Question Master HDD swap

[efiste]

Im no expert but my main HDD sounds a lot noisier than normal so im assuming its planning to retire. Its the original drive that came with the PC six or seven years ago , its a 2TB Hybrid drive. and searching the net I gather Hybrid drives are yesterdays news, so I would prefer replace it with an SSD.
How would I go about doing changing my main drive before it throws the towel in. Having read a couple of other posts on here it seems I can fit the new drive to another port on my motherboard and CLONE my original, is it as straightforward as it sounds ??

My processor is an "AMD A10 7700K Radeon R7 10 compute cores 4C+6G 3.4Ghz" and my mother board is an ASUS A88XM-Plus and am running Windows10 64Bit

 

[USAFRet]

Assuming the current drive is fully readable, cloning is a definite option.

How much space is consumed on this drive?
You need a target drive with more space than that.

Assuming the current consumed space is less than 1.5TB, a 2TB SATA III SSD will work.
Samsung 870 EVO or Crucial MX500, for example.

Clone procedure below.

 

[USAFRet]

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Specific steps for a successful clone operation:
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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.
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[geofelt]

Buy a sata 2.5" ssd with sufficient capacity to holed the used contents of your HDD plus some for expansion.
You may need a 2.5" to 3.5" adapter like this for your case.

https://www.amazon.com/Corsair-Dual-Mounting-Bracket-CSSD-BRKT2/dp/B016498CK0/ref=asc_df_B016498CK0/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=198093101467&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=11718398757465415024&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9011560&hvtargid=pla-365069387933&th=1

Most ssd vendors supply clone utilities to replicate the C drive to the ssd.
I like the samsung ssd devices and their ssd migration is very easy to use.
App and instructions here:

Tool & Software Download | Samsung Semiconductor Global

Download various software related to your product, including Samsung Magician, designed for use with Samsung's memory products, and find related information.

semiconductor.samsung.com

The app does not change the source drive.
When done, remove the hdd and test.