"Simple" move O/S from one SSD to another with Easeus Todo Backup

@GracieAllen

I installed EaseUS Todo Backup to see if it could create the bootable media. It can. Step 1a. in post #19
It looks like it will create an ISO image. Then you would use RUFUS (if EaseUS doesn't offer to do it for you), to put that ISO on a bootable USB stick.






Then I restored from my backup to remove EaseUS Todo Backup.




Note: As @monkeylove mentioned, Hasleo Backup Suite is a much better program than EaseUS Todo Backup.
It pretty much does everything, and it's free.

I suppose that the old and new SSD is a SATA and not NVMe
Further I Suppose that you have access to the PC you mentioned as System (1)
In that case everything can be done from there without any Rescue Disk.

1. Connect the disk to the PC (1)
2. Open Diskmanagement and find out the disk number #
3. download the attached Partition script (par.txt) and replace the (#) in line 3 with the disk-no. from step 2
4. Save this script as par.bat
5. rightclick and run as administrator
6. it should not take more than 15 seconds and your disk is ready for the Recovery
7. Run your Backup&Recovery (ToDo...) and recover only the OS-partition (temporaryly W:)
8. Should be ready within 5 min.
9. open command prompt (cmd) as administrator
10. copy & paste: bcdboot W:\windows /s S: /f UEFI
11. Ready to boot in your laptop!

No other 3rd party software is needed
the above script is only for preinitialized disks!
In Future: Whenever you want to recover only one partition, run reagentc /disable first

I don't know why some turn simple things into rocket science. Simply connect the target drive and clone to it. No formatting or anything else needs to be done. I clone with Acronis, but there are other programs very capable of a simple clone job.

To the OP....

GracieAllen said:

Instructions say "Choose the recovery location". I have NO OPTIONS for "choosing" anything other than the original drive I'm trying to get it OFF of. New drive is there, initialized, but the only thing Todo Backup shows is the EXISTING system drive which is where I DON'T want the new installation.

Click to expand...

I know nothing of Todo, but typically when you attempt to clone a drive you need to tell the clone software what drive is being cloned, and what the target drive (drive you're cloning to).

In preparing the system for cloning, you need to make sure the target is connected to the PC "before" the cloning process/software is started. In near all instances, there is no need to format or do anything to the drive other than connect it to the PC.

And yes, you can connect the drive externally and once cloned replace the old internal drive with it. Cloning kits - SSD Cloning Kit

@Dru2
1+1=2 and 2*2=4 right?

To prepare a disk for a OS-migration is a basic Windows operation and like 2*3=6, but not rocket science!
Copy & Paste is also not a rocket science. But it would be interesting to know what rocket science in your opinion is!
If you read the thread carefully and understand everything you realize that a "CLONE" is not an option.
Analyse the given infos and you come to the conclusion, that a "clone" would be the worst^2 option!
worst^2 =worst*worst. right?

Thanks for all the replies.

Got it done. I deleted the partition(s) on the new drive. Ran the Restore again. This time, unlike the repeated times yesterday, the new drive showed up and I was able to restore to it. I wound up with only 2 partitions instead of the 5 the original installation had, but it boots and I don't care. I did have to go in with a partition manager and change the O/S drive to use 150GB instead of the 931 the restore gave it, but that wasn't a big deal.

GracieAllen said:

Thanks for all the replies.

Got it done. I deleted the partition(s) on the new drive. Ran the Restore again. This time, unlike the repeated times yesterday, the new drive showed up and I was able to restore to it. I wound up with only 2 partitions instead of the 5 the original installation had, but it boots and I don't care. I did have to go in with a partition manager and change the O/S drive to use 150GB instead of the 931 the restore gave it, but that wasn't a big deal.

Click to expand...

Good job.

The two partitions are the Windows partition and the EFI partition.
You need both of them to boot Windows.





Now that you got things set up the way you want, make a fresh backup.

Always good to have a backup! And hope you never need it!

GracieAllen said:

Always good to have a backup! And hope you never need it!

Click to expand...

No truer words... but I would take it a step further and say "Always good to make regular backups" .
It's said around here a lot, but folks still won't do it. Le sigh!

I did this around four times, but it was for Win 10 (it might work for Win 11). Instead of moving the OS I just backed it up to a spare drive, then cloned the SSD to a new drive, and then either switched the boot sequence to the new SSD or detached the first SSD.