Disk cloning is the process of copying the contents of a drive (such as a hard disk) to another drive (such as another hard disk or an SSD). It creates an operational one-to-one copy of your storage device to be readily used as a replacement or upgrade to the original drive.
There are multiple scenarios when you would want to consider cloning a disk in Windows 11. Some of the possible scenarios are given under:
- Your drive is gradually failing. You’re looking to transfer all of its data including Windows installation, and installed programs to a new drive.
- You’re running short of storage space. You want to upgrade to a hard disk with a larger storage capacity.
- You’re looking to upgrade from a hard disk to an SSD for obvious performance benefits.
- You want to back up your Windows installation, installed programs and other data to another drive for data security purposes.
About Installation of the New Drive
You may connect your new drive (such as a new hard disk or an SSD) through the secondary SATA Connector in the case of a Personal Computer (PC).
If you’re using a laptop, you can connect your new drive by purchasing an HDD Caddy. An HDD Caddy is a casing for a hard disk or an SSD built using an aluminum body and plastic frame. When you mount your new drive, the caddy connects it to the relevant connector inside your laptop. This, of course, requires you to unmount your laptop’s DVD Drive first.
Once the new drive is installed, Windows Disk Management will show it up. You can open the tool by pressing Ctrl + X and selecting Disk Management.
If there are only Disk 0 and Disk 1 showing up in the Disk Management, Disk 0 can be your Source Drive that might contain your current Windows installation, programs and other data. On the contrary, Disk 1 might be your newly attached drive (such as an SSD or an HDD with more storage).
Using Clone Disk Wizard in Windows 11
A third-party software, NIUBI Partition Manager, provides a Clone Disk Wizard that simplifies the entire disk cloning process for beginners.
Steps:
- Download and install NIUBI Partition Manager.
- On the main screen, expand the Tools category from the left-hand side panel.
- Click on the Clone Disk Wizard option.
- You’ll get a list of all storage drives connected to your PC/ laptop. Select your source disk.
- The source disk is the drive from which you want to copy all data to another drive. If you’re not sure which source drive should you select since the drive names appear as Disk 0, Disk 1, take a look at the Size column that displays the drive’s total capacity in GB or TB. You may also refer to the Disk Map shown underneath to view the partitions on that particular drive.
- Click on Next.
- On the next page, select the Target Drive. The target drive is another drive where you want to clone your source disk. If you’re upgrading from a hard disk to an SSD, select the SSD as your target drive.
- Click on Next.
- On the subsequent page, check on Apply and then click on the Turn off computer option.
What Should You Do If Your Cloned SSD Won’t Boot Up Windows 11?
Sometimes, things may go wrong. Despite successful cloning, your computer may fail to boot the Windows 11 operating system. Windows failed to start. A recent hardware or software change might be the cause. is one of the common error messages reported.
Here are some tips about what you can do under such circumstances:
- There may be bad sectors on the source disk. As a result, the Target Disk is unable to boot the Windows operating system.
- The disk cloning may have been unsuccessful. For example: Due to an error, power outage or other technical reason, not all files relating to your Windows operating system were cloned to the new disk. As a result, some files may be missing.
- You didn’t choose to clone the system reserved partition which contains crucial OS data.
- Your CMOS Settings pertaining to the Boot Drive Sequence are incorrectly changed. For example, The first boot device is set to some other drive, rather than the cloned SSD/ HDD. Restart your computer, repeatedly press the F2 or Delete keys and then configure these settings. Make sure to save and update the settings.
- Set the UEFI or Legacy Mode in the CMOS Settings, depending on the mode selected on the source disk.