Cloning a hard drive is a very responsible, but sometimes necessary step.
Guarantees 100% identical disk-clone with the original.
With EASEUS Disk Copy, you can clone the entire disk as well as individual partitions and even files, including deleted ones (if they have not been overwritten), hidden and copy-protected.
Features and Benefits of EASEUS Disk Copy:
- the ability to start from a bootable DVD or;
- independence from the operating system installed on the computer;
- support for SATA I-II, SCSI, SAS, USB, IDE, Firewire and dynamic disk interfaces;
- support for hard drives up to 1 TiB;
- high cloning speed;
- intuitive interface;
- free license.
Disadvantages:
- lack of Russian localization, which can make it difficult for inexperienced users to figure out how to use the program;
- when installed on Windows, advertising junk is installed along with EASEUS Disk Copy.
Paragon Drive Backup Personal
Paragon Drive Backup Personal is a multifunctional data backup tool that can also be used to create disk clones.
It can be run both from bootable media and from under Windows.
Advice! To work with Paragon Drive Backup, you do not need to read the instructions and delve into the essence of various settings - all functions are performed by "wizards", each action of which is accompanied by prompts.
Strengths of Paragon Drive Backup:
- many modes of data copying;
- support for any file systems;
- the ability to selectively clone individual sections and files;
- high speed of work;
- support for all types of hard and solid state drives;
- intuitive Russian-language interface;
- support for Windows 8.1 and 10.
The disadvantages of this wonderful tool include its payment. The cost of the license is $39.95.
Macrium Reflect
Macrium Reflect is another handy tool for creating copies of a hard drive for transfer to another medium. Distributed for free.
In addition to cloning, it creates images of partitions and entire disks, which, after recovery, can be mounted in Windows Explorer and used as virtual media.
Functional features of Macrium Reflect:
- full and partial disk cloning;
- creating images "on the fly" - without rebooting the system;
- verification (identity check) of finished images;
- high speed of work;
- the possibility of multi-level encryption of the created images to ensure their security.
Disadvantages:
In addition to backup, it can create clones of a wide variety of drives with different file systems.
At the user's choice, it can clone individual partitions, files, or an entire disk. Good compatibility with both older versions of Windows and Windows 8.1
To create a disk clone using Acronis True Image, just boot the computer from or on which the program is written and run the clone wizard.
Advantages of Acronis True Image:
- multifunctionality;
- Russian-language interface and intuitive settings;
- automatic and manual operation;
- the ability to select data to transfer, including those invisible in Windows Explorer and protected from copying;
- high speed.
The disadvantage of this program is the same as that of Paragon Drive Backup - a paid license. Its price is 1700 rubles.
Often, when using a computer, it becomes necessary to transfer all data from the hard drive to a new hard drive. This operation is necessary when there is not enough space on the hard disk or you want to save all the data from your computer before repairing or selling it. First of all, you need to purchase a new hard drive with a larger capacity to be sure that you can clone the system to it.
If your computer does not have a special bay to install another hard drive, you can temporarily mount it instead of a CD-ROM drive, or use a USB 2.0 port for an external target drive. Otherwise, you will have to clone the hard drive by creating an image and restoring it to a new hard drive that has larger partitions. It is convenient to transfer data from a hard drive to a new hard drive using Acronis True Image, which is rightfully considered one of the most powerful tools for cloning hard drives or their partitions. She can copy all the data, including operating systems and applications, which will be instantly restored and will be able to work flawlessly on another computer in Windows even without rebooting.
It is worth remembering that before cloning a hard drive, it is worth checking it with special tools to identify and fix errors. If you follow all the simple instructions, the new hard drive will keep an exact copy of the original drive, and it can be used instead of the old one or used as additional media.
Hello admin. I want to clone the Windows 8.1 operating system in Acronis True Image 2015 from a regular hard disk to an SSD, I think this method is much simpler than all the others, first I specified the Source disk, then the Target disk and that's it. A 500 GB hard drive is naturally larger than a 120 GB solid state drive, but can you exclude unnecessary disks, folders, and even just files in the cloning settings?
