New SSD on a win 11 computer, need to clone the HDD problem drive to new SSD

I have a laptop that is win 11 with the MS word suite on it (and the customers files). I think it was purchased from walmart or where ever, so the suite came with the laptop.

The hard drive has become an issue, so I installed the new SSD and that seems to have solved the issue. However, I need to take the info and the OS from the old HDD and place it on the new SSD so they can have all of their files, MS word etc.

What would the steps to go about this? I was thinking Macrium reflect to clone the HDD, but I am unsure how to do this considering the old HDD is not working great (it is causing major slowdowns) and it has been removed the system.

I was thinking about using two USB enclosures AND a separate system and clone it that way - is that the best method? Does anyone have another suggestion?

you can use recover keys

I just used a USB to SSD adapter. No problems.

KWEB : how does that work?

It gets power from the USB port which works OK because the SSD doesn't use much power. Not sure where I got, Ebay or Newegg. Check your USB port, if it supplies enough power. You can get an ISO and install WIN11 since your computer has a license already. Moving programs is the only problem.

What I would have done was to image the HDD (using Macrium Reflect) to an external drive, swapped the new SSD into the laptop, and then used a USB rescue drive to restore the image to the SSD. An image of the HDD would be a good thing to have, in itself.

I suggest getting a USB dock, adapter, or enclosure and imaging the old HDD immediately. I hope that the HDD isn't defective.

You may be able to use a Macrium Reflect rescue USB drive to clone the HDD (adapted to USB) directly to the new SSD. I've not done that, though.

So I have tried to clone the HDD to the SSD, but the HDD is 500 gig and the SSD is 120 gig. The HDD has only 71gigs of used space (enough for the SSD), but I am unsure how to just clone that portion of the HDD drive to the small SSD. Any suggestions?

netrate said:

So I have tried to clone the HDD to the SSD, but the HDD is 500 gig and the SSD is 120 gig. The HDD has only 71gigs of used space (enough for the SSD), but I am unsure how to just clone that portion of the HDD drive to the small SSD. Any suggestions?

Click to expand...

That's a small SSD. When I needed to do something lke you want to do, I used the drag and drop a partition to the new drive in Macrium. You should be able to resize the Windows partition so it will fit on the smaller drive.

I am using the free version of Macrium and I don't see the drag and drop feature. I have now tried to clone the 500 gig to a 256 gig and it says insufficient space, even though only 100gig of space is used on the 500gig drive. I am not tech savvy enough to know how to transfer the info to a smaller drive. I just want the windows OS and the user files so I can boot to win 11.

I just went through this yesterday, was getting tired of doing canary builds so switched my Dell xpx8940 512 ssd to a a 1 T ssd.
for me the key is to make sure you a a Macrium rescue disk, and when you load up the new ssd you will need to do boot from rescue Macrium usb and change bios to ignore boot manager and have the rescue disk correct the boot manager. for me that is what the key is.
If I switch from the new to old ssd I have to redo this to access it, but will be done with the canary builds.

netrate said:

I am using the free version of Macrium and I don't see the drag and drop feature. I have now tried to clone the 500 gig to a 256 gig and it says insufficient space, even though only 100gig of space is used on the 500gig drive. I am not tech savvy enough to know how to transfer the info to a smaller drive. I just want the windows OS and the user files so I can boot to win 11.

Click to expand...

Then you're going to have to shrink the partition size of drive C so that it's small enough to fit on the smaller drive. It's not the used space, it's the size of the partitions that counts. The total size of all the partition you want to move to the smaller drive have to be equal to or less then the size of the smaller drive. I have the licensed version of Macrium so I don't know first hand if the free version allows the user to drag, drop and resize partitions.

this a youtube vide that should help you

Winuser said:

I have the licensed version of Macrium so I don't know first hand if the free version allows the user to drag, drop and resize partitions.

Click to expand...

My free version allows drag, drop and resize.

netrate said:

I am using the free version of Macrium and I don't see the drag and drop feature.

Click to expand...

It's not a feature you'll see on any of the menus. First, select the image you wish to restore. then select your target disk.
Now, from the image you want to restore click (and hold) the partition (lets say C drive) you want to copy and drag it to the
appropriate partition on the target disk. Literal Drag and Drop.

Once that's done, click Layout and the resize box appears. Use the slider to resize your disk. Took me a while to figure out. Just play with it
and you'll figure it out too

I watched the video and cloned the drive successfully.

I now have an issue when booting - blue screen says it is missing winload.efi file or something. I have gone onto the microsoft site and they send me to a page that doesn't help.

Error : 0xc0000000e

Asking for the recovery disc (which I do not have). Am I able to use the Win 10 media creator this?

Here is the link that did not help :

Ok, I think I know why the issue is here , but I don't know how to resolve it.
When I was cloning I had to drag and drop the partitions into the new smaller drive - but out of order - so I am thinking that is why when trying to boot to the cloned drive, it gives me the error. However, I don't know how to resolve this issue and have tried several website, including this video

I think you need another machine and connect the old and new drives to it, then clone the contents of the old to the new using something like Hasleo (free).

You can not reorder the partitions to a different drive and expect it to boot. You can attempt to use Macrium boot media and select "fix boot problems' but I would not bet money in this case but you might get lucky

If you get it to work, IMO, that drive is not large enough. It makes no sense to use a tiny drive that will not handle the needs of the system. The owner will be in a world of hurt when any windows update comes down the pike that creates a windows.old folder. 256 and 512 gb ssd are cheap. You do not say what type of ssd you are using.
If m.2 NVME 256gb are about $25 512gb are about $35 as are m.2 sata. If you are using 2.5" sata ssd prices are about the same as well. (Amazon prices)