Moving pre-installed Windows 8 from HDD to SSD

[theog]

For Windows 7 take a look here:
http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/13326-downgrade-windows-8-windows-7-a.html

 

[tmsmith616]

Thanks again. Successfully initialised sad using the command prompt. Repair or restore faq surname errors though.

So I gave up and went to instal win 7. Now I get 'secure boot violation....invalid signature detected. Check secure boot policy in setup' FFS I can not spend my life on this and am disgusted with my simpleton go to Apple and return this Asus thoughts!

Secureboot has to be disabled for windows 7. Go into bios. If you don't see an option to disable it, look for an option to set an administrator password. I've heard some laptops won't let you disable secureboot until an admin password is set.

 

[diesele]

Revisited BIOS/UEFI - this seems independently modified by which OS you are trying to install!!!??? A complete disable of secure boot now seemed possible with the WIn 7 DVD in the drive (WTF?) so disabled it and successfully installed Win 7. Even got a lovely 7.9 out of 7.9 for CPU and disk in Win Experience So, as a complete system rebuild was now clearly on the cards thought I'd try to restore to the fully paid for Win 8 recover USB flash disk - ESPECIALLY as BIOS was now not in this Win 8 'spectre controlled' consumer killing secure boot mode. No go - usual 'disk locked' or 'wrong partition' errors.

I mean, could they MAKE it any harder?!

Huge thanks for your help and tips though - really appreciate it on this learning curve. I have long since asked for vendors help and may simply ask for my money back on this useless Farstone cloning software; They cant sell it as 'Win 8 & UEFI' compatible if MS have locked such a cloning possibility out on Asus computers. It also creates 4000k strips - not the 1024 ones an SSD needs, so might have been shite anyway...

I just can NOT spend more time/swearwords on this -work tomor!

 

[theog]

For test.
Just cloned my test rig with uEFI, GPT, Secure Boot setup, using Paragon Backup & Recovery 12, no problems.
Booted first time.



Paragon 12 has full support Windows 8 uEFI, GPT & Secure Boot.

PARAGON Software Group - partition manager, drive backup, hard disk partitioning

 

[diesele]

I tried the demo vers of that Paragon app when selecting a cloning tool but it didn't work with a " "the operation 'apply changes is not available" error. Maybe a limitation on the trial - but enough to put me off risking a purchase. May revist.

Did you use the 'migration' command in it - we users still use the term clone as that seems potentially the most successful! HA!

Final question - what PC or motherboard?

Final final q - I have NTFS not GPT source drive - if I didn't the Farstone ISO app may have worked?

Thx

 

[SIW2]

I think you mean MBR.

Pargon stuff is excellent.

You can try the free one first and see how you go.

I am using HDM Pro 12 - it is $100 , but you may find one of the less expensive deals will be all you need.

There is a deal On B&R Home ( not so many partitioning functions as the B&R Suite ) right now - it comes with separately downloadable winpe boot media builder.

 

[theog]

Hi Si

The screenshot is of the free try of B&R. Worked for UEFI, GPT, Secure Boot, from Windows 8 desktop.

Free try link:
Paragon Backup & Recovery Home



I use Hard Disk Manager 12 Pro.

$100, with Windows 8 win pe, boots with Secure Boot ENABLED.

 

[Epoch]

For test.
Just cloned my test rig with uEFI, GPT, Secure Boot setup, using Paragon Backup & Recovery 12, no problems.
Booted first time.

View attachment 14029

Paragon 12 has full support Windows 8 uEFI, GPT & Secure Boot.

PARAGON Software Group - partition manager, drive backup, hard disk partitioning

THEOG! IT WORKED!

So I know you posted this awhile ago, but I hadn't tried it because I could only find the paid version. After you posted this link I found the free trial version. I installed the program, went to Disk Migration, automated everything, took out the HDD, put in the SSD, and it boot in less than 5 seconds, perfectly.

Wow! There is a solution.

So now what do I need to do to ensure the proper utilization of my SSD? People have talked about "alignment" and other nouns that don't mean anything to me in the computer sense. I will probably install my Samsung Magician software to see what it can do (that came with my SSD).

 

[theog]

So now what do I need to do to ensure the proper utilization of my SSD? People have talked about "alignment" and other nouns that don't mean anything to me in the computer sense. I will probably install my Samsung Magician software to see what it can do (that came with my SSD).

Paragon do a alignment tool, but I believe only free with a paid version, check on the Paragon web site.

 

[jwarchal]

Edit 1

So I have a Lenovo Y400 with 1 TB HDD and I have been working on this for a few days. Thanks for you all of the info that everyone provided and sorry for making this so long.

