Upgrading SSD (Cloning Drive help)

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atrance5

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I have this 80GB Intel SSD that I'd like to upgrade to something bigger (running out of space).


But, I'd like to keep all Windows data intact. Specifically User Accounts and Firefox Cookies for each User Account.

If I clone the SSD, would everything work normally as if nothing happened?

Windows 7.
 
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I cloned my 120GB 830 to a 256GB 840 Pro with Acronis True Image and it worked just fine. I was told that a fresh install is best but I've had no problems at all. It's only been about 2 months though.
 
Yes everything should work just fine as though nothing happened. Macrium Reflect Free is a great option for just this task. Although regarding the cookies depending on the site you may still have to re-login to sites. Cache should be fine though, but cookies are something else as they do expire which is a good security mechanism.
 
^ Thanks.

All the user accounts and cookies are being used daily, so yeah.

Another question, how about Firefox Remember Passwords, are they preserved?

So Macrium should work fine? Should I look at something more sophisticated (paid) or does this one suffice?
 
I HIGHLY recommend Self Image. I'm not sure if you said you had 7 or 8. I think it's compatible. I use it for all my cloning (besides my hardware cloning unit).

http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/Back-Up-and-Recovery/SelfImage.shtml

No cost involved and it's fully functional. Not a trial.

Make SURE you select "DeviceX\(entire disk)" as the source and same goes for the destination "DeviceY\(entire disk)". X and Y obviously being the #'s associated with your source (current SSD) and target (new SSD).

Once the clone is complete, start the new SSD (obviously the old has been unplugged) and use "diskmgmt.msc" to expand the system volume to the max size. That's it.
 
Firefox passwords are preserved, everything is preserved down to the customized icon locations down to the pixel because it's a sector by sector copy. --- if you "CLONE" that is.
 
GreenLED said:
I HIGHLY recommend Self Image. I'm not sure if you said you had 7 or 8. I think it's compatible. I use it for all my cloning (besides my hardware cloning unit).

http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/Back-Up-and-Recovery/SelfImage.shtml

No cost involved and it's fully functional. Not a trial.

Make SURE you select "DeviceX\(entire disk)" as the source and same goes for the destination "DeviceY\(entire disk)". X and Y obviously being the #'s associated with your source (current SSD) and target (new SSD).

Once the clone is complete, start the new SSD (obviously the old has been unplugged) and use "diskmgmt.msc" to expand the system volume to the max size. That's it.
Click to expand...

Windows 7.

Can you elaborate on the last part a bit. I have no clue what that is.
 
Sorry about that.

1). Click Start, then "Run" (or just press Windows Key + R)
2) Type: "diskmgmt.msc"

diskmgmt.msc is a utility that manages your disks. It's included in Windows.

3) Once Disk Management opens, Right-Click on your SSD, you should recognize the drive letter, usually "C:". Once you have right-licked, hit "Expand".

4) The wizard will guide you through the process of choosing how much space you want to expand the drive. Choose the maximum amount allowed. Keep going through and wait till Windows resizes your drive.

Important Edit: Everything I posted above is OK, but if Self Image does not show your drives, use the Acronis or whatever it's called. Take this slow if you haven't done it before. You REALLY don't want to mess up the source and target, I've almost done that a few times and I've been doing this for years. Just take it slow.
 
Here's what you can use for the first part.

http://www.snapfiles.com/get/trueimage.html

I want to be VERY clear about this. Make sure you are cloning the ENTIRE drive, NOT just your "C:" partition. You want to copy the entire disk to the new entire disk. The reason that's important is, copying the entire disk is NOT the same as copying just a partition. Copying the entire disk to another entire disk means every single sector is cloned.
 
Yep, there are important boot files located on hidden partitions, so you want to make sure to copy those partitions.
 
Ok thanks guys.

What's a reliable SSD nowadays? Around 256GB. I got the Intel G2 because it was reliable at that time.

If it goes bust, it can take down 50+ user accounts, which would be a pain in the ass to re-do.
 
All SSDs are prone to failure at any time. Either run RAID 0, or do continuous backups with Acronis.

Samsungs and Crucials tend to be the most popular.
 
RAID 0?

Anyway my vote on a good system image/backup program would be Macrium Reflect. Better then the Acronis and Paragon equivalents I've tried for my needs. But I usually just capture images once every month and that is transferred over the network to my WDS server which is only online when I need it to save images or installing an OS from network boot. I use to have a spare Ubuntu server and few hot swappable bays so I can dd hard drives across to new replacements. Man that was the long and hard way.
 
Tsumi said:
All SSDs are prone to failure at any time. Either run RAID 0, or do continuous backups with Acronis.

Samsungs and Crucials tend to be the most popular.
Click to expand...

I don't understand why you said to run RAID 0. Can you explain?
 
I used Acronis True image, made a backup then used the restore image to put it onto the SSD just like if I was recoverying a hard drive. The second time I used EASEUS to do home backup and did the same thing.
 
Yes, clone the whole the C partition. Usually, C partition contain system partition and other data. I suggest you try the freeware Aomei Backupper to do the cloning.
About Firefox, where do you install it? C or other drive? If it is in C, then it works.
 
Ok, I'm going to clone the hole thing, it's only 80GB and will be replaced by something around 250GB.

Will try Acronis I think.

The DATA (files) is all backed up anyway, even now. I just need to have all User Accounts and all that intact for the new SSD.

Thanks all.
 
I've cloned my system at least 3 times and everything is where it was on the original.
I'm actually still running my original windows 7 ultimate install from august of 2009, it's just been cloned over and over as drives wear out or when I upgraded to an ssd.
 
Haven't had time to clone my two units yet.

I need to close a 500GB HDD to a 240GB SSD. How would I do that considering, the HDD is bigger.

It's from a Thinkpad Notebook. The whole 500GB is not needed, as the OS/Restore Partition/Programs, should not be more than 200GB ( at most ).
 
adriantrances said:
Haven't had time to clone my two units yet.

I need to close a 500GB HDD to a 240GB SSD. How would I do that considering, the HDD is bigger.

It's from a Thinkpad Notebook. The whole 500GB is not needed, as the OS/Restore Partition/Programs, should not be more than 200GB ( at most ).
Click to expand...

You can first delete anything you dont need obviously. I use a program called WinDirStat that shows files by size, so you can be sure you dont have any misc files taking up space.

Then simply use Acronis or Todo EasUs to clone the drive. Both programs will automatically re size the partition(s) as needed assuming you have less than 240gb of data.
 
jmilcher said:
You can first delete anything you dont need obviously. I use a program called WinDirStat that shows files by size, so you can be sure you dont have any misc files taking up space.

Then simply use Acronis or Todo EasUs to clone the drive. Both programs will automatically re size the partition(s) as needed assuming you have less than 240gb of data.
Click to expand...

Will try that. Thanks.
 
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