I know this video is over 2 years old now, but I have to mention this for anyone who came to this video to have instruction on cloning their main drive to a new drive. AOMEI no longer allows system clones in the freeware version or the pro trial of their software. You have to purchase the pro version license. Just an FYI.

For those of who are late to the party, use Macrium Reflect Free edition to clone your drives as the AOMEI is no longer supporting cloning on the free version. I just completed cloning pcie3 250GB drive to a pcie4 500GB drive in just 13 minutes without any dramas. Cheers

Thank you so much! For a luddite like myself you made this so easy to understand and much less intimidating than many of the previous instructions I looked up. Thank you for explaining what you were doing and why so thoroughly and simply!

Something kept bringing me back to this video. There's something about your cadence that made me watch this video several times until last week my C drive hit maximum capacity. I ordered the docking station and an SSD drive, downloaded the pirated version of AOMEI Backupper because the free version wouldn't allow cloning and cloning my drive right now at 68%. Thank you so much for the encouragement and all the details. Also, you uploaded the video on my birthday so maybe that was a sign that I kept coming back to it lol. Cheers Mate!

When he felt the need to clarify the "Kids Videos" folder 😂

This video was fantastic! I just did a complete rebuild, went from an SAMSUNG PRO 1TB nve TO A 2TB, took an hour for the clone and 30 seconds to fix the partition. This is the smoothest build I'ver ever gone through. Not a single mess up or hitch. That never happens lol. Even when I opened chrome for the first time it asked if it could restore my pages that I had open just before I cloned. Incredible. Thanks man.

That was fantastic. Many thanks for taking the time to produce something as informative as this video!

note: Disk clone of the system drive is no longer available on the free version. Even if simply doing the same process as in the video and bypassing 'system clone' and going simply to Disk Clone as shown the app will recognize the GPT partition and force you to upgrade to the paid version. :(

Jay’s heart rate when he saw the ‘Kids Videos’ folder 📈📈📈

Jay, Phil, and Nick...you three have spoiled us this month with all these wonderful videos! Thanks guys. I appreciate it.

went from an HDD to an SSD, using this method about a year ago and it worked flawlessly. just recently deleted the old windows of the the HDD. Thank you very much for this video

Thank you so very very much Jay for sharing such an informational video and making this seem so easy that I feel confident enough to give it a shot ! Blessings and good vibes your way 🙏🏻😇

Jay is like a dad to all of us in the fact that he goes deep into explaining and put in extra work to spit game 💯 subbed for life

"You wouldn't clone a car." Jay: "Watch me do it for free!"

If I'm being completely honest, I had better luck with Samsung Data Migration, fully free and since I had a Samsung SSD I think it definitely helped. Managed to boot up from the SSD successfully which is awesome, so if anyone is looking to do this but is still running into issues with AOMEI or any other cloning software, Samsung Data Migration might be your next best bet

Found you doing a search for cloning and can not stop looking at that rig. I have searched your videos, but I can not seem to find the one you mentioned. I just subscribed and thank you for your very helpful information. Now please send me in the direction of that rig.

I know I won't be using this anytime soon-- but boy when I need it I can always count on Jay to tell me every detail. I would trust this dude to fix anything.

I tried cloning a hdd to SSD for a friend 1 yr after this video was made and this software company put the cloning ability behind a $50 pay wall.

Tried to clone disk from one SSD to another larger SSD but the free version does not support it anymore from the comments I'm reading. It kept prompting me to pay for the pro version. Its $40 USD for a year, no other options of than lifetime which is around $70 USD. I paid for it and its working fine, there are other ways by using a flash drive to move an OS over to another hard drive but it doesn't partition anything and you'll have to do it manually. I just wanted it for convenience sake lol

Thank you, Jay!! I cloned my Nvme ssd drive to a bigger drive 2 years ago and was going insane trying to figure out why the new drive wouldn’t boot on Windows 10! 2 years later, now I know why! Thanks to you! 👍 I’ll be doing this tomorrow! And finally have my bigger windows 10 drive!

