Clone Windows – 2.5 SSD to M.2 For FREE
This video shows how to clone a Windows drive to a larger SSD or M.2 disk using one of the last remaining free disk cloning tools available. Instead of reinstalling Windows from scratch, you can copy your entire system, including files, apps, and settings, directly onto a new drive in just a few steps:
This little mini computer has died. However, me being the eternal dumpster diver that I am, I thought to myself: can I pull any spare parts out of this thing? What do we have here?
Aha, what is this? Looks like a one terabyte SATA M.2 chip. While it’s not a PCIe M.2, I’ll still take it, and I know just where this thing can go.
This is my test machine, and I’ve already upgraded the storage space on it twice before. It started out with an ancient 80 gig mechanical hard drive that was upgraded to a 128 gig SSD, which was then quickly upgraded again to a 256 gig SSD. Basically, I just upgrade parts on it whenever they become available. So this one terabyte M.2 is going to be a great upgrade.
However, one thing I won’t be doing is reinstalling Windows on it. I’m simply going to clone the existing 256 gig SSD in its entirety over onto the new one terabyte. To do this, I’m going to use one of the few remaining free tools available for cloning drives called Macrium Reflect Free. But first things first, let’s remove this chip and install it onto the test machine alongside the existing two and a half inch SSD drive. Let’s move this video card out of the way real quick to give us some space.
All right, beautiful. Now that our new drive is connected, let’s grab the free software we’ll need for the cloning process. When you install Macrium Reflect, be sure to select Personal Free License and enter a real email address when prompted. You’ll receive a custom link via email that you need to use to download the software.
Now that we’ve got the program installed, let the cloning process begin. Click on your original drive, then click Clone This Disk. Click Select the Disk to Clone To and select your new drive. Now click Copy Partitions and select the option Shrink or Extend to Fill the Target Disk. You can see in our example that the program will expand the original drive when cloning to make use of the larger size of the new drive. Go ahead and click through the remaining prompts and click OK to start.
How long the cloning process takes depends on how much data you have to clone as well as the speed of both the original and the new drives. This example took about 33 minutes.
Now that the cloning process has finished, I’m going to shut down the computer and remove the original drive. Once we turn the computer back on, let’s see if it boots back up. Oh yeah, back in action. Let’s see how much free space we’ve got now. Beautiful.
Another successful upgrade to the test machine. Time to download GTA 5 and run some benchmarks. If you have any questions, please feel free to leave a comment in the video, and thanks so much for watching!
UPDATE: Some viewers have reported that Macrium Reflect Free no longer supports this type of drive cloning. Other viewers are saying that it still works. If you know for real, please let us know in the video comments!
Macrium Reflect Free:
