Cloning and formatting SSD's.

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I've just taken delivery of a 750gb ssd. I want to clone my old 256gb ssd onto this one rather than doing a fresh install of everything so I presume I'll just use an app like carbon copy cloner? :confused:

Although CCC is the software I've used on a Mac before, whats the windows equivalent?



I've got an external usb 2.0 caddy to plug the new ssd into to clone it. Im tempted to keep the 256gb ssd for mass storage. How would I go about formatting this to make it like 'brand new', so I can either sell it on or keep it for storage?


If I'm doing anything or missed anything please let me know before I begin. It's gonna be nice finally having all my games installed without having to constantly uninstall and reinstall to manage space :D
 
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Macrium Reflect.

Then once you've confirmed it's working on the new drive, you can format the old one in Disk Management (within Windows)
 
Ok Ive got a problem.

Ive cloned the old drive to the new drive. 256 > 750.

However the new 750 drive still acts like a 256, saying there is only a couple of GB free. When I open Macrium Reflect it shows that there is 460.16GB 'extra' but Im unable to select it.

Im guessing I've done something wrong? I simply cloned my old drive, which it has done but its "blocked" off the rest of my new larger drive.


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On the Actions drop down, can you not expand or adjust the size of the C: partition to use the remaining space?
 
Nope it just gives me the option of

-Image this partition only
-File system properties
-Analyze file system.


I'm at a loss what to do :/
 
When you go through the clone stage, you select the source disk, then select the destination disk.

You should then be able to select the partition and click "Cloned Partition Properties" and adjust the size.
 
What's Partition number 3 for? If you still have that on the 250, delete it from the 750 drive, expand your 2nd partition, leaving room to copy partition 3 back over to the 750 after.
 
What's Partition number 3 for? If you still have that on the 250, delete it from the 750 drive, expand your 2nd partition, leaving room to copy partition 3 back over to the 750 after.


No idea thats just as it was, I haven't set up any partitions - I wouldnt even know how to. I think disk management said something about safe recovery partition though as that 450mb partition.


Its currently cloning again - nothing different to what I did last time however so Im not that hopeful its gonna work this time :mad:
 
So ****ed off! Its done the exact same thing again




EDIT: Seems to be that 3rd partition that is blocking the free space. I cant increase that 3rd partition space but if I delete it, it allows me to make the C drive (partition 2) bigger, up to 700GB.
 
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So ****ed off! Its done the exact same thing again




EDIT: Seems to be that 3rd partition that is blocking the free space. I cant increase that 3rd partition space but if I delete it, it allows me to make the C drive (partition 2) bigger, up to 700GB.

That's exactly what you need to do. You can't expand partition 2 because partition 3 is taking up the free space on the drive.

Delete partition 3 and expand partition 2 and you'll have a 750GB drive visible in Windows.
 
Use gparted or some other tool to move the partition if you don't want to delete it. Create a backup before you touch anything.
 
Why do people use cloning tools, when you could just create a couple partitions and copy the files across to the new drive? I've really never understood the need for cloning tools at all.

Esp with GPT disks. You don't even need to install boot loaders code into the MBR (etc) anymore!

Is it really that hard to use Disk Manager and then copy some files? Must be missing something.
 
I`ve recently started to use MiniTool Partition Wizard for cloning drives. Unlike the previous app I used, EaseUS Todo Backup and sometimes Macrium Reflect or Samsung Data Migration, Minitool's Copy Disk Wizard produces a bootable clone first time.You can easily edit partition sizes on the target drive before cloning takes place. No having to fix MBR etc which seemed quite common with the other apps. MiniTool also seems to be the easiest to use with a nice GUI.
 
EDIT: Seems to be that 3rd partition that is blocking the free space. I cant increase that 3rd partition space but if I delete it, it allows me to make the C drive (partition 2) bigger, up to 700GB.

You can.

Drag and drop the partitions instead of clicking Copy selected partitions. The partitions will be in a different order, but at least C: will be able to take advantage of the extra space. I don't think this method will cause problems for the 450MB recovery partition.

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I haven't tested it, but MiniTool Partition Wizard appears to be the tool to use if you don't want to change the partition order.
 
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