How to Create A Bootable Clone for Windows 11?

PAGE CONTENT:

Can I clone Windows 11 to an external SSD or HDD and make it bootable?

Is there a way to clone Windows 11 system and installed applications to an SSD for better performance or to clone a hard drive in Windows 11 for disk upgrade or backup? Can I clone Windows 11 or copy it to another drive and make it bootable? A backup is an absolute necessity for any computer user. However, sometimes hard drive cloning is required.

If your hard disk in Win 11 ever fails, you can replace it with a new one and have your Windows system backed up by using a disk clone. Cloning your hard drive means creating a replica of your drive's contents to another disk. Is Windows 11 hard drive cloning something you're interested in? In fact, you can easily complete this task with a right disk clone solution.

How to choose a good disk clone software for Windows 11 bootable clone?

Top-notch disk cloning software includes:

• Easy — It moves information using data migration with a simple method of system backup and restoration. Just simple clicks, you can copy Windows 11 and all the programs to external hard drive without reinstalling.
• Effective — Instead of spending hours configuring each computer separately, you can restore numerous machines simultaneously with a Windows bootable clone.
• Compatibility – Clone between various brands of hard disks, and support hard disk cloning between different sizes, especially when your external hard disk space is smaller than the system disk, as long as the data on your Win 11 system disk is smaller than the external hard disk, you can achieve cloning, such as cloning from a 500G system disk to a 250G external SSD.
• Safe and sound — Rest assured that the highest possible safety level guards your information.

Here we recommend Donemax Disk Clone to do cloning windows 11 to external hard drive to make a bootable clone. This cloning software that has been tested and practiced by us and meets the above characteristics. The important thing is that it does clone the system to an external hard drive with a few simple clicks and guarantees boot. This's why we recommend and use it.

How to clone Windows 11 to an external SSD or hdd with Donemax Disk Clone?

Here are the steps to copy entire Windows 11 OS to an external SSD or HDD:

Step 1. Connect your external hard drive to your Windows 11 computer with a cable.

Step 2. Launch Donemax Disk Clone and choose Disk Clone.

Step 3. Select the Windows 11 PC's system disk as Source and select the external hard drive as Destination.

Step 4. Click Next button.

Step 5. Edit the partition layout on this external hard drive.

• "Only clone existing data" - only copy existing data on the source partition to the destination partition.
• "Autofit the disk" - resize the layout on destination partition according to the size of it to make the disk as the best status.
• "Copy as the source" - do not change anything on destination partition and the layout is same as source partition.
• "Edit disk layout" - allows you to manually resize/move partition layout on this destination disk.
• Check the optimization for SSD option if the destination partition is SSD to improve its efficiency.

Step 6. Click on Clone button. It will clone all the data on Windows 11 system disk to the external disk.

Step 7. Then you can set to boot Windows 11 from the external hard drive after cloning.

Once the process gets finished, you can use the external hard drive as a Windows 11 bootable disk.

How to backup and restore Windows 11 to an external hard drive without software?

Here are all the specifics on backing up and restore Windows 11 system hard disk to external hard drive with it's build-in backup through the setting menu.

Go to the Start menu in the middle of the taskbar > search for "control" to bring up the Control Panel.

Find "Backup and Restore(Windows 7)" and open it.

Select "Create a System Image" from the menu on the left.

You'll be prompted to choose where the system image will be stored, such as hard disk, DVD, or network location.

Select "Next" and you'll get a summary, total storage space, and a list of backup drives, including the EFI system partition.

Click the "Start backup" button to create the Windows 11 system image. Your drives will be backed up in order, and an image will be created to restore the Windows 11 OS.

After backing up, you can restore the disk image to the external hard drive. All the data will be restored to the new drive in Windows 11.

A disk to fix the system will be created once the operation is finished. If your computer corrupts or you experience a BSOD, you'll be glad you made a backup or clone of your system. You can also create the repair DVD which contains Windows system recovery tools, and can reinstall Windows after a catastrophic failure or reimage your computer.

How to boot Windows 11 from an external HDD or SSD after cloning?

When cloning is completed, how to changed to boot Windows 11 from the external hard drive as the primary boot device? To make a cloned SSD or HDD bootable on a Windows computer, you can alter the boot order in the BIOS as the simple steps below.

• 1. Restart the PC and hold on F2, F8, F11, or the Del key to access the BIOS setup screen. Different brands of computers may have different keys to enter the BIOS.
• 2. Switch to Boot Menu.
• 3. Press "Shift" and "+" to pin the boot options of the cloned external hard drive to the top, or put the USB boot to the first one
• 4. Press "F10" to save your changes and restart the computer.

Conclusion:

Partition or Disk selection and cloning from one disk to another in Windows 11 is possible and can be accomplished easily with the help of Donemax Disk Clone. However, the original contents of the target disk will be permanently erased after cloning, so please backup important data on it. Now I hope you have successfully cloning Windows 11 system to an external hard drive and make it bootable.