Successful Clone of Windows OS hard drive to SSD (GPT UEFI)

[paul pitiful]

$16 is cheaper than a $20+ tech support call to Acronis!!!

 

[Christopher1]

$16 is cheaper than a $20+ tech support call to Acronis!!!

You should not have had to pay anything to Acronis, Kingston has already paid for the support when you bought the drive with that software included with it. If they told you differently, I would have told them "Okay, then what is your managers number so I can have my state AG have a talk with you?" Gets them off that bunkus REAL quickly.

 

[Darionanni]

I've got a desktop Asus g10ac and I wanted to update my hdd windows to an ssd drive
I ended up having a 1tb crucial m550
After trying with ease us todo backup, acronis 2015 and talking several times with asus service support and playing around with BIOS, I had no luck booting from the ssd until I got to this threat
So I bought paragon software, cloned the drive with the uefi option, rebooted and went back to the BIOS and chose one more time to boot from the crucial ssd
Finally did it!!!!
Thanks man! Your post came right on time and gave me hope (something I almost lost on this horrible journey)

 

[terrible_towel]

I have been trying to use Paragon's Hard Disk Manager Suite 15 for this. I always end up with an un-bootable destination drive. (Complains that c:\\windows\system32\winload.efi could not be loaded)..

Can someone that has used this successfully please post the options they selected during the run?

- HDD raw copy?
- partition raw copy?
- create EFI boot for destination drive?

I think I have tried all combinations.. and always check the create EFI boot check box... but I have never got a bootable drive.
I actually bought the program and have a support case open.. but no resolution yet.

Thanks.

 

[Geo2804]

For everyone readings this post DO NOT BELIEVE anything. IMO This is just to make you buy the software. Believe me I did that and no matter what I did, followed step by step all the instructions, not just once by many times, Paragon always said successful? ??!!... NEVER-NEVER-NEVER it worked So after sending lots of money and time cause I wanted the operation system and all other software tried the free program clonezilla with no much hope and wolla. .. ) Worked like a charm....
So people before you waste any money and time..just search and also have a look on YouTube how to on your operating system with clonezilla or other free software. I will never pay again for big companies that they only care to sell . Good luck and I hope I save some of you wasting hour money.

Edited by moderator - no one here is selling this software; please refrain from bashing others and their opinions and limit your comments to your review of the product. Thank you.

 

[popatim]

Please do not bash others who report a good or bad experience with using this software; only report on your own personal experience. I am not affiliated with nor selling this software but it was worked several times for me in the past on win7 pc's. I have not had experience with this on win8 or 8.1.

And if you are only looking to clone your drive then definitely try the Free Options first!

 

[Konrad_2]

The Paragon software worked great from me in cloning a 1 TB HDD to a 240GB SSD Win 8.1 for my Dell XPS 18 "tablet". Maybe I should call it a "table" instead.

The Acronis 2014 did NOT work, spent hours with the GPT partition errors.

 

[jasonh77]

I want to migrate the OS from a relatives laptop HDD to SSD however their Windows 7 is entirely in Dutch.
Does Paragon migrate critical files and folders of the OS by filename? I'm just don't want to buy the software if it won't work because all of the system files and folders are in Dutch.

 

[The Original Ralph]

i'm not the most versed software poster around, by a long shot but up until today, ever since going to a UEFI Bios, EaseUS ToDo backup (freeware version) would clone, but then the cloned copy would not boot unless i put the windows dvd in and did a "repair installation" function.

Then today, while cloning or attempting to, EaseUS advised me that cloning to or from a GPT drive required me download their WinPE Emergency disk creator utility, create a disk and boot into what i guess is linux and perform the clone from there. I did, and was a little curious so after cloning i swapped drives and sure enough it booted

Think it's just a case of a lot of the software outfits getting their software friendly to UEFI and GPT.

 

[David_LM]

Struggled for days trying to clone my notebook hard drive to a new Kingston SSDNOW V300 drive so that it would boot, but I finally found success. After searching forums and seeing hundreds of stories about what worked and what did not, I thought I'd add my solution in case it might help someone else.

My desktop hard drive ....blah blah yada yada. Good luck.

ONE SHOT AND IT'S DONE....BAM!!!!

Thank you for this solution. I, too, had spent days of searching and trying "solutions" for imaging my existing Win7Pro installation on a 60gb ssd to a larger 128gb ssd. I just found and read your post this morning, went to the Paragon site, paid $15 (thanks for the coupon code, Aaron Conaway) for the Migrate OS to SSD software, ran it once, and it worked.

Thank you all for the solution.

So happy for Paragon that you folks are bragging about shelling out your cash for their software. Minitool Partition Wizard Free, could have gotten it done for ya for free, even if you were going from a hard drive to an SSD. Migrate OS is part of the free software. It is just a web search away for everyone else who wants to migrate their OS to an upgraded HDD or SSD for free.

Don't know if it is still on sale but, the PRO version has more features, including server drive partitioning, deleted partition recovery and data recovery software included - with lifetime upgrades to boot - for about $29.99 The free version includes the OS migration tool so, you don't have to buy the Pro version unless you want the other (very useful) hard drive recovery tools.