Jay:- You need to be patient. Me who has downloaded 1gb movie files back in 2G days during daytime:- not a problem at all

Jay: "Kids Videos... these are videos for my daughters." FBI: "Understandable have a nice day!"

Thanks, jay. I hope you are getting well your information is Greatly appreciated

Thanks Jay. I know this is an older video, but it was really useful for me in cloning a bunch of PC's from spinning HDD's to SSD's. One thing I'd say to anyone following this is that if you have the ability, then definitley connect your new/destination SSD via SATA and do the clone from there rather than a USB hub as I've found it MUCH quicker (less than an hour doe 500GB drive) than in the video using a USB type hub (I have one, too). Once the clone is done, I simpy detach the old HDD and plug in the new SSD to the same port as the previous drive on the Motherboard (I'm not even sure that's necessary, but I guess it's minor OCD or something).

The timing of this video coming out is impeccable.

Looks pretty good. Personally I'm a big fan of todo backup. It can do some pretty crazy stuff besides the usual ssd upgrades and backups (system transfers with automatic mbr->uefi conversion for example)

Watching this about 1 year later and holy shit such a life savior, thank you!

Excellent tutorial my man! Sub'd! Crystal clear, straightforward, and I feel as if you touch on every key point but in a very concise and effective way that doesn't overload/overwhelm. Kudos to you my friend. At this point I've now watched several tutorial videos on this topic, but yours takes the cake and will be the one I follow when I do my upgrade. Thanks for putting this together.

You can actually adjust the partition sizes in the "edit partition" option on the bottom before you click start/finish

I am a fan of macrium reflect myself.

Its been 3yrs and im still rewatching this

Thanks, JZ. I bought a larger SSD some time ago and had absolutely no idea of how or what software to use to clone my old D: drive to the new. There's tons of stuff on KZfaq, but the first one even suggested software that installed malware that Defender couldn't fix!! How's that? I've had to re-install Windows. But managed to migrate using your suggestion. I should have checked your stuff first because I believe that you're a trusted source of information by many and your instructions make it so easy to follow. Thanks again!

I'll soon be needing to do this. I really appreciate this fam.

If you are having trouble with the paywall, make sure to initialize your new drive in the same format as your old drive. My old HDD was GPT while my freshly installed SSD was MBR (you can see these details in AOMEI as well). Using "create and format hard disk partitions," I was able to initialize my new SSD as GPT to avoid the paywall. (Converting and cloning a GPT drive to an MBR drive was only in the pro version). There are still other locked functions like expanding partition sizes to fill up bigger drives than the original disk, but luckily I did not have to deal with that in my case and I was able to use AOMEI with no other problems.

so its 8/17/23 and it wont let me clone for free, gotta love it

The " Two Cents" analogy pales in comparison to it's real value ! True knowledge, is Priceless ! So, Thanks for sharing !!

This is literally what I woke up to do today. What perfect time Jay! Thanks so much!

Just the vid i needed ! right on time im getting my pc tomorrow thanx jay xD

THAT was a superb video! Been watching for a while and am buying components for a Christmas new build for my 13 year old son. This will help a lot, thank you.

AOEMI didn't work for me, they wouldn't allow me to clone an OS, probably because they have a Migrate OS function and kept trying to upsell the pro edition. I tried to do the free trial, thinking it would allow me to actually test out the software, nope it did the same as the free version.

I think it's important that you guys who do these videos try and get across to the uninitiated the benefits of spending a little extra cash to purchase an extra drive and have it there just in case. I've been cloning my drives for years (I go back to the early days of Ghost) and it's always a comfort to know that if my drive goes bad I can just pop the other (cloned) drive in and be back up and running in no time. It's an easy way of dealing with a nasty virus too. I usually re-clone the drive if I install new software or make any major changes to the setup. That way both drives have the same software and configurations.

