Thinkpads Forum

A co-worker has purchased a new HP Elitebook 860. He knows that I prefer to clone the machine's original SSD, before the the machine is being used for daily use. This way, a person can easily restore back to the machine's original factory setup.

So, I downloaded and installed the latest free version of AOMEI BackUpper. I put his original SSD in a USB enclosure. I put a never-used Samsung 840 PRO SSD in the Ultra-bay caddie of my T61. I performed a DISK CLONE without changing any settings.

Naturally, his machine produces a Boot Device error and will not start up Windows 10.

Since then, I have learned that his original SSD uses GUID Partition Table (GPT), instead of MBR. I have learned that his machine runs Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI), instead of BIOS.

I verified that his machine's setup had turned off UEFI Secure Boot Startup.
I changed his machine's setup from UEFI to Legacy.

His machine still produces the same Boot Device error.

So, how do I go about trouble-shooting this problem?

Can a brand-new 10 year old Samsung 840 PRO SSD support GPT?

How can I check whether DISK CLONE to destination Samsung 840 PRO as MBR or GPT?

I would guess that I could use Windows/Admin Tools/Disk Management.
Can this be done in Windows 7 or do I need to use a Windows 10 machine?

Compare MBR and GPT: https://www.alphr.com/mbr-vs-gpt/

However, versions of Windows earlier than 8 can’t boot off of GPT drives. This means earlier OS versions have to use MBR on their primary/boot hard drives.

The clone parameters GPT-->GPT or GPT-->MBR or MBR-->GPT can be set in Backupper.

Set both drives to GPT should be the easiest solution. Then you proceed with the cloning. Though this also means you have already wasted about 100GB worth of write cycles.
I believe GPT has nothing to do with the age of the drive really. I have my GPT Windows 10 bootable setup on a 20 year old 8GB Toshiba hard drive and it boots off GPT perfectly.

Using the latest free version of AOMEI BackUpper. I put the original SSD from a brand-new HP Elitebook 860 in a USB enclosure. I put a never-used Samsung 840 PRO SSD in the Ultra-bay caddie of my T61. I performed a DISK CLONE without changing any settings.

It appears that my mistake was choosing "DISK CLONE" instead of "SYSTEM CLONE". With "SYSTEM CLONE", I see the SSD Alignment option and the Sector by Sector option. I believe that I should choose the SSD Alignment option.

Now, I have a new problem. I was able to choose my Samsung SSD as the destination disk (after using Windows 7 Disk Management to remove the partitions created from the earlier botched clone). However, AOMEI BackUpper automatically chooses my T61's internal SSD as the source disk. I desire to assign the HP Elitebook's SSD in my USB enclosure as the source disk. I am not able to find a way to have AOMEI BackUpper select the SSD in my USB enclosure as the source disk. Any thoughts on what I could try next? Would the paid version be any different?

So, I moved on to the free version of Macrium Reflect. At first glance, it appears to be Backup & Restore Disk Partition Image software. Since, I have no idea how to place the Windows 10 System Partition and the two Hidden Partition Images on a blank SSD, I gave up.

Running Macrium Reflect a second time, I see, in tiny font, a link that says "Clone this disk..." in the middle of the screen. Would anyone know whether Macrium Reflect will allow me to select the SSD in my USB enclosure as the source disk and the blank SSD in my T61's Ultra-bay as the destination disk?

Hi ,You have an internal SSD/HDD + ultrabay SDD setup and a USB SSD to be used as source you said right ? Does the USB SSD have a clone of the OS already in ?
As far as i know macrium uses the windows you had booted into as the source disk by default, when you click clone this disk than it asks for the destination disk to clone to, however on that same screen though , right top side you have an option as "slect different source disk" , have you played around with those settings?
Have a look at this #4
https://knowledgebase.macrium.com/displ ... ing+a+disk

P.S Besides , about your USB SSD to be used as source , i am sure you are aware of the differences between Clone & Image
Hope that helps.
Vopu

Vopu wrote: ↑

Fri Dec 11, 2020 2:49 pm

Hi ,You have an internal SSD/HDD + ultrabay SDD setup and a USB SSD to be used as source you said right ? Does the USB SSD have a clone of the OS already in ?

Yes, I placed the original SSD of my co-worker's HP Elitebook into a USB enclosure.
Yes, I placed the blank SSD into my UltraBay Caddie.

Yes, I believe that you are correct that Macrium Reflect chose the internal SSD of my T61 as the default source disk.

Running Macrium Reflect a second time, I see, in tiny font, a link that says "Clone this disk..." in the middle of the screen.

Having three disks attached to my T61 caused my confusion. With three disks, the "Clone this disk..." link scrolled off of the bottom of the screen.

At the moment that I placed a check_mark in the box immediately to the left of the image representing the Disk in my USB enclosure, the "Clone this disk..." link appeared. It is located at the bottom of the image representing the desired source disk.

Of course, there was one more obstacle for me to overcome. The original SSD is 320 GB and my blank Samsung 840 Pro is 128 GB. Unlike my very old version of Acronis True Image, Macrium Reflect does not automatically adjust the size of the partitions I clicked on another link (Position Partition, I think), and I reduced the size of the Windows 10 Partition which allowed me to "drag-n-drop" the last partition.

To remind future readers of this post, I used Samsung Magician 3.2 to run the optimize performance wizard to ensure that de-fragmentation (and other features) were disabled.

My co-worker's HP Elitebook immediately asked for his e-mail to initiate the Windows 10 setup process.

Thanks for everyone's help.

Glad you sorted out . From memory if not mistaken, i remember a way to resize automatically. Will be corrected if wrong , but ;
For reference though , say if the source disk 320gb has 4 partitions one being the windows partition to be cloned to 128gb, you can directly drag & drop all 3 but main windows partitions , and when you drop the windows partition last it automatically resizes to the remaining space to fit,as long as the un-allocated size is bigger than your windows partition.
Win10 has a habit of keeping the Win part. inbetween other partitions. you could even swap partition order by sliding after you dropped all , to match source disk. As said, it's been some time though, since i cloned using macrium. Just keep the boot at first.
Vopu