Restore AHCI SSD Image to NVMe drive

Tanyac · Feb 3, 2016

I see lots of threads about installing Windows 7 on NVMe drives (Like SM951, 950 Pro etc).

I've pretty much run out of activations of my Windows 7 OS. If I reinstall from scratch MS will likely refuse another activation. I've already been down this road with them. They are pushing Windows 10 so hard the typical MS response has been, "We will not support additional activations on Windows 7. We strongly encourage you to upgrade to Windows 10.. Blah blah..".

I use EaseUS todo free to create my images. I tried Acronis but when it came to restore time it kept failing to read the images it had created.

So, my question is; How to restore an image created from my SM951 256gb AHCI drive to a Samsung 950 Pro 256gb NVMe drive?

Thanks

USAFRet · Feb 3, 2016

Macrium Reflect
Direct migration from Drive A to Drive B.

crystal_tech · Feb 3, 2016

using dism add the nvme driver to the current windows install, then use your backup software and move it over.

dism help:
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh825070.aspx

driver:
http://ssd.samsungsemi.com/ecomobile/ssd/update15.do?fname=/Samsung_NVMExpress_Driver_rev11.zip

use 7zip or universal extractor and pull the files you need.

ihameed46 · Feb 4, 2016

Tanyac, the issue is that windows 7 needs to be able to read from the NVME drive. W7 does not natively support NVME, but Windows 8.1 and 10 does. So a simple migration tool or a cloning tool will not work since they will be moving across AHCI drivers which are no good on an NVME supported drive. the DISM tool mentioned above is quite complicated. You need a simpler hack. I have seen one on Youtube but will take some time to find again. Is there a reason you don't want to migrate to W10 because it will make your life a lot easier in this regard? Alternatively, any reason you have opted for the NVME drive? They are faster but the difference will not be noticeable unless you do heavy duty video editing or need super fast loading of games. Otherwise I would recommend sticking with AHCI in the Sata III guise.

Tanyac · Feb 4, 2016

ihameed46 :

You really don't want to get me going on the reasons for not wanting to migrate to reason 10. The list is extremely long.

But thanks for your response.

Tanyac · Feb 4, 2016

crystal_tech :

So, on the current system, add the NVMe drivers using dism. Then back up the current system, remove the ahci drive, install the NVMe drive and then restore from the back up.

I'll have to check with EaseUS. I believe it uses the WinPE bootloader. Is it going to see the NVMe drive?

I'll give it all a try. Will let you know how it goes.

thanks

Tanyac · Feb 5, 2016

I should also have mentioned, I suppose, thar my boot disk is currently a Samsung SM951 AHCI M.2 drive, not a Sata drive.

Anyway, I contacted EaseUS and we seem to be having some irreconcilable language issues.

My email to them started "I will never install or upgrade to windows 10. I am on Windows 7"... Their response. "Our product can't help you. Please contact Microsoft to see if you can get a free upgrade to Windows 10"

I, like 55% of the PC market, will not be upgrading to Windows 10. Ever. Period.

I've rephrased my question to EaseUS... "Can your emergency boot disk detect and write to an NVMe drive?".

I suspect that what I'm restoring is irrelevant, since the image is a sector by sector copy. Might I be on the right track here?

If UEFI can see it, and I slipstream the drivers via DISM, or perhaps ntLite if that can handle it, then back it up....???

I guess the only way is to try it. I can set up a test PC. Won;t be the same hardware, but it has a activated W7 license, so the concepts are the same.

thanks

ps. I'm doing this for several reasons..