Macrium Reflect Free is also very good for cloning/backup up.

I just went to western digital and downloaded Acronis software for free and it cloned my OS with absolutely zero issues. It copied from my old Samsung ssd to the new Western digital ssd in around twenty minutes and I didn't have join anything or pay a penny. When it finished cloning it asked me to shut down my PC and remove the original drive. When I did that it booted from the new ssd with no problems at all. The software is called Acronis True image for Western digital.

Excellent video, did all that. Works like a charm, thanks. Bought me a Samsung QVO 870 1TB SSD at a sale ($90). First run to clone failed because i selected “SSD Alignment” (option can also be selected to optimize the performance if the destination is an SSD) because they advised it highly. Took up to 80% (4 hours) when it came up with a Failed Error (Not enough space). I did it again without it and still used sector by sector transfer and all my partitions on the 1TB Drive were perfectly cloned, including the three Windows partitions. Swapped the Drives and at first boot all great. Good speed improvements and a lot more snappy. Spending up to $40 for one time use is a bummer, but you get a lot of backup options. Thanks again showing us this feature, it made a change for the better for me.

3:14 Jay: "You can't just clone a drive" Also Jay: *"so anyway i started cloning"*

This worked perfectly for me. Cloned my 500GB SSD to 1TB NVMe. Then used the partition assistant to adjust partitions and erase the SSD. Was easy and quick for me.

Late to the party but thanks Jay for basically showing me any and everything I need to build a PC and set everything up

Thanks for making a video about this jay

Thanks, Jay. Finally a decent description which got me through the whole process and really worked.

10:00 smaller to larger drive 11:10 test booting from the other drive to test if os and programs work the same

Can you share with me where did you get that case?

this is a very useful tool i think no matter from its function or compatibility, Jayz is so right.

Had a 5 year old HDD start clicking - panic bought a new larger HDD and used the freeware AOMEI products listed here to successfully clone the HDD before it died. Much appreciated Jay!

Appreciate the Heads up Sea and Mevan

Thank you for this tip, it was very useful for me, especially because I don't want always to format my PC and I need to keep the things running. Well, thank you!

I use Macrium as that can resize partitions and do the clone

I know 99% of everything that you are explaining - just here for the tool. But man - how well you explain! I couldn't have done it even close to that. Kudos!

Yes I did have to subscribe. Also when he said much faster for NVMe. I wasn't expecting it to be a bit less then 10mins. Man that's quick.

Awesome! Currently using this to clone my smaller drive I use for my steam library to a bigger faster drive! Thanks Jay! ^_^

EDIT 11/8/21: Apparently, the below advice no longer works on later versions that restrict GPT to GPT transfers. Oh well. EDIT 6/9/22: DON'T USE THIS SOFTWARE! THE FREE RIDE IS OVER. USE SOMETHING ELSE NOW. ORIGINAL POST: IF YOU GET THE PROMPT TO PAY ON THE FREE VERSION: Go into disk management and initialize your new disk first. Make sure to match it to the same disk type as your source disk (MBR or GPT). When you re-run AOMEI it will let you past the paywall. Apparently it's a premium feature to clone to a different disk type, but if they match it goes right through.

Thank you! I do music production and my C/boot drive is only 25 GB ssd. However, a lot of the stuff I use for production defaults to C drive and can't be altered. I'm going to be copying from this boot drive to a 1tb ssd and I didn't think about the partition stuff.

Doesn't work. They have changed the features. It won't let me get to the point where is starts the clone without upgrading.

Imagine JayzTwoCents , I need this video after 2 years you made it. :)

Thanks for this Vid Jayz! With this i was able to clone my old system from a hdd to a new nvme SSD in under 2 hours.

The amount of time and agony that could’ve been avoided if this had been posted a month ago...

Free and trial version no longer support cloning.

