. Sorry if this is a dumb question, but I'm on my old 1080ti build from however long ago. I haven't done hardware work for a long time unfortunately.

If I am working only with m.2 drives, do I need to pay attention to any of the directions about sata cables? I don't think I do with m.2 drives, but I don't want to skip an directions.

2. Related to question one either way...

Do I need to move the newly cloned boot drive into the m.2 slot that was where the previous m.2 boot drive was? I am hoping I can just leave that where it is, and install my new m.2 drive where the old boot drive was and save some tear down.

Thanks!
 
No, you don't need to worry about "sata cables".

Yes, you DO need to physically remove the old OS drive before booting up the first time.

Regarding which port....we still do not know the specifics about what drives are involved, and what motherboard.
 
axlrose said:
I have a 1/2tb boot m.2. I have a 1tb m.2 for my games.
I got a new 2tb m.2 for Christmas. I'd like to wipe my 1tb drive. I'd like to clone my 1/2tb boot drive on to it and make it my boot drive. I'd like to install my 2tb m.2 for games.
Any suggestions for wiping my 1tb drive before cloning onto it?
Click to expand...
So
500GB windows drive​
1TB games drive​
2TB new drive.​
​
1. Clone 1TB drive to 2TB drive.
2. Clone 500GB drive to 1TB drive.
3. Remove old 500GB drive and boot from 1TB drive. This step is not optional. You have to physically disconnect old drive.

No need to reinstall anything.

What model motherboard do you have?
Does it have 3x M.2 slots onboard? With only 2x onboard M.2 slots it will me much more complicated.
Also list model names of your M.2 drives.
 
Last edited:
Okay. Removed some old sata drives per the direction, that I think were there because 'there might be something I need on them' but rebooted without them, so don't appear to. I'll keep them around in case I someday figure there is some picture on there that I need etc. :)

So I have a custom water loop. First one I ever built. Main take away after my first water loop (other than don't screw down the cpu block so tight that you crack it and have to buy and install a new one) is to put a drain at the bottom of the loop. Ooops.

Both m.2 drives are solidly behind the gpu. I think there is only a screw on the left side of an m.2 drive? I can access both drives enough that I think I can uninstall them both, probably. Might have to remove my psu and cables to get at the 1tb m.2, but that doesn't involve draining the loop somehow. Whew!

Drives

500gb 960 evo (boot drive I'd like to clone onto the 1tb drive an turn into the new boot drive so that my boot drive is 1tb instead of 1/2 tb and I assume the 1tb is probably a faster m.2 drive)

1tb game drive Adata xp8200 (I want to clone the boot drive onto here and make this his new boot drive with twice the storage capacity).

New 2tb drive to install and make the new game drive Crucial P3

Motherboard - MSI Z170A Mpower gaming titanium

Board has two m.2 slots I believe. I am using both. I want to take out the 1/2tb. I want to make the 1tb the boot drive instead. I want to add in the new 2tb m.2 for games.

1/2tb and 1 tb to 1tb and 2tb
 
Any idea if I need to swap the second m.2 drive physically after I clone the current boot drive on to it? I think I probably can if I remove my psu and cables connected to it. If I label the cables first, that probably isn't a massive problem.
 
My memory of installing the m.2 drives is that they are kind of tricky to get into the slot and there is some tension when reinstalling the screw to hold them down, sort of like when clamping down the cpu. Might be a bit tricky with the access I have, but I think I can do it. I could be remembering that wrong though. It's been a while.
 
Possible procedure:

Drive 1 - 500GB
Drive 2 - 1TB
Drive 3 - 2TB

-------------------------
Install Macrium Reflect
Create a Macrium RescueUSB (on the toolbar)

Remove Drive 1
Install Drive 3

Boot from the RescueUSB

Clone from Drive 2 to Drive 3

Remove Drive 3

Install Drive 1

Clone from Drive 1 to Drive 2

Power OFF, remove Drive 1. Ensure the system boots from only Drive 2.

Now, connect Drive 3

Done.
---------------------------
 
I don't follow. This seems like a lot more remove an reinstall physically. That's going to be the hardest part at this point.

What is a 'macrium usb on the toolbar'?

I wiped the games off of the 1tb. There must be some fragments or something or some screenshots etc. still on there, but it's otherwise almost empty. Nothing to clone from the 1tb drive.
 
axlrose said:
I don't follow. This seems like a lot more remove an reinstall physically. That's going to be the hardest part at this point.

What is a 'macrium usb on the toolbar'?

I wiped the games off of the 1tb. There must be some fragments or something or some screenshots etc. still on there, but it's otherwise almost empty. Nothing to clone from the 1tb drive.
Click to expand...
Yes, there was a lot of moving drives around.

That was if you needed to clone from the 1TB to the new 2TB.
If that is no longer a need, the complexity goes WAY down.

So.....
Clone from the 500GB to the 1TB.
Remove the 500GB
Verify actual booting from only the 1TB
If it works, install the 2TB.

Move on, install you games.

Done.

See specific clone steps listed above.
 
Can I verify still, do I have to physically move the 1tb drive? Does it matter which m.2 slot it is in as the boot drive?

Can I clone the boot to it, leave it there, swap the 1/2tb boot drive for the new 2tb, and reinstall games on the 2tb drive and have a happy pc?
 
I messed something up my first time cloning. I'm going to try it again. After cloning, my 1tb drive says it only has as much storage as my 1/2tb drive. I must have missed a step with the partitions still.

What did I screw up when I cloned it?

Thanks.
 
axlrose said:
I messed something up my first time cloning. I'm going to try it again. After cloning, my 1tb drive says it only has as much storage as my 1/2tb drive. I must have missed a step with the partitions still.

What did I screw up when I cloned it?

Thanks.
Click to expand...

Most likely there was about a half terabyte of "unallocated space" on the 1 TB drive that you could add to C so that entire capacity is available.
 
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