Of course, I can do everything myself, but I'm afraid, since I have little experience with Acronis True Image, and you only look at it like this!
How to clone the Windows 7, 8, 8.1 operating system in Acronis True Image 2015 from a regular hard drive to an SSD (the size of the drives varies)
Hello friends! If you often work with Acronis True Image, then you probably noticed that the program settings have such an option called Cloning, and as our reader rightly noted, this option is very finely tuned.
For example, I suggest you clone my Windows 8.1 from a regular 250 GB hard drive to a 120 GB SSD. A simple 250 GB hard drive is almost full of files and naturally all the information from it will not physically fit on the SSD, but when cloning we can exclude unnecessary folders, files and even entire disks, as a result of the cloned information exactly 120 GB will remain, that is, as much as SSD volume. But you need to do everything right, because the Windows 8.1 operating system cloned to another hard drive should start with us!
First, connect an SSD solid-state drive to the system unit with a second device.
For the success of this serious operation, you must be well versed in Disk Management, pay attention to this window of my computer and you will immediately understand what's what.
Disk 0
A simple 250 GB SATA hard drive.
1 . The first hidden section (we will clone) System Reserved (Reserved by the system), has a capacity of 350 MB. The main purpose of the hidden partition is to store Windows 8.1 boot files. If you have Windows 7 installed, then this partition will be 100 MB in size.
2 . The second section has the letter (C:) (we will clone) 105 GB, installed operating system Windows 8.1.
3 . The third section under the letter (E:) capacity 127 GB, with data files: music, movies, and so on, occupied by 100 GB. We can clone this partition not completely, just exclude large files when cloning. Or we can completely exclude this partition from the cloning operation and instead, at the end of the process, an empty partition is formed on the SSD.
Disc 1. Solid state drive SSD, when cloning, all information on it will be deleted
Acronis True Image 2015
For cloning, it is better to use the boot disk of Acronis True Image 2015, since this version works without errors with SSDs and has UEFI support. It is better not to install Acronis True Image in Windows and work with the boot disk of this program, so you will avoid many errors.
You can make a bootable USB flash drive with Acronis True Image 2015 in the program itself or with the help of this article of ours .
So, we boot from a disk or flash drive with the Acronis True Image program. Who does not know how to boot from a disk or flash drive, read our article - .
For example, I enter the boot menu of my computer with an ASUS motherboard by often pressing the Delete key when turning it on, then select the "Boot Menu" and select the drive or USB flash drive in it.
In the main window of Acronis True Image 15, select
Tools and Utilities
Disk Cloning
Select with the left mouse the Source disk (the disk from which you want to clone the Win 8.1 operating system), in our case, a simple hard disk 3 MAXTOR STM 3250310AS and click Next.
Select with the left mouse the Target disk (the disk to which you want to clone the Win 8.1 operating system), in our case, a solid state drive Silicon Power SSD and Beyond
Acronis displays a warning "The selected target hard disk contains partitions that can store data. Click OK to confirm deletion of all partitions on the target hard disk." Click OK and Next.
Window Exclude by files and folders.
In this window, Acronis True Image 15 tells us that in order to clone information from the Source disk to the Target disk, we need to exclude 23.72 GB of files from the Source disk. You can't exclude files from the first section (Reserved by the system) as the Windows 8.1 download files are located there. It is also undesirable to excludefiles from the disk with Windows 8.1 installed. The drive with the installed Windows 8.1 operating system is assigned the letter (D :) here, if you click on it with the left mouse button, the operating system files will open.
So we will exclude files from the disk (E:).