One final note. Minitool Partition Wizard Free will faithfully copy a partition but, if you don't shut down and swap out the drives before rebooting, the Windows OS will alter the boot record of the cloned to drive, rendering it unbootable. This is, I'm sure, part of their anti-piracy policy and, is not a failure on the part of the copy disk/partition software. I'd only add that, I have no idea how well it would work with a GPT (?) UEFI based file system, except to say that, I'm pretty sure it won't work if you're just copying the OS partition and, not the others with it. Microsoft, with Windows 8 and up, also likes to tie its OS's boot sequence to other drives so, having multiple drives can impact the disk copy process when you're trying to clone your OS based hard drive to a new drive (SSD or HDD). If possible, resize the active (MBR type - not UEFI), OS partition to the same size as the partitioned hard drive you're copying to as, using the auto resize feature makes changes that the Windows OS sees as an attempt at cloning, and will render it inoperable. I believe this is why "OS Migration" software has come about. Microsoft doesn't care about your moving an OS. They just don't like people cloning it for redistribution (and you're only allowed by law to have one back up copy (not simultaneously in use) for each licensed copy of Windows you legally own. Microsoft legally assumes that your original install image (weather USB or DVD disk) is the back up copy, which is, I believe, why they go to so much trouble to ensure against system cloning of it's operating systems.

 

[popatim]

Please keep in mind that Minitool did not have that functionality back when this thread began; 3 years ago!

 

[Dangit Dave]

Please keep in mind that Minitool did not have that functionality back when this thread began; 3 years ago!

Good point... I wasn't thinking of that but, it is NOW a free option well worth considering and, one which should be mentioned so that, people reading here can give it consideration in meeting their upgrading needs. (Minitool has had the HDD to SSD migration tool for at least a year now and, it is only now getting mention where people are looking for such potentially useful and expense saving information.)

 

[Colin Australia]

I've cloned SSDs without problems in most instances. Yet at times I've had difficulties.
There appears to be an incompatibility element of hit & miss in some situations.

Some recommendations:
1. Try the manufacturer's recommended software first
EG 'Samsung': Samsung migration software.
'Sandisk': EZ Gig IV.
2. Then try 3rd party software solutions.

Lastly
Update the MB BIOS if possible.
(Ensure AHCI capability exists in the BIOS -it may not for older MBs)

Try another brand of SSD

>>There may well be other approaches to this problem.

BTW
I have also experienced the previously mentioned situation, where a bootable SSD wont boot (not recognised by the BIOS) yet is a readable drive.

Hoping some of my experience helps.

 

[clickykbd]

After two solution posts eaten by 500 errors, I'm getting real brief with this, but here is what worked for me on a GPT map with UEFI boot and annoying bitlocker partition (bitlocker was not in use).

My situation was due to a bootcamp install with only windows on it, macpro 5,1, AHCI m.2 drive, I was trying to upgrade to a larger one.

A pure clonezilla approach was not working for me, resulting resized drive/partitions that were not bootable. My hunch is I was ending up with a hybrid drive. fdisk was reporting as much.

Note FREE solution (mileage may vary).

1. Make Clonezilla CD or USB
2. Do Clonezilla disk-to-disk, no resizing, use original part map, force sector by sector! (essentially the same as using dd)
3. Boot into cloned larger drive, but windows will probably see it as the same size as older one initially.
4. Use AOEMI Partition Assistant (Standard-Free) to move any partitions out of the way of a resize for C:. I had to move bitlocker to the end of the drive.
5. Test reboot, good? Continue.
6. Within windows you can now use DiskManager to "expand" the C: NTFS partition.
7. Reboot + Profit?

Cheers, this thread helped lead me in the right direction, AOMEI was the trick for me, too stubborn to pay for something I wasn't 100% sure would work.

 

[The Original Ralph]

a tip on cloning - i learned this the hard way. I keep a cloned copy on hand and up to date, windows update wise, in case i get hit by a virus, malware etc - some of the malware can take hours to eradicate, going by majorgeeks instructions.

Well, twice in a row when i would clone back to the OS drive, i'd still have the malware or whatever there, even though the cloned drive was kept without a sata data cable connected (to prevent any malware migrating to it).

I was talking to a customer who is a retired microsoft engineer, and he advised me that before cloning to any drive, he recommended wiping it three times as most cloning software when it's cloning to a drive, the software will check the target drive as it's cloning, and if it sees a file identically titled to the one it's about to clone over to the target drive, it will skip that file - that explained how the malware was still there after cloning the backup copy back to the OS drive. It also explained why clone times would vary, sometimes they'd take 28-30 minutes, others 19-21 minutes.

For what it's worth, wiping the target drive, whether the backup clone drive or the OS drive before cloning is necessary.

 

[karenjoly]

Not sure that information is accurate for all cloning apps. Macrium Reflect, e.g., says that it deletes all data and partitions on the target prior to the clone.

" Please note that when cloning a disk, the entire contents of the target disk including partition information will be deleted and replaced with the contents of the original disk."

 

[The Original Ralph]

i can't speak to macrium, i tried it a few times (actually bought a copy) but had some issues getting the macrium copy to boot, not sure why) - plus I like the gui on EaseUS better - but that was the only explanation for the same malware re-appearing - and as i stated, "most cloning software"

still, it's not a bad practice to wipe a drive before cloning to it