I installed a Crucial M4 256GB MSATA SSD in my laptop. I downloaded and used the free version of EaseUS ToDo Backup. I had been trying to look at various guides to migrate the OS to the SSD. You would think this would be an easier process, but guess not.

I used the EaseUS ToDo Backup to clone a backup copy of the main HDD on an external HHD and then again to copy the entire HDD to the SSD including the recovery partitions and checked the "Optimize for SSD" option. I resized the partitions so that the Windows partiton was 200GB and the Lenovo partition was 16 GB and left all the other partitions alone. Note: You can use EaseUS Partion Master if needed to adjust the partition sizes. I used it initially, but it is not necessary if you don't have too much stuff on your drive. I did this to a new out of the box computer.

You could probably just copy the Windows partition only to the new drive using the ToDo Backup, but I wanted the extra copies of the other partitions, just in case. It took about 20 - 30 minutes to clone to the MSATA SSD. I rebooted and removed the HDD.

Checked the BIOS and made sure that the M4 was listed as the Boot Drive with the UEFI enabled. Computer booted to windows in lless than 15 seconds included pw entry. Only problem was that the OneKey recovery doesn't work now, but I already had created a USB recovery back up drive with the recovery partition using Windows. Alternately, I believe if you call Lenovo and tell them that the Onekey Recovery is not working they will send you the recovery discs.

I reinstalled the HDD and set it up for storage. You can reformat the whole drive if you want the space, but I would make sure you have some way of doing the system recovery either with discs from Lenovo or a recovery drive. I think I may call Lenovo to see if I can get a set of the discs as a backup. If I a do, I might try to do a fresh install to the SSD to see if I can get the OneKey recovery working and then reformat the HDD for just storage.

Thanks again for everyone's input.

Just as an added note you can do all of this without removing the main HDD if you are migrating to an MSATA, but not if you are putting a new drive in place of the HDD. That would require some extra steps outlined in the link below.


This thread also gives some good info: How to: Disk and Partition Cloning, Backup, Restoration, & Migration

 

[diesele]

THEOG! IT WORKED! +1 for Paragon. Ohh the hours and hours I could have saved if i'd bought this first! Thanks so much for your help here.

I suspect the alignment is 4000kb rather than the prfereffer 1020kb? Checking this now and hope this is fixable in a straightforward way.

I like the way Win 8 is optimising (trimming) the drive once a week - never seen this tool in my SSD install on main desktop machine that runs Win 7. I wonder if its trimming there?

Anyway will report back on the alignment possibility with Samsungs bundled sware.

Meantime I will be asking Farstone for my money back - still no response to my support request but the holidays wont have helped any business here.

 

[diesele]

I found this and seem aligned:

To check the alignment of your SSD's partition, it is quite simple.
In windows 7, run msinfo32 by typing it into the search box on your start menu and hitting enter.
click on: components => storage => disks
Look for your SSD and check the partition starting offset.
It needs to be divisible by 4096 (ie return a whole number when you divide by this) otherwise the alignment is not correct.

 

[diesele]

This app checks alignment Download AS SSD benchmark 1.7.4739 - Technical Details - FileHippo.com

Hover the mouse in the top left box and it will indicate alignment or not.

Getting almost 500Mbps read and 400Mbps best write on the SSD

 

[theslyprofessor]

The OG, you are a mofo'n OG. This method will become THE defacto method for cloning an HDD to an SSD once google moves this thread closer to the first results.

The only problem I had encountered was that Paragon software allowed me to migrate the disk without initializing it first, which caused problems at reboot. I initialized it before hand it worked flawlessly. Thank you theog, diesel, and especially Epoch for so clearly articulating your problem which I have painfully endured for almost 2 weeks.

 

[Epoch]

Computer booted to windows in lless than 15 seconds included pw entry. Only problem was that the OneKey recovery doesn't work now, but I already had created a USB recovery back up drive with the recovery partition using Windows. Alternately, I believe if you call Lenovo and tell them that the Onekey Recovery is not working they will send you the recovery discs.

I reinstalled the HDD and set it up for storage. You can reformat the whole drive if you want the space, but I would make sure you have some way of doing the system recovery either with discs from Lenovo or a recovery drive. I think I may call Lenovo to see if I can get a set of the discs as a backup. If I a do, I might try to do a fresh install to the SSD to see if I can get the OneKey recovery working and then reformat the HDD for just storage.

I didn't get the EaseUS clone to boot, but the free Paragon program runs the OneKey Recovery. I haven't actually done it to see if the image would burn correctly, but I DID copy the recovery partition from my SSD onto a USB. I have already started personalizing the OS so I am not going to try to reinstall using the recovery drive, but everything else has worked so I think that should.