1. Just to see if I can
2. I do ALOT of video editing
3. many of the PCs here are running HDDs, I'm going to upgrade them to SSD. If I'm going to do that, I'm going to go top end, and not part of the way. Means I only have to upgrade once. Why waste money on a 500/450 SSD drive now, only to upgrade to a 2500/1500 drive later!

ihameed46 · Feb 5, 2016

Tanyac :

TanyaC, I think EaseUS response is a load of shit. It works on W7. They have not understood your problem. I think the direction you are headed on should work as the theory is good. But you have an insurmountable issue of the cloning image not being able to be restored and I suspect its because the image is of an AHCI interfaced disc. Use the DISM tool to slipstream and then re-clone the disk; if you are happy with the complexity. It should work. The only issue I think you may face is that the slipstream may mess up your existing installation of W7 as it would over write the AHCI drivers, wouldn't it? Your idea of a test bench is a good one. Make a clone of the existing AHCI based disk ---> then do the slipstreaming job with DISM on that one ---> then clone that version and try restoring on the NVME disk. That will keep the original AHCI based disk in good order in case it all goe pear shaped. Good luck.

crystal_tech · Feb 5, 2016

try clonezilla : http://clonezilla.org/ its free and will do a direct sector by sector if you need it.

if you slipstream the drivers via dism it will only add it to the driver.cab /cache and will only be used if windows sees the new hardware.

Tanyac · Feb 12, 2016

I got the drive installed and running and it was nowhere near as problematic as I feared it was going to be. Just shows that research and planning are a must when you're venturing into something a lot of people have had problems with.

The system started with:

1. SM951 256GB AHCI boot
2. 850 Pro 512gb SSD AHCI data
3. Seagate ST2000DM001 2000gb data
4. ASUS X99-Deluxe Motherboard (BIOS 2101; NVMe has been support since 1601)

1. Downloaded the NVMe drivers and the data migration tool (link below)
2. Backup all data on the 850 Pro
3. Backup current SM951 installation using EaseUS todo backup free.
4. Restore the EaseUS image to the 850 Pro SSD.
5. Shutdown and replace SM951 with 950 Pro
6. Only 1 change in BIOS. As I have a PCIe boot already CSM was already enabled, as was Boot Device Control. Only had to enable "Boot from PCI-E/PCI Expansion cards" (UEFI first.).
7. Boot up from 850 Pro.
8. Install NVMe driver
9. Reboot
10. Run data migration from 850 Pro to 950 Pro
11, At this stage, when I went to change UEFI to boot from 950 it showed duplicate "Windows Boot Manager: Samsung 850 Pro" entries but nothing for 950 Pro. Subsequent attempts to boot resulted in BSODs.
12. Booted from windows 7 install DVD & using repair tools, deleted all partitions on the 850 Pro and "Cleaned" the drive.
13. Rebooted, Set the now single Windows Boot Manager entry in UEFI bios as default boot.
14 Restarted PC and viola up and running with new 950 Pro.
15. Re-partition the 850 pro for data usage, restore the data from my back up

Done!

No fresh install of Windows required.

As the data migration tool didn't migrate the pagefile, I suspect there was a conflict when there were two drives the system thought were both 850's and it caused the BSODs. Once I deleted the 850 Pro partitions everything was perfect.

Resources

NVMe Driver/Data Migration software: http://www.samsung.com/global/business/semiconductor/minisite/SSD/global/html/support/downloads.html
NVMe boot guide: (Intel) http://download.intel.com/support/ssdc/hpssd/sb/nvme_boot_guide_332098001us.pdf

EDIT: The Samsung Data Migration tool doesn't have an uninstaller. It also doesn't appear to create any registry entries (Other than a start menu entry). So I just deleted the "c:\program files (x86)\Samsung" folder, the start menu entry and the desktop icon manually. A installation log file is also left over in the c:\users\<yourname>\samsung folder which can be deleted.

hth
Tanya

Search

Restore AHCI SSD Image to NVMe drive

Tanyac

Reputable

Tanyac

USAFRet

Titan

crystal_tech

Distinguished

ihameed46

Distinguished

Tanyac

Reputable

Tanyac

Reputable

Tanyac

Reputable

ihameed46

Distinguished

crystal_tech

Distinguished

Tanyac

Reputable

TRENDING THREADS

Latest posts

Moderators online

Share this page