How can you move windows 10 to new storage devices?

[Adoni_Earnes]

This is pretty self explanatory really. If I install windows 10 onto a hard drive and upgrade down the line to an SSD (I just don't have the budget for it right now) how do I move windows 10 to the faster drive? Is it as simple as copying files from one drive to another?


And actually, another question. In my current laptop, I have a hard drive with w10 installed on it. If I transfer that drive to my new build, could I effectivley get w10 for free on that PC?

Thanks!

 

[SkyNetRising]

To move windows from one drive to another - you clone it
(Marcium Reflect free, Minitool Partition Wizard Free, Acronis Disk Director or some other cloning/partition management software).
For cloning to be possible, used space in source OS partition has to be smaller than target drive.

About drive transfer to another pc.
This actually introduces a number of problems:

• 1. system on new pc may not boot at all (certain BIOS options need to be matched between source and target pc-s);
  2. new pc may experience degraded performance because of incompatible drivers;
  3. windows activation will be broken on new pc.

That's why it' s recommended to reinstall windows instead to moving OS drive from one pc to another.
You may be able to transfer windows license from one pc to another using windows activation troubleshooter. In this case windows on old pc will be deactivated.

 

[QwerkyPengwen]

ever since the creators update, Windows 10 can freely change hardware without being a bitch about it. As for transferring an existing installation to a new drive there is only one option that I know of and that is to clone it. If the drive you are cloning from has an amount of data on it that exceeds the capacity of the new drive you will have a problem. If not then you can clone away but that puts all of the programs and such on the SSD as well since it'll be an exact copy. Afterwards you can format the HDD and start moving programs and files over to it freeing up some space. Alternatively, you can just do a backup to the cloud of important documents and files and do a fresh install on the SSD then wipe the HDD and re-download and install all of your programs to the HDD and then download your backup of your files to it as well.

If for example you have a 500GB HDD and are planning to just replace it with a 500GB SSD so that you can move the HDD to another computer to be used there then just do a straight clone of the drive. If planning to get a smaller size SSD that's big enough for the OS and main applications with room left over for other stuff you download then you'll need to refer to my comments above about data amount vs capacity or just doing a backup of important stuff and a fresh install.

If you like, you can get Windows 10 for free by downloading and using Windows Media Creation Tool along with a flash drive that has 8GB or more of capacity and creating a bootable Flash drive for a fresh install. You don't need to activate Windows 10 to use it. All activation does as far as I'm aware is remove a watermark in the corner if there is one and unlock desktop customization in settings. (which you don't need to have a wallpaper. All you gotta do is download the image you want then right click the file and select "Set As Desktop Background").

Windows 10 doesn't lock you out of the OS after 30 days without activation like previous versions did so you can use in full for free as long as you want.

There is a super easy method of activating Windows 10 for free but I can't talk about that here. Google it if you want to find out.

If the device you are looking to upgrade to an SSD on is a laptop and this laptop came with Windows 10 pre-installed then you can do the fresh install and use the Windows key located on the license sticker usually on the bottom of the laptop as well if you should choose to go this route.

So you have options and it's up to you as to which one you want to go with.

 

[13thmonkey]

ever since the creators update, Windows 10 can freely change hardware without being a bitch about it.

What exactly do you mean by this?

 

[QwerkyPengwen]

ever since the creators update, Windows 10 can freely change hardware without being a bitch about it.

What exactly do you mean by this?

It used to be that before the creators update, any copy of Windows that was RTM (release to manufacturer) or in simpler terms a copy of windows that comes pre-installed on a machine that was pre-built such as a Dell, HP, Toshiba etc. would be a version that would lock itself to that hardware once activated on it and if it noticed the hardware changing such as it recognizing a new motherboard or cpu it wouldn't allow you to use it and would require a new key to activate and unlock it. If you wanted a version of a Windows activated with a key that allowed hardware changes you had to buy it and it cost more than a standard key. With the release of the creators update Windows doesn't do this anymore and any copy of Windows 10 that has been updated to the creators update or later will allow hardware changes without the need to buy a whole new key for it.

 

[13thmonkey]

So it's the OEM vs Retail key version, and not the magical ability to move hardware and just work.

 

[QwerkyPengwen]

So it's the OEM vs Retail key version, and not the magical ability to move hardware and just work.

Not sure what you are getting at but to clarify, before the creators update it was matter of OEM vs retail activation. But ever since the creators update, Windows can be moved from one computer to the next without the need for a specific type of activation vs another. So now you can take an installation that's on an SSD for example from one PC to another and it will just work without giving you crap. And now activation is only one type of key and it only does the watermark, desktop customization in settings and of course full scale technical support from Microsoft. It won't do anything else to the OS and if you don't activate it won't lock you out after a "trial" period.