Attention : Friends, you can simply exclude this entire disk (E :) from cloning, as a result, Disk C will be cloned to the solid state drive:(Reserved by the system) containing download filesoperating systemand another drive (D:) containing Windows 8.1 files, but you can choose a more difficult option. Let's open the disk(E:) and select an unnecessary file or folder on it. For example, on this disk, the NewVirtualDisk1.vdi virtual hard disk has been an eyesore for a long time, I have not needed it for a long time and its volume is about 50 GB, let's exclude it from cloning, mark this virtual disk with a checkmark. Program
As you can see, after excluding the file, we still have 30 GB of free space left. Click Next
If you click Proceed now, the cloning process will begin exactly as shown in this window.
Before - what is on the solid state drive now and all this will be deleted.
After - what will be on the SSD after cloning, that is, two small partitions.
I want to say that I personally do not need this state of affairs. I need a hidden partition on the SSD disk (Reserved by the system) containing the operating system boot files and another disk (D:) containing the files of Windows 8.1 itself
So I'll be back at the window File exclusion and tick the whole disk
(E:). Acronis True Image 15 restarts cloning space calculation.
Friends, pay attention to the disk (E :), it will be created sooner, since this is a drive cloning operation, but the disk (E:) will be completely empty. After cloning, we simply delete it in Disk Management, and attach the resulting unallocated space to the C: drive, that's all.
Proceed. The cloning process begins.
Disk Clone operation completed successfully.
We restart the computer and enter the boot menu, select the SSD for booting and boot from it.
Cloned Windows 8.1 boots fine. Windows activation failed. We go to Disk Management and see this picture.
Partitions on a simple hard drive have lost drive letters, but you can simply assign them and that's it.
On the SSD, as intended when cloning, there are three partitions. The first one is with the operating system boot files. Second drive C: with cloned Windows 8.1. Third disk D: completely empty.
Delete drive D: and attach unallocated space to drive C:.
I would be glad if I could help.
In this article, I want to share with you a super simple, extremely fast, and completely free workflow that creates a perfect 1 in 1 copy of an HDD (or partition) for backup or to migrate to an SSD. This method has saved me so many hours, days and maybe weeks of stress, and it's free and done in minutes.
You want to transfer the contents of hard drive A to drive B (maybe an SSD)
There are plenty of backup tools (and sometimes even migration tools) that will backup your entire operating system for you, sometimes copying all the files on your hard drive, sometimes duplicating a complete partition. I have used them several times and believed this tool, it only gave me the realization that the result was completely unusable, simply because these tools do not create a REAL copy of the hard drive.
The built-in Windows backup tools will simply create a compressed image, which is only useful if you have a DVD drive, burned ISO (disk) with exactly the same version of Windows, a lot of time and a lot of luck. Creating a fully working system from these backups very often ends in failure.
Other tools create a complete copy of the entire Windows partition, which looks very, very good. Until you really need this backup and imagine it won't be bootable because these tools don't copy the tiny (hidden) partitions that contain the bootmanager. Bummer!
Or do you just want to backup your drive at extreme speed?
The instructions are also useful if you just want to make a one to one copy of any data discs that contain your files. The manual copy will process each file and each directory and initialize the copy process for each individual item, while the one-to-one copy method will simply copy everything as a big block in low hardware.
What do you need:
I use Macrium Reflect (Free Edition) for this. Before you ask, it's completely free, I don't get paid or anything like that for saying this, and there's no affiliate link or anything like that. It's just an awesome tool. I am writing this in March 2015, and if you are reading this years later and the program is no longer free or available anymore: There are several websites on the net that contain an archive of earlier versions of almost any program, maybe this will help.
Macrium Reflect can copy individual partitions to any disk, usb or partition, or clone an entire disk (including hidden boot/swap partitions) to any other hard disk, even if the destination disk is smaller or larger. However, to be sure, it should have enough space for the content.
How to clone:
The cloning process is extremely simple. Check the box on the left to fully clone your hard drive. DO NOT uncheck the boxes at the bottom of the sections, even if you do not understand what these sections are and where they came from. Because without these hidden partitions, your clone won't have a boot area.
Click “clone disk” and select the destination disk in the next window. Further, everything is self-explanatory.
