I can just copy paste everything from one HDD to another or do I need to clone it?

[testtube5]

I have a 1TB HDD at the moment and I just purchased a 6TB HDD.

I have programs and a bunch of other stuff on the 1TB HDD.

Can I just copy paste to the new one? Or no because they contain programs and not just movies and pictures etc?

 

[jdanniece]

maybe. If the 1tb is dieing make a disk image and put that on the 6tb. I would search the web.

 

[testtube5]

maybe. If the 1tb is dieing make a disk image and put that on the 6tb. I would search the web.

The drive isn't dying. I'm just replacing it.

 

[testtube5]

maybe. If the 1tb is dieing make a disk image and put that on the 6tb. I would search the web.

The drive isn't dying. I'm just replacing it.

 

[junii]

Yea you can just copy paste it over, you'd have to remake all your shortcuts to the programs which is simple.

 

[junii]

Its honestly not that hard.

 

[testtube5]

Yea you can just copy paste it over, you'd have to remake all your shortcuts to the programs which is simple.

Okay, thing is, I can't plug in 2 HDDs at once.

But I do have a 4TB External Drive.

Can I first copy it over to the External, and then to the 6tb HDD?

Also, are you absolutely positive this will work, all I have to do is make new shortcuts?

 

[COLGeek]

To make sure you have all the files, including those that are hidden, it is best to clone the drives (old to new). You can then use a partition tool to expand the partitions on the 6TB drive. Is your current HDD formatted as MBR or GPT?

 

[junii]

To make sure you have all the files, including those that are hidden, it is best to clone the drives (old to new). You can then use a partition tool to expand the partitions on the 6TB drive. Is your current HDD formatted as MBR or GPT?

probs MBR

 

[k1114]

That's not going to work. You copy some files but miss all the important ones so wouldn't be able to boot. There are other partitions that can't simply be copied from windows unless you clone the hdd. You can either do a clean install or clone it with the external enclosure. I don't know if you can open it but it makes it a lot easier if you can just clone to the external then swap hdds.

 

[testtube5]

That's not going to work. You copy some files but miss all the important ones so wouldn't be able to boot. There are other partitions that can't simply be copied from windows unless you clone the hdd. You can either do a clean install or clone it with the external enclosure. I don't know if you can open it but it makes it a lot easier if you can just clone to the external then swap hdds.

Oh, my operating system is on my SSD.

The HDD I'm replacing only has programs and other files on it.

Does that make a difference?

 

[USAFRet]

I have a 1TB HDD at the moment and I just purchased a 6TB HDD.

I have programs and a bunch of other stuff on the 1TB HDD.

Can I just copy paste to the new one? Or no because they contain programs and not just movies and pictures etc?

Is this the OS drive?
If so, you CANNOT just "copy/paste" . Period.

So...what do you have and what are you actually wanting to do?

 

[USAFRet]

Also, are you absolutely positive this will work, all I have to do is make new shortcuts?

If you give us greater detail of exactly what you have and what you're trying to do, we can probably give you a full step by step solution that will actually work.

Instead of a few half formed thoughts.

 

[k1114]

In that case, copy all the files to the external hdd, swap the internal hdds, then copy from external to new hdd.

 

[testtube5]

I have a 1TB HDD at the moment and I just purchased a 6TB HDD.

I have programs and a bunch of other stuff on the 1TB HDD.

Can I just copy paste to the new one? Or no because they contain programs and not just movies and pictures etc?

Is this the OS drive?
If so, you CANNOT just "copy/paste" . Period.

So...what do you have and what are you actually wanting to do?

Also, are you absolutely positive this will work, all I have to do is make new shortcuts?

If you give us greater detail of exactly what you have and what you're trying to do, we can probably give you a full step by step solution that will actually work.

Instead of a few half formed thoughts.

Not trying to be rude or offend so please don't this that way, but I didn't post half formed thoughts.

What you are asking me is what I have already stated. Reread what I posted please.

I have a 1TB HDD. It is NOT my OS drive, which is my SSD. I want to put all of the data (Games, movies, pictures, everything) onto the new 6TB HDD that I just purchased. I can't plug in both HDDs at the same time so I can't do a straight copy paste even if I wanted to, but I have an external HDD that I can copy everything to, then copy it to the new HDD.

I believe that is all the information that I could possibly provide in this situation. If it isn't, please tell me what it is I'm missing and I will provide said information.

Thanks.

Edit: (I believe k1114 did actually read the whole post (Thank you if you did), and posted a correct solution, but I'd like to be 100% certain before I start taking apart my computer just to get it wrong=p.)

 

[USAFRet]

It wasn't you, but rather some of the other answers were a bit...incomplete, shall we say.

Anyway...
For a secondary drive, all you need to is copy/paste, and then change the drive letter of the new drive to whatever the old one was.

You won't even need to edit any shortcuts.

I'd recommend not trying to copy everything in one operation, but in smaller pieces of the data.

 

[testtube5]

It wasn't you, but rather some of the other answers were a bit...incomplete, shall we say.

Anyway...
For a secondary drive, all you need to is copy/paste, and then change the drive letter of the new drive to whatever the old one was.

You won't even need to edit any shortcuts.

I'd recommend not trying to copy everything in one operation, but in smaller pieces of the data.

Thank you.

Last question (I think?) I just copied everything to my external in 1 shot. It took over an hour. What would be the reasoning behind transferring in smaller chunks?

 

[USAFRet]

Thank you.

Last question (I think?) I just copied everything to my external in 1 shot. It took over an hour. What would be the reasoning behind transferring in smaller chunks?

Smaller chunks of it, because if it fails part way through, you'll have a much better idea of exactly what needs to be redone.
Copy/paste is not strictly sequential. If it fails, for whatever reason, the contents of some sub/sub/subfolder may only partially be there. And you won't know exactly which files went and which didn't.