How Do I Clone My OS to a Drive I Don't Want to Wipe?

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Rune Talonek

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Sep 16, 2013
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I recently purchased a Lenovo Y410p laptop which has an Ultrabay slot where I can add another storage drive. I wish to use the 60GB SSD I currently have in my desktop in the Ultrabay. This SSD has my desktop computer's OS on it, and I wish to clone that OS to the 750GB HDD D: drive that already has all my installed programs on it (in the desktop). Is it possible to clone my OS from the SSD onto that HDD and keep all the installed programs functioning so that I don't have to do another full reinstall of Windows on my desktop (use only the HDD)?

To Clarify

==Currently==
Laptop HDD: [OS][Files]

Desktop SSD: [OS]
Desktop HDD: [Original files]

==What I wish to do==
Move SSD to laptop

Laptop SSD: [wipe, reinstall OS]
Laptop HHD: [wipe, reinstall files]

Desktop HDD: [cloned OS][Original Files]
 
Solution
USAFRet
Drives can be swapped between computers.
Click to expand...
Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. I've seen both.

The SSD I am moving is going to be wiped, empty, kablooie. No OS, nothing. I'm going to reinstall the laptop OS on the SSD.
I want to clone whats currently on the SSD (the desktop's OS) over to the Desktop, so I don't have to do a full reinstall on the desktop.
I then take the SSD and wipe it, afterwards doing a full reinstall on the laptop..
On a side note, how is this a breaking of the TOS, I didn't see that anywhere.
Click to expand...

Trying to merge the OS (which lives on one drive) with the applications currently existing on the D....will not work.
I suppose by some weird partitioning scheme you could make it work. But that would be far...
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USAFRet

USAFRet

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Mar 16, 2013
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"Is it possible to clone my OS from the SSD onto that HDD and keep all the installed programs functioning so that I don't have to do another full reinstall of Windows on my desktop (use only the HDD)?"

You have D drive, with a bunch of currently installed programs on it.
You wish to somehow clone/paste/migrate the OS from another drive onto that D, without losing any of the installed applications.

That will not work.

You then wish to use that drive in another machine? (a little confused on which ends up where)

That probably won't work either.
 
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R

Rune Talonek

Honorable
Sep 16, 2013
5
0
10,510


Drives can be swapped between computers.

The SSD I am moving is going to be wiped, empty, kablooie. No OS, nothing. I'm going to reinstall the laptop OS on the SSD.

I want to clone whats currently on the SSD (the desktop's OS) over to the Desktop, so I don't have to do a full reinstall on the desktop.

I then take the SSD and wipe it, afterwards doing a full reinstall on the laptop..

On a side note, how is this a breaking of the TOS, I didn't see that anywhere.

 
Upvote 0 Downvote
USAFRet

USAFRet

Titan
Moderator
Mar 16, 2013
171,746
18,110
184,590
Drives can be swapped between computers.
Click to expand...
Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. I've seen both.

The SSD I am moving is going to be wiped, empty, kablooie. No OS, nothing. I'm going to reinstall the laptop OS on the SSD.
I want to clone whats currently on the SSD (the desktop's OS) over to the Desktop, so I don't have to do a full reinstall on the desktop.
I then take the SSD and wipe it, afterwards doing a full reinstall on the laptop..
On a side note, how is this a breaking of the TOS, I didn't see that anywhere.
Click to expand...

Trying to merge the OS (which lives on one drive) with the applications currently existing on the D....will not work.
I suppose by some weird partitioning scheme you could make it work. But that would be far more effort than a simple reinstall on both machines.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Solution
F

fzabkar

Judicious
Sep 22, 2010
9,374
745
36,390
ISTM that all you would need to do would be to shrink the 750GB partition to make room for the partitions on the 60GB drive, and then use a cloning program to transfer these 60GB partitions to the larger HDD. Make the appropriate partition bootable, reassign the drive letters in the appropriate way, and all should be well.

Or am I missing something?
 
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R

Rune Talonek

Honorable
Sep 16, 2013
5
0
10,510


Cloning deletes all partition data on the drive being cloned to.

I bought a new HDD and formatted the new HDD, then cloned the OS on the SSD to the new HDD. When I booted off the new HDD, I got a light blue screen that said "this copy of windows 7 is not legitimate" (or something like that). There were no desktop icons, taskbar, or start button, however, I could ctrl+alt+del and thus open the task manager, but that was it. I'll try to reassign the drive letters to try and make that work.
 
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F

fzabkar

Judicious
Sep 22, 2010
9,374
745
36,390
Cloning and imaging are not the same thing. A sector-by-sector clone (aka "image") will overwrite the target drive, but a "logical" clone can selectively clone a partition, and can even expand it to fill the target.

You just need to be very careful and understand what you are doing.
 
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