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Can a cloned disk work in this situation?

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I have a cloned disk and a data backup, but not a full disk backup of a computer drive that failed. The problem is that the bootable SSD that failed, apparently caused a short that fried the motherboard, so I'm wondering if the clone will have any use. It appears I will have to build a new system, since this one is 8 years old and the motherboard is not something I can find anywhere. From what I understand the clone will only work with the same configuration as the old system. Is my only solution to build a new computer, then manually install all the programs (there are many) and then move the data over?  

 

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Steve, welcome to these User Forums.

You may be able to reuse your cloned drive with a new motherboard in your computer but there are a number of caveats to be considered.

If your old motherboard is 8 years old, then was this a Legacy BIOS board with MBR drives, or did it have UEFI and support GPT drives?  Any new motherboard is likely to be the latter, so there will be an element of migration if your cloned drive was from a Legacy system.

The Windows OS version that you have on the cloned drive is also an area that can be an issue - if you have an older Windows OS such as XP or 7, then you would need to use the Acronis Universal Restore tool to prepare that OS to work with the new hardware presented by your new motherboard, CPU etc.  If your cloned drive was using Windows 10, then chances of this working with the new motherboard are a lot higher because of the much better device support available in Windows 10.  You may still need to use Acronis Universal Restore but could try booting into Windows first and see how it handles the change.

Windows 10 activation may also be an issue here.  Windows 10 is typically activated based on the hardware signature of the computer where it was first installed.  The new motherboard would present a different hardware signature, so you may need to contact Microsoft to get a new activation key after explaining that no direct replacement motherboard was available.

While doing a clean install of Windows and applications can be a pain, there can also be benefits of doing this if you are coming from a system where the OS has been upgraded across different versions of Windows and has accumulated a lot of junk over years of use.  You would definitely see a much improved Windows OS by doing the clean install then porting your user data back.

Thanks for the info. I wasn't aware that universal restore could be used on cloned disk.

The computer was running windows 10, which was automatically upgraded from my OEM windows 7.  Unfortunately, I don't know if it's a legacy bios. I might be better off building a new computer since I'm not even positive that the damage is limited to the motherboard. If it extends to the CPU or the RAM, it would probably be too much money to put into an older computer - and then possibly still have problems with getting windows working. 

 

 

I forgot to ask, if I upgrade to a new computer, can the clone be transferred to that?  I'm wondering if there is a way to pay an OEM fee to have MS allow me to use the clone on the new computer. 

 

Steve, just to deal with your points in order.

The cloned drive would appear as if it had been restored from an Acronis backup, after which you would boot the AUR media and point this at the OS on the drive so that preparation is actioned.  The key difference in using a cloned drive versus doing a backup then restore is that doing the latter in conjunction with how the Acronis Rescue Media is booted (to perform the restore) determines whether the drive will also be converted from Legacy/MBR to UEFI/GPT as part of the restore.

Note: If you check the partitions on the cloned drive in Windows Disk Management or using a Partition Manager program (such as the free MiniTool Partition Wizard), this will show whether you have a hidden system EFI partition or not.  The EFI partition should only be present for UEFI systems.

You would need to ask MS about what licence you could use if moving the cloned drive to a different computer completely.  I would suspect that they would ask you to buy a new licence but the first task would be to try to get Windows 10 to boot on the new computer.