I found this and seem aligned:

To check the alignment of your SSD's partition, it is quite simple.
In windows 7, run msinfo32 by typing it into the search box on your start menu and hitting enter.
click on: components => storage => disks
Look for your SSD and check the partition starting offset.
It needs to be divisible by 4096 (ie return a whole number when you divide by this) otherwise the alignment is not correct.

Yup I found this out independently and I checked and the number was divisible by 4096.

This app checks alignment Download AS SSD benchmark 1.7.4739 - Technical Details - FileHippo.com

Hover the mouse in the top left box and it will indicate alignment or not.

Getting almost 500Mbps read and 400Mbps best write on the SSD

The test of my Samsung 830 using the Magician software got 500Mbps read and 400Mbps write too.

The OG, you are a mofo'n OG. This method will become THE defacto method for cloning an HDD to an SSD once google moves this thread closer to the first results.

The only problem I had encountered was that Paragon software allowed me to migrate the disk without initializing it first, which caused problems at reboot. I initialized it before hand it worked flawlessly. Thank you theog, diesel, and especially Epoch for so clearly articulating your problem which I have painfully endured for almost 2 weeks.

Yeah, perhaps I should edit my first post and place a walkthrough of what worked for me? I started this thread because I was getting fed up with the problem and I just couldn't believe that no one on the internet had solved the problem yet. As time went on, more and more people have posted in this thread (and in another one on Lenovo's website) that they want to do the same thing. It baffled me that a simple upgrade could be so complicated. Thanks again to Theog for providing help along the way and a viable solution.

 

[cheesum]

Hi all;
Firstly, a big thank you to THEOG...thanks alot...i will definitely try out his approach this Saturday.

Anyway, can i ask for forumer's opinion on this approach as per below...the objective is to use the SSD as a boot drive on a Lenovo Y580.

Steps:
(1): Use the Lenovo One Key Recovery - recover to a 16GB thumbdrive.
(2): Take out the HDD from the laptop and replace the HDD with the SSD.
(3): Load the retail copy of the WIndows 8 64 bit CD. The OEM license key is coded into the BIOS. (SOmeone on the Lenovo forum states for Y580 (which has WIndows 8 pre-installed), the USB drive cannot recover to a blank SSD / HDD. Hence, i will loading the Windows 8 64 Bit first into the SSD.)
(4): After loading Windows 8, stick in the USD thumbdrive and recover to the SSD.

Will the above work???? Also, will WIndows be smart enough to create a partition in the SSD to hold all the drivers????



If worst come to worst, then, i will be using THEOG's method. Any feedback are welcome.

 

[theog]

Yeah, perhaps I should edit my first post and place a walkthrough of what worked for me? I started this thread because I was getting fed up with the problem and I just couldn't believe that no one on the internet had solved the problem yet. As time went on, more and more people have posted in this thread (and in another one on Lenovo's website) that they want to do the same thing. It baffled me that a simple upgrade could be so complicated. Thanks again to Theog for providing help along the way and a viable solution.

Hi Epoch

This is a more detailed post.
http://www.eightforums.com/installation-setup/17083-how-migrate-os-new-hard-disk.html

 

[theog]

Steps:
(1): Use the Lenovo One Key Recovery - recover to a 16GB thumbdrive.
(2): Take out the HDD from the laptop and replace the HDD with the SSD.

(4): After loading Windows 8, stick in the USD thumbdrive and recover to the SSD.

You would need to test.

Also, will WIndows be smart enough to create a partition in the SSD to hold all the drivers????

You need to download the drivers or copy the drivers from the HDD.

(3): Load the retail copy of the WIndows 8 64 bit CD. The OEM license key is coded into the BIOS. (SOmeone on the Lenovo forum states for Y580 (which has WIndows 8 pre-installed), the USB drive cannot recover to a blank SSD / HDD. Hence, i will loading the Windows 8 64 Bit first into the SSD.)

YES.

How to install with a uEFI/ BIOS firmware:
http://www.eightforums.com/tutorial...e-firmware-interface-install-windows-8-a.html

 

[jgregori37]

Hooray for Paragon! For me it solved the exact same problem Epoch was having. I was able to use Paragon to clone my factory-installed HDD onto a SSD that I bought, and then swapped the HDD out for the SSD, and bingo. Windows 8 is running perfectly off of the SSD, which is now my primary and only internal disk. Thanks to all of you for your very helpful posts, and thanks especially to THEOG and Epoch for giving me hope.

 

[theog]

Hooray for Paragon! For me it solved the exact same problem Epoch was having. I was able to use Paragon to clone my factory-installed HDD onto a SSD that I bought, and then swapped the HDD out for the SSD, and bingo. Windows 8 is running perfectly off of the SSD, which is now my primary and only internal disk. Thanks to all of you for your very helpful posts, and thanks especially to THEOG and Epoch for giving me hope.

Welcome to EightForums.

You are welcome, well done.