Jan 15, 2024 • Filed to: Windows Computer Solutions • Proven solutions
It's really a pain to upgrade your OS installed hard drive because when you reinstall your well running operating system, it will need your Windows ID and key, let alone the amount of time spent on it. So the best way to move your existing OS to your new and larger hard drive is to clone it to the larger hard drive. Cloning can help in moving all your content on the hard drive to your new drive, including the operating system, files, programs, and all personal settings.
AOMEI Backupper is a professional data backup software. This tool was designed to perform backup processes with ease and includes a feature that assists you clone a hard disk drive or partition with total security. Below are the steps on how to use the software.
Step 1: Go to "Disk Clone"
Once you have opened the program, you should go to the "Clone" section located on the left panel and then click on "Disk Clone"
Step 2: Select the "Source Disk"
Here you must select the disk you want to clone and then, click on "Next"
Step 3: Choose the "Destination Disk"
Once you've selected the "Source Disk", all you must do now is select a "Destination Disk ".
Step 4: Confirm the process
Now all you have to do is, click on "Edit Partitions" to make sure you have the C drive and the System reserved partition marked and then click on "Start Clone"
You can directly clone your old drive to your new hard drive if you can connect it to your computer with related connecting devices, or you can clone it to an external disk first, and then clone it back to your hard drive when you've replaced the old one with it. Just take the way convenient for you.
Also, you can choose to image your hard drive with "Disk Backup". It can backup your hard drive content as an image file. Then you can restore it to your new hard drive. By the way, you can also learn how to copy Windows 7 to another drive.
For this solution, you will need two hard drives i.e. the source drive that contains the data you want to clone and the secondary hard drive where you’ll clone the data to.
Windows users can use a cloning software called Macrium Reflect Free that’s free and easy to use.
Step 1. Start by downloading the software to the computer with the source hard drive.
Step 2. Start cloning. Launch the software and you’ll see a list of the hard drives connected to your PC. Select the hard drive you want to copy by clicking on the checkbox then select “Clone This Disk” as indicated in the image below.
Step 3. Select the secondary/destination hard drive — select the hard drive that will contain your newly copied Operating System and any other data. Note that this will delete all data on the disk, so make sure you’ve backed up any data in the secondary drive. If you are cloning to a bigger hard drive, select the “Cloned Partition Properties” tab located at the bottom of the window, and expand the partition to fill up in the hard drive. Click next to start the cloning process.
The software will start the cloning process. This will take a few minutes or hours depending on the amount of data you are cloning. You should now be able to boot from the cloned hard drive once the process is complete.
During cloning hard drive often comes along with data lost from your hard drive, and you do not have a recent data backup. Under these circumstances, you will need a hard drive data recovery software to retrieve your lost data back.
Recoverit data recovery software is capable of restoring deleted/lost files or formatted partition from hard drive (HDD and SSD), external hard drive, usb flash drive, memory card, digital camera, camcorder, iPod, Music Player and many kinds of mobile devices (Nokia, Blackberry phones and Phones with older Android OS than ICS). While offering the advanced recovery modes like 'All-Around Recovery' mode, it`s pretty easy to use:
>> Guide for Hard Drive Data Recovery with Recoverit
Download the Wondershare Recoverit software and launch it. Select the location from the window that shows up after launching the software i.e. the storage device you’d like to recover your data from. Tap “start” to launch the scanning on the Device/location you selected.
At this point Recoverit will start scanning your device or location you selected above. The scanning process can take a few minutes or a couple of hours depending on the amount of data you had in the device that’s being scanned.
Recoverit gives you a chance to preview files before saving the recovered data to your computer. This let’s you choose what you’d like to recover or not. Once you decide on what to restore, Click the “Recover” button to retrieve and save your data to your computer.
Cloning a hard drive is one way of recovering files from a computer that has issues. We recommend that you enlist the help of data recovery professionals if you feel cloning is too complex for you. Wondershare will recover your data safely and also help you back it up to avoid further losses.
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David Darlington
staff Editor