Let me say at the outset that I have no financial or any other commercial interest in the disk-cloning software I'm going to recommend. I mention this because I’ve often been accused of being a zealot for that program so I must have some financial interest in the product. I assure you I'm simply a satisfied (very satisfied!) user of this software.
1. The program I strongly recommend is the Casper disk-cloning program. I have been using various versions of this program for about 10 years or so. (The current version is Casper 8). During that time I have probably used the program thousands of times cloning hundreds of hard drives (HDD) and SSDs. My experience has been solely with the various MS OSs, primarily with XP, Vista, Windows 7 & 8.
2. The basic object of a disk-cloning program such as the Casper program is that by cloning the contents of one's day-to-day working HDD or SSD to another HDD/SSD (internal or external), the user creates a precise copy of his or her "source" HDD/SSD. Thus, a comprehensive backup of one's system has been accomplished in one fell swoop, i.e., the user has backed up his/her entire system including the operating system, all programs & applications, registry, configurations, and of course, all user-created data. In short - everything that's on the source drive. So that the recipient of the cloned contents - the "destination" HDD/SSD - will be, for all practical purposes a precise copy of the source HDD with all data immediately accessible. What better backup system can one have?
3. While there are many other disk-cloning programs, e.g., Acronis True Image, that can perform this operation, Casper has a rather extraordinary ability to create "incremental clones", using what Casper refers to as its "SmartClone" technology. Understand that the "incremental clone" thus created is a *complete* clone of the source disk, *not* an "incremental file". The result of this incremental clone process is that it takes the user only a fraction of the time to create subsequent clones of the source HDD/SSD than it would otherwise take using the typical disk-cloning methodology.
4. As an example...
When a typical disk-cloning program undertakes its disk-to-disk cloning process it generally does so without regard that the source and destination drives involved in the disk-cloning operation are the identical drives that may have been involved when a prior disk-cloning operation had been undertaken. It doesn't matter to the typical disk-cloning program whether the HDD/SSD now being cloned was cloned an hour ago, a day ago, a week ago, or whenever. The now disk-cloning operation will proceed as if the HDD/SSD recipient of the clone, i.e., the destination HDD/SSD, is bare of data, even if that same destination HDD/SSD was the recipient of a prior clone from the same source HDD/SSD 10 minutes ago.
The result of all this is that the usual disk-cloning operation will take a substantial amount of time to "do its work" each time the disk-cloning operation is undertaken, without regard to the fact that perhaps only a relatively few changes involving the source HDD/SSD's data has changed since the last disk-cloning operation. So, as an example, let's say it takes about 40 minutes or so to initially clone the contents of a drive containing 100 GB of data to another drive. Two days later the user decides to again back up his or her system by undertaking another disk-cloning operation. Presumably the data changes over those two days haven't been especially large. But with the typical disk-cloning program, it will take the disk-cloning program just about the same period of time to currently perform the disk-cloning operation as it did originally, i.e., 40 minutes, as in this example. And so on and so on in the following days.
5. But the Casper program has the unique capability of recognizing only the change in data that has occurred from its last disk-cloning operation and will proceed to "do its work" on that basis. Thus, given the example above it will probably take less than 4 minutes or so to complete the disk-cloning operation.
6. So you can see what a valuable incentive this is for users to systematically & routinely backup their systems with the Casper program - knowing that the expenditure of time to complete the disk-cloning operation will be relatively slight. Surely this is a strong incentive for a user to maintain his/her complete system in a reasonably up-to-date fashion. Obviously the amount of time it will take to complete this "incremental" disk-cloning operation using Casper will be dependent upon the total volume of data being cloned as well as the additions, deletions, configuration changes, etc. that the PC user had made since he or she undertook a previous disk-cloning operation. So the user is encouraged to perform these disk-cloning operations on a relatively frequent basis since by doing so the expenditure of time in completing the operation will be relatively short. This last point is crucial. The program works best when it is used with a fairly high degree of frequency – perhaps not less than once a week or even on a daily or two or three times a week basis. When it is used in that manner, the expenditure of time in completing the disk (or partition)-cloning operation comes close to being trifling. And most importantly the user is secure in the knowledge that he/she has an up-to-date complete backup of his/her system.
