I need software to clone a partition without destroying data on destination drive.

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Rodion15

Rodion15

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Sep 11, 2011
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I have a desktop with two Seagate hard drives, one of only 40GB with Windows 7 and another of 1TB for data.

Now I'm running out of space in the 40GB drive, so I want to use the 1TB drive for the OS. So I want to clone the 40GB partition to the large drive. On the large drive I have two partitions, one for data and the other is empty.

I've downloaded Seagate DiscWizard but when I try to clone, a message pops up saying that I'll lose the data in the destination drive.

Both drives are basic drives all partitions are primary.

Is there any software to clone to the large drive's empty partition without losing the other partition and its data?



 
Solution
13thmonkey
you need to shrink the partition on the target drive so that there is enough space for the cloned partition to sit, however you are mucking about with your windows installation, and where that sits and how it is initiated, and that can lead to problems. What you want to do is difficult and dangerous.

you need to create the 200MB system partition on your 1TB drive + your 40GB partition and ensure that the files in the 200MB partition point to the right place.

if you are confident that the 40GB will continue to work you could leave the system partition on the 40GB drive and have windows on the 1TB, but if you ever remove the 40GB windows will fail to work even though it is installed on a different physical drive.

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13thmonkey

13thmonkey

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you need to shrink the partition on the target drive so that there is enough space for the cloned partition to sit, however you are mucking about with your windows installation, and where that sits and how it is initiated, and that can lead to problems. What you want to do is difficult and dangerous.

you need to create the 200MB system partition on your 1TB drive + your 40GB partition and ensure that the files in the 200MB partition point to the right place.

if you are confident that the 40GB will continue to work you could leave the system partition on the 40GB drive and have windows on the 1TB, but if you ever remove the 40GB windows will fail to work even though it is installed on a different physical drive.

The best of doing this is to backup your 1TB to an external drive, do the move and then move your backup back to the 1TB, but do you have access to an external drive.
 
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Solution
Rodion15

Rodion15

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Sep 11, 2011
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Thanks 13thmonkey. I think you're right. I'll move the data to an external drive and then clone using Seagate DiscWizard, then move the data back.

I thought there may be some software or method to do this easily and that's why I asked.
 
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