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Clone tool forcing GPT when disk is MBR

Hello, my aim is to clone an old Windows 8.1 64bit laptop HDD to a new SSD.

The SSD is connected to the laptop via a USB3/SATA adapter, and upon successful cloning will be installed into the Windows 8.1 laptop.

The HDD has two partitions, C: and D:, where C: is the bootable OS partition.

The SSD, whose capacity exceeds the HDD (and set to 'proportional' in clone tool settings) was formatted with one simple partition and was set to MBR. This is confirmed in the drive properties within Windows.

When setting up the clone tool, finalizing the source and destination drives, and ticking the option to exclude the D: partition, the clone tool reports that "The selected disk will be restored as is (disk's layout will remain GPT)."

Why is the clone tool doing this and how do I fix it so that the clone to the SSD is in MBR and therefore bootable as the new drive in the laptop?

Thanks for any advice.

Craig

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Are you sure that your original disk is booting via Legacy/MBR?  Have you checked via msinfo32.exe from a Run box to check how the computer boots.?

What should be happening is that the clone tool checks your current system to determine how the system boots ie. UEFI/GPT or Legacy-CSM/MBR.  Once determined then the tool will perform the clone function to match the current installation.

Thanks for the reply, i checked msinfo32.exe on the laptop and it reports:

 

BIOS mode UEFI

Secure boot state OFF

 

Does this mean I could proceed with the clone in GPT?

 

 

 

Yes, your computer boots via UEFI.  UEFI requires the format of the disk to be GPT so your all set.