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Help on HHD to SSD transfer

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i just bought a new Dell 8910'desktop computer with a 2tb HHD.  I am upgrading to a Samsung 850 PRO with 1tb.  I want to copy the HHD to the SSD and make the SSD the primary drive and use the HHD for documents, pictures, music, etc.  After reading on how to do this, it seems the recommended method is to backup and restore as opposed to cloning as this mehod is safer.

i have the Arconis True Image 2017.  I started to do the backup last night and it is still running.  The time remaining is 2 days and xx hours.  

I am not sure if I am doing the backup correctly as I do not think it should take that long.  The backup I defined was sector-to-sector.  Thinking about it, do I really need sector-to-sector?  Is this why it is taking too long.

Since I am going from a 2tb to a 1tb, do I need to do sector-to-sector.  My understanding is sector to sector is used only if you have the same drive size.  Sector to sector is an image of the current drive thus retoring it to a smaller sized drive will not work. Am I correct?

Should I cancel the backup and restart all over again?

Any help suggestion is appreciated.  Thanks.

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Felix, welcome to these user forums.

Doing a sector-by-sector backup of your 2TB HDD will result in a 2TB backup image file which will not be able to be restored to your 1TB SSD drive so I would recommend cancelling the backup if it is still running.

The process that I would recommend is as follows:

  1. Backup the 2TB HDD to your backup drive without using sector-by-sector.
  2. Create the Acronis bootable Rescue Media on either CD or USB media, and test that you can boot your Dell 8910 desktop from this and see the HDD drive correctly.  Note: the rescue media should be booted in the same way that your Windows OS boots, i.e. if Windows boots using EFI then the media should do the same.
  3. Remove the 2TB HDD drive from the computer and replace it with your new 1TB SSD drive - leave the HDD disconnected.
  4. Boot the Rescue Media with the backup drive connected and if you can see the SSD drive correctly, then restore the backup image to the SSD and allow Acronis to automatically resize the partitions to fit.  
  5. Shutdown and remove the Rescue Media and backup drive.
  6. Start the computer and boot into Windows with the new SSD.  If all is OK and Windows starts correctly, then connect the original HDD externally via USB using either a dock, caddy or adapter, so that you can reformat the drive before reconnecting it internally in the computer.  Do not attempt to boot the computer with both the SSD and HDD internally when both drives are essentially identical after the restore.

Steve Smith, thanks for the quick reply.  OK I cancelled the backup and restarted again.

I just want add a few comments.

I am doing the backup on an external hard drive.

After the backup I was planning on doing the restore to the SSD.  When this is done, I was going to shutdown the computer.

Both the HDD and SSD are hooked up in the computer.  I did this to make sure the computer recognizes the SSD in File Explorer and it did recognize it, also had to initialize the SSD.  In step 3 do I need to remove HDD?  Could I just disconnect the HDD both power and data cable and then connect the SSD data cable to the HDD data port?  Once I do this, I was going to turn on the computer to see if it is going to boot from the SSD.

If it did boot, I was going to reconnect the HDD both power and data cable while the computer is on and delete the files on the HDD.

Will this work?  I am doing this because I do not have the cable to attach the HDD to the USB port.

Thanks.

Felix, one of the key points of migrating from the HDD to the SSD is that the SSD should replace the HDD by connecting to the same controller port and cables, so that when the SSD is booted, the Windows bootloader will find that new drive at the same motherboard address that the HDD you copied from was connected.  If you try to boot the SSD when it is connected to a different port / cables then it is unlikely that Windows will boot because the configuration data will not match your hardware placement.

If you replace the HDD with the SSD then put the HDD inside the case but leave it disconnected until you have the SSD working and booting to Windows without any issues.

Once the SSD is working, then reconnect the HDD and then reformat the drive to prepare it for use as a data drive.

Steve, thanks.

Just an update.  The backup completed and I am performing a validation.

I just downladed Acronis Universal Restore tool to create the Bootable Media.

One question about your latest comment and it is in regards to the sequence of steps.

After copying the backup to the SSD, the steps and sequence that I understood are as follows:

Power down computer

Connect SSD data cable to the original HDD port

Disconnect HDD both power and data cables

Turn on computer and hope it boots using the SSD. 

If it boots, turn off computer

Reconnect HDD both power and data cables.  The data cable should be connected to another port (not to the original port)

Turn on computer

Reformat the HDD drive.

Are the steps and sequence correct?

Thanks for all your help.

 

Felix, the steps look good for me.  You do not need the Acronis Universal Restore tool for doing this - that tool is only needed when you will be migrating to a different computer with new hardware.  For just moving from using a HDD or a SSD the normal Rescue Media is all that you should need.

Steve, just an update and really aapreciate your help.

I created the rescue nedia.  I then shutdown the computer and plugged the flash drive/rescue media that I created.  Powered the computer and booted but I think it booted from the hard drive.  Inshutdown the computer and then turned it on.  I then pressed F12 to get to the boot menu.  From the menu, I selected the flash drive and pressed enter.  When I did this I got an error about Secure Boot Viloation Invalid Signature Detected .....

After searching the internet,

I changed Secure Boot to Legacy and it still will not boot.

I turned off secure boot with UEFI and still will not boot.

I do not know what to do to fix it.  Is it possible the Rescue Media I created is wrong?  Is there something I should have done when I created it?  When I looked at the boot menu the flash drive says UEFI.

I am lost.

