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Keeping it brief.

Upgrading SSD in my laptop. Only one SSD slot. Thinking of creating a system image on my external hard disk.

  1. Creating a Bootable usb
  2. Creating system image in external hard disk
  3. Installing windows in new SSD in laptop via Bootable usb.
  4. Using restore option in windows and selecting the system image in external hard disk to recover all my files.

Could you please let me know if this will work?

Details:

Laptop - Asus G14 2021 Model New SSD - Samsung 990pro External HD - WD Passport Only one SSD slot in my laptop.

I do not want to invest in a nvme to usb adapter. Hence can't clone and thought of this.

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  • This should work, but seems like extra effort to me. I use Sync Back Pro to keep documents and files on 2 machines and sync’d daily to keep current instead of non current on an external image. Also my experience with good SSD drives (4 machines) is that they are highly reliable,
    – anon
    Commented Dec 7, 2023 at 16:59
  • This question should include more details and clarify the problem.
    – Ramhound
    Commented Dec 7, 2023 at 17:04
  • @Ramhound I've added extra details. Please check.
    – Anon
    Commented Dec 7, 2023 at 17:10
  • 1
    So what exactly is your question? Creating an image of a disk, putting it on an external disk, and restoring the image to a disk should work.
    – Ramhound
    Commented Dec 7, 2023 at 17:42
  • 1
    The only issue might be if the HDD and SSD are different sizes. If the SSD is smaller, of course, the image might not fit. If larger, after cloning, there would be unallocated space, which could easily be added to the last partition or made into a new partition. Some software kvetches when restoring to a disk of different size.
    – DrMoishe Pippik
    Commented Dec 7, 2023 at 18:28

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
1

My preference would be to perform an identical clone of the old NVME onto the new. Looks like a lot of steps but it's really not. here are the steps...

Preparing the USB:

  1. Download the Clonezilla ISO file
  2. Download Rufus USB Boot
  3. Run Rufus USB Boot.
  4. In Rufus, select the USB drive under "Device," then click on the "Select" button next to "Boot selection" to point it to the Clonezilla ISO file you downloaded. Click "Start" to initiate the process.
  5. Wait for Rufus to finish creating the bootable Clonezilla USB. Once completed, your USB is now prepared for use.

Saving the image:

  1. Power up the machine and boot into Clonezilla using the USB drive.
  2. Choose your preferred language and keyboard settings, then select "Start Clonezilla."
  3. Select "device-image" as the operation.
  4. Choose "local-dev" as the source.
  5. Connect the external HDD and wait for 5 seconds. Press "Enter" to continue.
  6. Confirm that both the NVME and HDD are visible in the resulting screen. Press "Ctrl+C."
  7. From the menu, select the external HDD's main data partition.
  8. Choose "Beginner" as the mode.
  9. Select "Savedisk" to save the image.
  10. Provide a name for the saved image.
  11. Choose the NVME as the source disk.
  12. Proceed through the remaining prompts to initiate the process of saving the NVME image to the HDD.

Install your new NVME and then proceed with the below

Restoring the image to the new NVME:

  1. Power up the machine and boot into Clonezilla using the USB drive.
  2. Choose your preferred language and keyboard settings, then select "Start Clonezilla."
  3. Select "device-image" as the operation.
  4. Choose "local-dev" as the source.
  5. Connect the external HDD and wait for 5 seconds. Press "Enter" to continue.
  6. Confirm that both the NVME and HDD are visible in the resulting screen. Press "Ctrl+C."
  7. From the menu, select the external HDD's main data partition where you saved the image.
  8. Choose "Beginner" as the mode.
  9. Choose "Restore disk"
  10. Proceed through the remaining steps on screen. If your new NVME is a different size to the last one, you will want to select "create partition table proportionally". This will resize the partitions to fit your new NVME capacity.

After the restoration process is complete:

  1. Shutdown the machine.
  2. Remove the Clonezilla USB drive.
  3. Power up the machine and enter the system BIOS/UEFI.
  4. Ensure that the new NVME drive is set as the primary boot device.
  5. Save the changes and exit the BIOS/UEFI settings.
  6. The machine should now boot from the upgraded NVME drive with the cloned image.
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