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laptop HDD cloning to SSD

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first forgive if this has been covered before. Bought new PNY 500 GB SSD. instructional video useless. Have perused many a tutorial, but each seems to omit pertinent details. So this is my understanding of process (please let me know if I am wrong). 1 check source disc for errors. 2 Download/register/activate Acronis True Image. 3 Create bootable media disc. 4 Shut down laptop, remove battery and all other removable drives, install SSD in laptop and connect source drive via USB. 5 Insert Acronis bootable CD into optical drive and boot system. 6 Start Acronis program- tools & utilities- select clone disc. 7 choose source disc. 8 choose destination disc. 9 review summary and proceed with cloning. 10. shut down acronis and laptop and reboot laptop. some tutorials mention messing with boot sequence in BIOS and others say it is no longer neccesasry with bootable media disc

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Most bases you have covered correctly however, I see one glaring omission which is after the clone process completes and you shutdown, detach the original disk from the laptop prior to startup.

In addition I recommend that you identify how your laptop boots by running msinfo32.exe from the Windows Run box ( Windows key + R) and look through the list for Boot mode.  You will need to make sure you boot the CD media in the same boot mode as you laptop currently uses.

I also recommend that you make a full disk backup of your present disk as a precaution in case of clone failure so that you have something to fall back on if necessary.

Jason, welcome to these public User Forums.

The steps you outlined are essentially correct though I would add a further prerequisite step which is to make a full disk backup to an external backup drive before starting any clone operation.  The is your safety net in case of any errors or mistakes made!

See KB 2201: Support for OEM Versions of Acronis Products which applies to all OEM versions of ATI supplied with hardware purchases.

See KB 65508: Acronis True Image 2021: how to create bootable media and KB 59877: Acronis True Image: how to distinguish between UEFI and Legacy BIOS boot modes of Acronis Bootable Media

See KB 56634: Acronis True Image: how to clone a disk - and review the step by step guide given there.

Note: the first section of the above KB document directs laptop users to KB 2931: How to clone a laptop hard drive - and has the following paragraph:

It is recommended to put the new drive in the laptop first, and connect the old drive via USB. Otherwise you will may not be able to boot from the new cloned drive, as Acronis True Image will apply a bootability fix to the new disk and adjust the boot settings of the target drive to boot from USB. If the new disk is inside the laptop, the boot settings will be automatically adjusted to boot from internal disk. As such, hard disk bays cannot be used for target disks. For example, if you have a target hard disk (i.e. the new disk to which you clone, and from which you intend to boot the machine) in a bay, and not physically inside the laptop, the target hard disk will be unbootable after the cloning.

KB 65539: Acronis True Image 2021: How to restore your computer with WinPE-based or WinRE-based media 

Steve Smith wrote:

Jason, welcome to these public User Forums.

The steps you outlined are essentially correct though I would add a further prerequisite step which is to make a full disk backup to an external backup drive before starting any clone operation.  The is your safety net in case of any errors or mistakes made!

See KB 2201: Support for OEM Versions of Acronis Products which applies to all OEM versions of ATI supplied with hardware purchases.

See KB 65508: Acronis True Image 2021: how to create bootable media and KB 59877: Acronis True Image: how to distinguish between UEFI and Legacy BIOS boot modes of Acronis Bootable Media

See KB 56634: Acronis True Image: how to clone a disk - and review the step by step guide given there.

Note: the first section of the above KB document directs laptop users to KB 2931: How to clone a laptop hard drive - and has the following paragraph:

It is recommended to put the new drive in the laptop first, and connect the old drive via USB. Otherwise you will may not be able to boot from the new cloned drive, as Acronis True Image will apply a bootability fix to the new disk and adjust the boot settings of the target drive to boot from USB. If the new disk is inside the laptop, the boot settings will be automatically adjusted to boot from internal disk. As such, hard disk bays cannot be used for target disks. For example, if you have a target hard disk (i.e. the new disk to which you clone, and from which you intend to boot the machine) in a bay, and not physically inside the laptop, the target hard disk will be unbootable after the cloning.

KB 65539: Acronis True Image 2021: How to restore your computer with WinPE-based or WinRE-based media 

Thanks for this accurate solution.