How to Transfer Data From One Hard Drive to Another in Windows 10/11

Is there any way to transfer data from one hard drive instead of manual migration through a cable? Of course, there have some quick and efficient solutions to solve this problem.

Suppose you want to replace the old hard disk with an SSD or larger disk while retaining all applications and the current operating system. In that case, you can use the copy disk function. There is no need to reinstall the system and software to upgrade to solid-state drives or larger disks.

The disk cloning software copies all data in the old hard disk, including system, software, and partition layout, to the new hard disk to replace the old hard disk. Compared with reinstalling the os and applications, the disk cloning utility would save a lot of time.

Reliable Disk Cloning Software to Transfer Data for Windows 10/11

It would be best to have reliable and versatile hard disk copy software to copy a hard disk. You can try DMclone. The software can run under Windows 10 / 8.1/8/7/xp and vista. It allows you to migrate the system to solid-state disk, mechanical hard disk, etc.

DMclone provides two ways to copy hard disks, as follows:

1. Clone the disk data: this method only copies the used sectors on the source hard disk to other hard disks. At the same time, it supports adjusting the partition size on the target hard disk. In this way, you can even copy a sizeable hard disk to a small hard disk.

2. Clone the hard disk(sector to sector): in this way, all sectors of the source hard disk will be copied to the target hard disk regardless of whether the sectors are used. In this way, when selecting the target hard disk, the capacity of the target hard disk needs to be greater than or equal to that of the source hard disk.

Precautions for using DMclone hard disk function:

1. All data on the target hard disk will be overwritten by the data on the source hard disk.

2. The hard disk where the system partition is located, dynamic hard disk, and offline hard disk cannot be used as the target hard disk.

3. Files deleted or lost on the hard disk can only be copied to the target hard disk through "sector to sector copy."

Let's take a look at how to transfer data on Windows 10/11:

Step 1: Select clone source and clone target.

Select a disk or partition as the clone source in the pop-up clone window. The target can be an empty disk or unallocated space as the clone target. Click next.

Step 2: Edit the destination disk layout.

To edit the cloned target disk layout, you can select auto fit disk layout, clone as the source disk, or manually edit disk layout.

Step 3: Perform cloning.

After confirmation, click "execute" to start the cloning process.

How to Boot from the Target Disk after Hard Disk Cloning?

If your PC does not allow you to keep both the old hard drive and the new hard drive, you need to replace the old hard drive with a new hard drive:

1. Turn off the computer.

2. Remove all external equipment;

3. Then open the chassis cover, remove the old hard disk and install the cloned solid-state hard disk or mechanical hard disk in the exact location.

4. At last, close the housing cover. In this process, a screwdriver is required

Suppose you can keep the old and new hard disks simultaneously. In that case, you need to enter the BIOS to set the new hard disk as the previous boot device:

1. Restart the PC and press a specific key (usually F2, Del, ESC, F8, F9, F10, F11, or F12) to enter the BIOS continuously.

2. Use the arrow keys to select the target hard disk as the previous boot disk.

3. Press F10 to save the changes and exit.

It is time-consuming to replace the hard disk with essential data on it. But now, having a disk cloning and data transfer utility makes disk upgrade and replacement easy. There is no need to reinstall the operating system programs and do manual data transfer. DMclone provides a three-step solution to transfer all data to a new HDD/SSD.