Solved Trouble imaging or cloning disk

I'm preparing for some extensive travel in a very remote area, and I would like to fully backup my HD (not just back up the files) before going, because if something happens to my computer along the way, it would be impossible to re-download software.

First, I tried to use the built-in 'system image backup' in windows 8.1 (accessible from file history). However, I get the 'There is not enough disk space to create the volume shadow copy on the storage location... (0x80780119)' error, presumably because the 'Windows Recovery Environment (System)' partition that came on my Lenovo laptop has 3 MB free (347 of 350 filled).

Not knowing how to safely mess with the 8 partitions that Lenovo put on the labtop (why so many!?), I decided to try after-market software to create a disk clone. I chose EaseUS Todo Backup Free 6.5 and tried to clone the whole disk. However, I get error '0x67817701, the sector size of destination disk and source disk is inconsistent' because my external HD has a sector size of 4 K, while the laptop HD has a sector size of 512 bytes.

So next I thought I would just create a new partition on the external with sector size of 512 bytes, but when I try to do that (using EaseUS Partition Master Free Edition v10.0), I don't have the option of 512 byte sector size.

How do I just create a copy of my HD so that I can easily replace my laptop HD if something happens to it?

Hi

Instead of trying to clone the drive to your external HDD, i would recommend creating a full disk backup image. This way sector size won't matter and you will have a complete backup. My personal choice is "Macrium Reflect Free" which is faster than "ToDo backup" ( personal opinion ).

Macrium Reflect FREE Edition - Information and download

v5: How to create a disk image (Backup, Image, v5)

Thanks for the suggestion Anshad. Using Macrium to create a disk image worked perfectly.