Coning a harddrive

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vampyiere6

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Mar 7, 2013
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So i have to change harddrive on one of my mothers friends laptop because it had a bad harddrive/ sectors that smart watch did report and i did test it with crystaldiskinfo does not remember the programs name exact now and it showed it as bad.

So i have ordered a ssd for it now a samsung 840 evo 250gb and i would like to reinstall wondows and all for a clean start because thats better.

While the person i do it for would like to keep everything since she is not so techy.

Is there any problems or anything if i would clone the drive?

What is the pros and cons with cloneing a harddrive?
 
Solution
Captain_WD
Hey vampyiere6,

Cloning a HDD/SSD is a great way to save all your data, settings and programs when changing drives.
Pros:
-you keep everything intact.
-your settings are saved as they are (no need for setting up anything)
-no need to reinstall anything
-creates a full copy (hence clone) of your current drive on the new one

Cons:
-As it copies everything, any errors, viruses, glitches and such would probably copied as well
-If you are cloning a drive with bad sectors, the damaged files would be transferred to the new drive and this might cause problems
-If the cloning program encounters a bad sector that it can't read, I might refuse to continue the cloning process
-Any fragmented sectors would also be copied

An important thing for...
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Captain_WD

Captain_WD

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Jul 30, 2014
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Hey vampyiere6,

Cloning a HDD/SSD is a great way to save all your data, settings and programs when changing drives.
Pros:
-you keep everything intact.
-your settings are saved as they are (no need for setting up anything)
-no need to reinstall anything
-creates a full copy (hence clone) of your current drive on the new one

Cons:
-As it copies everything, any errors, viruses, glitches and such would probably copied as well
-If you are cloning a drive with bad sectors, the damaged files would be transferred to the new drive and this might cause problems
-If the cloning program encounters a bad sector that it can't read, I might refuse to continue the cloning process
-Any fragmented sectors would also be copied

An important thing for cloning a drive is to have at least as much space on the new drive as you have on the old one (if the old drive is bigger than your 250GB SSD, that migh cause problems because you don't know on which part of the platter the data is written and fail to copy some data, possibly system files which could cause system fails and BSODs)

I would advise doing a clean install of windows on the new SSD, backing up all the needed data from the old HDD and just restoring the backup on the SSD (you'd need to reinstall any programs or games that your friend might have had).

Hope this helps,

Captain_WD.
 
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vampyiere6

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Mar 7, 2013
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Yea i myself wanna reinstall windows on it as all errors etc will go away as you know how it is with parents and older people when they use a computer its full with extra toolbars, programs etc and that laptop is really slow and full of stuff i did not even start to clean or check what all was on it just a fast look.

So i need to check what she needs and just copy it and do a clean install as it would improve so much more.

As i have never used the laptop or so i have no idea what files/programs could be currupt do to the bad sectors etc on the drive.

I will try to get her to let me just do a clean install.
 
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Captain_WD

Captain_WD

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Jul 30, 2014
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Good luck with reviving the laptop :)
Clean install always refreshes the rig, especially when there hasn't been any maintenance performed on it (I guess not everybody do it). Hope it will work as charm once you are done with everything.

Glad I was able to help, feel free to drop me a message if you need anything else,

Captain_WD.
 
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