To confirm: Open a command prompt, type “compmgmt.msc” there, go to -> “Computer Management” -> “Storage Devices” -> “Disk Management”. There you should see an exact copy, along with the hidden section.
Be sure to unplug one of the drives so you don't get confused after a reboot.
Working at a computer, the user creates and saves a huge amount of information. It can be ordinary photos or videos, programs, games, documents and much more. If you save all the information to the internal hard drive without using cloud storage or removable drives, you may soon find that the space on the HDD or SSD is running out.
On sale you can find thousands of models of hard drives of different sizes and speeds. Including, in recent years, solid-state drives have become more and more popular, largely due to their high speed. If the disk space has come to an end, but at the same time you want to save all the information on one drive, you can buy a new HDD and transfer everything to it: files, programs, operating system, and so on. In fact, the user can create a complete copy of their data, but on a larger or faster disk. To do this, you will need special applications, and in this article we will look at the most popular and effective hard drive cloning programs.
Please note: The applications discussed below are suitable not only for transferring data from HDD drives, but also for cloning solid state drives.
Acronis True Image
One of the most powerful and well known disk cloning software. The application is able to work with any version of the operating system, and it has the Russian language by default. At the same time, the program has one big minus, which can scare away potential users from using it - this is a high price. The application on the official website of the developers costs a certain amount of money, while its free competitors will be discussed below in the article.
If you decide to use Acronis True Image to clone your hard drive, it's very easy to do. The application must first be installed and run. After that, among the available tools and utilities, select "Disk Cloning".
The drive cloning wizard will start, which allows you to select automatic or manual mode for working with the application:
- Automatic mode assumes that all information from one hard drive (or SSD) will be transferred to another HDD or SSD drive. In this case, the disk to which the data is transferred will become bootable for the system, and all data stored on it before will be deleted from it. Automatic hard drive cloning is suitable for most users, especially if they rarely have to deal with such applications.
- Manual mode assumes that the user will fully control the operation of transferring information to a new drive. In manual mode, the user independently chooses the partition sizes, file system, and many other parameters.
After selecting the automatic mode, you will need to mark which of the drives connected to the computer is the source and which is the target. After that, the application will do everything on its own.
Depending on the speed of the source and destination disk, the amount of information, the speed of the computer and many other factors, the time that Acronis True Image will spend on cloning the hard disk will vary.
Macrium Reflect
A handy hard drive cloning application is Macrium Reflect. Unlike the option discussed earlier, this program is free, and it copes just as well with the task of creating an identical copy of the data on a new hard drive. However, this application does not have a Russian language, and it will be much more difficult for beginners to work with it.
To create a copy of the hard drive through the Macrium Reflect application, you need to download and install it. Next, you need to run the program, select the necessary disks and click "Clone this disk". After that, it remains to follow the instructions from the program, which are quite simple and intuitive.
The Macrium Reflect application differs from many competitors not only in its free distribution, but also in a number of features:
- The program transfers information from one hard drive to another much faster than analogues;
- After creating the image, the application will automatically check it for identity to the source disk;
- To ensure security, special information encryption algorithms are used.
It is worth noting that when installing the Macrium Reflect program, downloaded from the official website of the developers, you need to be extremely careful. If you do not uncheck the user agreement, a number of adware will be installed along with the application.
Paragon Drive Backup
A powerful data management program is Paragon Drive Backup. It can be run both from under Windows and from an external drive, which is convenient when you need to make a copy of a disk on a computer where the operating system is not installed. The full licensed version of the Paragon Drive Backup application is distributed for a fee, but there are trial versions of the program, which are enough to clone a hard drive.
As in the previous two programs, Paragon Drive Backup has a special wizard for performing certain actions. To clone a hard drive, the user does not need to study the documentation for the application for a long and tedious time, it is enough to launch the required program operation mode and follow the suggested steps.
Paragon Drive Backup supports any file system and works with different types of drives. Cloning a hard drive can be done in several modes, including partial.