7. A quick example based upon one of my PCs SSDs containing total data of about 105 GB of data. Note this is total data - including the OS, all programs & applications, all my user-created data - in short, everything that's on my "source" SSD. I last used the Casper program to clone the contents of that drive four days ago. Naturally, like most users, I've made changes of various kinds over that four-day period - added, deleted, modified some programs, manipulated this or that configuration, etc., etc. More or less the typical kinds of changes made by most users over a period of time. Earlier today I again cloned the contents of that source SSD to one of my desktop's internal SSDs. It took just about 1 minute. (I should point out that I've been converting nearly all my HDDs to SSDs so disk-cloning speed is considerably faster than when using HDDs. I would estimate that in the example I've given it would have taken me about 2 or 3 minutes to complete the disk-cloning operation using HDDs as the source & destination disks).
8. The point to keep in mind is that the recipient of the clone - the destination HDD/SSD - will be a precise copy of the source HDD/SSD with all its data immediately accessible in exactly the same way one would access data from their source drive - their day-to-day working HDD/SSD in most cases. And the destination HDD/SSD, should it be another internally-connected HDD/SSD or a USB external HDD/SSD will be immediately bootable without the need of any special recovery process.
9. So that if a user's source HDD/SSD becomes dysfunctional for any reason - he or she will have at hand a bootable HDD/SSD that will return their system to a bootable fully functional state in virtually no time at all. Had the user cloned the contents of their source HDD/SSD to a USB external HDD/SSD (instead of an internally-connected HDD/SSD), he/she could restore their system in reasonably short order by cloning the contents of the USBEHD back to an internal HDD/SSD or, should the drive itself be removed from the external enclosure it could then be installed as the system's internal HDD/SSD - fully bootable & functional. In some (but not all) cases because of the proprietary nature of some manufacturer's PCs - desktop or laptop - the cloned USB external HDD/SSD may not be bootable when connected as a USB device although when its contents are cloned back to an internally-connected HDD/SSD that latter drive will, of course, be bootable. Similarly if the cloned USB external HDD/SSD can be removed from its USB enclosure and installed as an internally-connected drive in the PC it will, of course, be bootable.
10. It's hard to imagine a better comprehensive backup system for the vast majority of PC users than a disk-cloning system such as the one I've been describing and strongly recommend. Besides its speed of operation as indicated above, the program is extremely easy to learn & use. It shouldn't take most PC users more than a few minutes to learn how to use the program.
The cost of the program is $49.99. AFAIK, the program is only available from the developer via download. There's a 30-day trial version available at...
http://www.fssdev.com/products/free/
The trial version is slightly crippled but it should give you a good idea of how the program works.
While the trial version is basically operational in that it will clone the contents of one HDD or SSD to another HDD or SSD, the recipient of the clone, (the "destination" drive), will be resized only to the extent of the amount of cloned data from your "source drive", i.e., the drive that is being cloned. The remaining disk space on the destination drive would be considered "unallocated" by the OS.
The licensed version of Casper does not have this limitation. Ordinarily the full disk space of the destination HDD will be utilized to contain the cloned contents of the source HDD so that there would be no unallocated disk space on the destination HDD. However should the user choose he/she would also have an option to create whatever size disk partition he or she desires on the destination HDD; the only limitation is that the size (disk-space) allotted to that partition be sufficient to hold the cloned data contents.
I hope the preceding is of some value to you. Give the trial version a look and determine whether the program will serve your needs. Keep in mind that when you initially clone the contents of one drive to another drive it will take a fair amount of time depending upon the size of the data being cloned. But thereafter, assuming you perform cloning operations with those same source & destination drives on a frequent basis, the expenditure of time will be remarkably slight.
Hope this has been of some help to you.
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