Felix, from the information you have provided, it seem that your system will only allow USB media to be booted in UEFI / Secure Boot mode, and you will need to create the alternative Windows PE Rescue Media instead of using the standard, Linux based media.

When you select to create the Windows PE media, you will then be directed to download the Windows 10 ADK software that is needed to create this media.  This is a large download of over 3GB but you only need to install just 2 components of the ADK as per the attached screen image.

Once the ADK is installed then the Windows PE media will be created and you should choose the UEFI option for booting this.  Note: some systems may still object to booting from CD or DVD media, in which case you should create the Rescue Media on a USB memory stick.  Any size from 1GB to 32GB memory stick will work, but don't use any that are larger than this as they will probably not boot correctly due to Microsoft restrictions on bootable media.

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Ok another update.  I deleted all the files in the flash drive and recreated the rescue media.  AI powered down the computer and powered on pressing F12 to get to the boot menu.  In the boot menu, I selected the flash drive and pressed enter.  I did not get any error message.  I did get a screen that had 3 choices.

1 - Acronis True Image

2 - I could not remember but it is related to Acronis

C - Continue booting

I pressed C, does this mean it booted from the flash drive or did it boot from the hard drive?

Felix, you should be taking option 1 for Acronis True Image from the screen choices shown - the third option is to continue booting from your internal hard drive.

C means it booted from the hard drive.  You would need to select option 1.  option 2 is to create an Acronis system report.

Thanks to all for being patient with me.  I am now doing the recovery using Recovery Wizrd.  Below are the selections I made in the wizrd tool.

Archive Selection = Backup Partition and Files

Recovery Method = Recover whole disks and partitons

What to recover = All partitions from the HDD

Settingsof Partition 1-1 = Specify recover settings of Partition 1-1 = New Location SSD (Partiton Size = Default)

Settings of Partition C = Specify recover settings of Partition C = New Location = New Partition Location = Highlighted NTFS (OS) (C:) then Accept.  Not sure if this is correct.  This Disk is referring to the HDD and not the SSD.  I cannot select SSD as it is not an option.

Settings of Partition 1-4 = Specify recover settings of Partition 1-4 = New Location = New Partition Location = Highlighted EFI System Partition then Accept.   Not sure if this is correct.  This Disk is referring to the HDD and not the SSD.  I cannot select SSD as it is not an option.

Settings of Partition 1-5 ='Specify recover settings of Partition 1-5 = New Location = New Partition Location = Highlighted Recovery Partition the Accept.  Not sure if this is correct.  This Disk is referring to the HDD and not the SSD.  I cannot select SSD as it is not an option.

MBR of Disk 1 = Select Target disk for MBR recovery = selected the SSD. Do I check Recover disk signature?

Are there any options that I should select?

Another observation, there is a Disk 4.  It is FAT32 (RECOVERY) (D:).  I have not done anything with this.

I am not comfotable proceeding as I sm not sure I am doing this correctly.

Are the selections that I made correct?  It just does not feel right.

Thanks again for your patience.

Felix, please see the attached document that I created for another user recently to show how to do what you are asking but keeping the restore actions to the disk level only, where Acronis will do automatic resizing for the partitions and data to fit the target drive.

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401065-135790.pdf 719.56 KB

Steve, finally some good news.  Thanks for the PDF file.  That really helped.

What I did today was the following:

Deleted all the backups

Deleted the Rescue Media

Created a new Rescue Media

Created a backup using the Rescue Media instead of through Acronis True Image in Windows

Peformed the Recovery using Rescue Media (checked everything based on the PDF file for errors)

Shutdown the computer

Disconnected the HDD power and data cable

Connected the SSD data cable to the original port where the HDD was connected

Turned on the computer and it booted from the SSD

SUCCESS!!!!

Now I need to reconnect the HDD both power and data cable.  Connect the data cable to a different port where the SSD was connected.

Question

Is it OK to turn on the computer with both the SSD and the HDD connected?  I read you are not supposed to do it but wondering if it only applies when you initially turn on the computer or after the initial boot.

Once I get the computer on, I can delete the data on the HDD or can I leave it there just in case a need it.  The HDD is 2tb so it is quite big for what I need plus I also use external drives for my music and pictures.

Again thanks for everything and being patient.

Things Learned

Initially I did the backup in Windows environment and doing the Recovery using the Rescue Media.  I think this was a mistake.  I should have just used the Rescue Media for both backup anf recovery.

I had a couple of backups in the external drive.  I should have deleted the previous backup first before creating a new one.

When I was doing the original backup, I was doing a sector by sector which was not necessary since the SSD was smaller than the HDD.  I lost a lot of time on this.

 

Felix, provided that you have been able to boot the new SSD into Windows OK, then you should be able to reconnect the HDD to another SATA connector and then reformat it to use as a data drive.

Steve thanks for the reply.  Is it ok not to delete or reformat the HDD just leave it there for just in case?  

So it is ok to turn on the computer with both dives connected?

Felix, if you are just wanting to keep the HDD 'just in case' then I would leave it disconnected so that nothing can write to it or corrupt the current data on the drive. 

It should be fine to turn on the computer with both drives connected now that you have been able to boot the new SSD into Windows when it was on its own.  It is the first boot when you must not have the two drives connected.

Steve, thank you very much for all your help.  I was starting to get frustrated and remorse on trying to upgrade.

Have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you and the family.

Thanks Felix, I wish you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you and the family too.