It's now outdated, AOMEI has a paywall for this function now.

I use mostly seagate drives(old habit I picked up at a company I worked for) so the seagate disk wizard is free to use. If you're using at least one seagate drive I would highly recommend it, it takes care of all the partitioning issue.

Hey just want to say I followed your steps and I successfully clone my window 10 and I plan to make a backup for it because I will try windows 11 recently, and aomei is awesome!

Came across this today. This will really come in handy when I upgrade to PCIE Gen 5! Thanks!

this was really helpful! thank you so much. i appreciate it! 😀👏

IMPORTANT: AOMEI no longer offers the ability to clone a drive for free. it's now a premium feature that you have to pay 45$ for. I reccoment Macrium Reflect (free version) it's a similar process.

"Kids Videos" *Sweat* quickly explains lol

Too bad, we can't use their software for free anymore with the Trial Version for the cloning process, apparently.

The Best tutorial to learn how to make a windows clone disk properly Thank you sir. You've helped me a lot

Even in 2021 still a great tutorial. Only have to use the version of this video (6.3, December 2020) and it works!

Without even going through the steps to clone a drive I already feel 99.99% confident this is the best way of going about doing this. I am not one to normally comment on vids of any kind but I would like to say this particular video spelled everything out perfectly and was super easy to understand from start to finish. Now wish me luck as I tackle this small project....thanks Jay for the info!

Very good. This video is EXACTLY what I wanted to know.

Yup! Just as what I expect.. Not for free..

Thank you so much for this video! I just bought a 4TB and will be cloning my 2TB C drive (yes, I am still using regular HDDs) and was wondering how to clone it. It will be the first time cloning a drive, so I am happy you showed the whole process for us. If all goes well, I have an 8TB external HDD of movies that I need to clone onto a 12TB external. I don't have any techie friends, so google and youtube are my 'friends'. Cheers!

wow, just as i start thinking about doing this, Jay uploads a guide 😭

If you aren't afraid of a little command line, you can also download a Linux live USB image and burn it to flash drive, boot from it, and use dd to copy your Windows install to new drive. Just another free option I thought I'd mention. Great video!

At 5:15 when you select start clone a pop up comes up to buy pro. I did not find a way to get past that.

Now, for the next 10 years, we want to see this done with open source software like clonezilla 🤪🤣

no joke the timing on this is gods work

Such a great help! Hope you are well.

Just for FYI: The software mentioned in this video The Aomei Backupper doesn't provide the system and boot disk cloning feature in the free version. The website or the software doesn't tell you that. When you install and try to clone the disk, it will just keep prompting you pay up the moolah! Very sneaky practice by a garbage company.

Can just use the partition assist and click clone it does the rest automatically, don’t need the backupper

this aomei tool is really enough for me because my disks are mbr so it is nice

like always clean and simple :) ty jay

Need to upgrade my 1TB SSD NVMe to a larger drive (2TB) drive. Been a long time since I did anything like this so needed a refresher. Software looks easy enough to use and free is always good too. Well done sir and thanks for making the video.

Finally a channel I can trust with this info

This isn't working it's asking me to upgrade to Pro and I can't get any further

Very well explained. Thanks for the help.

Thanks Jay, exactly what I needed! main drive is about to burst, so upgrading :)

make sure to change ur new ssd/ hard drive to GPT in disk management (format same as the disk u wanna clone from), I used 6.3 AOMEI and it's working.

I used the free edition of Macrium Reflect instead. As my new SSD (128GB) is smaller than the original SSD (256GB), I had to manually copy each partition and adjust the main partition size so there's 520MB remaining for the recovery partition. Once that was done, the clone worked perfectly.

thanks for the help jay i love your vids

There are docks out there with a cloning function, got one of those and I use it all the time for cloning not only windows but also other OS like Linux 😉

All cloning options have a lock on it on the free version and the pro trial for me -.- Update: Macrium is still free for direct cloning