Windows 10: Cloning Drive C:/

I bought a new hard drive so I could clone my main hard drive. The new drive was formatted after putting into an external hard drive bay connected using USB cable. I right clicked on my C:/ drive & chose copy. I then right clicked on my new hard drive F:/ and chose paste. It then started to copy C:/ to F:/, but it eventually failed saying I wasn't authorized to access certain files even though I'm the Administrator of my computer. It also said I had a bad sector on C:/ drive. I then reformatted C:/ & tried to make a clone drive onto F:/. All that did was copy over ...

$RECYCLEBIN, Boot, Recovery, System Volume 1, bootmgr, BOOTNXT, BOOTSECT.BAK

It appears to me that all it did was make a boot disk in case C:/ drive failed to boot I could have the computer boot using drive F:/ which is not what I wanted. I already have drive E:/ for that in the same bay housing as F:/.

What I want is an exact clone of C:/ drive, every program & file on it!

Anyone got any suggestions?

:)

 

Cloning to SSD then swapping drive letters


@SamHobbs
What you want done is very simple and can be done in short period of time. Here's my suggestion:
There's 2 modes that Windows can be installed: UEFI and the old legacy MBR. Open Disk Management, look at the disk where your C drive is, if there's a

1. EFI System Partition, your Windows was installed using UEFI.
2. System Reserved partition, your Windows was installed using MBR

Next, Connect your SSD to an available Sata port (no need to format or do anything). Download: Macrium Reflect Free . Install and run. Follow the steps below:

1. From Macrium, click on image this disk under your C drive and save it to either an Internal or External Drive. This will create a single backup image of the whole disk containing your C drive.
2. Again, from Macrium, click on Restore tab and select the image created from step 1, Select your SSD as the destination drive, click Next->Finish
3. Exit Macrium. If your Windows was installed using MBR, Open disk management and make sure the SSD is marked "Active" else go to next step.
4. Shutdown your PC. Disconnect the HD containing Windows C drive then connect your SSD to it.
5. Reboot. Your PC should boot and the Windows should have C as the drive letter.

NOTE: The procedure above is to backup your Windows to an image file then copy it back to the SSD. This ensures proper cluster size aligment for the SSD. In addition, Macrium also perform Trimming for the SSD. This is more preferable than cloning.

 

Clone Bitlocker enable drive to SSD

Keitaro

My name is Andre Da Costa; an Independent Consultant, Windows Insider MVP and Windows & Devices for IT MVP. I'm here to help you with your problem.

Heed the advice of the software, you must disable BitLocker before cloning. This is highly recommend if you ever want to get access to the drive.

There is nothing wrong with having to re-enable it after restoring the clone.

Step 1: disable BitLocker.

Step 2: clone drive

Step 3: restore the cloned image to the new drive.

Step 4: Re-Enable BitLocker.

 

Cloning from 1TB to 2TB hard drive

Whats a good free imaging/cloning program? I have a 1TB hard drive with Win7 and I want to seamlessly migrate my stuff to a 2TB hard drive. Any suggestions?