My journey of replacing my HDD with an SSD

[JerryF]

I took the plunge and got an Samsung EVO 250 GB SSD. My laptop had a 320 GB HDD. I attached my Samsung with my USB to SATA adapter. No problems there; it was instantly accessible.

I tried cloning the the HDD to the SSD using my bootable USB EaseUS Todo Backup (purchased) that has cloning. Unfortunately, my 9.2 version doesn't recognize EXT4 filesystem natively and has to use the sector by sector copy feature which takes a long time. Because it's a sector by sector copy, I couldn't resize any partition so that I could fit the larger 320 GB to the 250 GB. One thing it does have is an option to ✔---Optimize for SSD.

I then turned to my bootable USB (Linux version) of MiniTool Wizard Pro 8.1.1 (purchased). It's always done well for me with partitioning. Oddly enough, my / and /home partitions weren't being recognized as EXT4, only as "Other". Another EXT4 partition was recognized as "Ext4" and the Swap was recognized as "Linux Swap".

Because / and /home partitions were recognized as "Other", it was a sector by sector copy. At this point, I figured that I had better shrink the 320 GB HDD partitions so that they'd be small enough to fit onto the 250 GB SSD. I did that and then completed the copy. When I tried to boot the SSD, the message was that there was no OS found and was unbootable.

So I turned to Clonezilla, which I'm not crazy about but I figured that it's going to do the job. After burning a bootable DVD of the latest Clonezilla, I proceeded to clone the HDD to the SSD. Another hurdle. Clonezilla complained that my 320 GB HDD had both MBR and GPT elements (not a quote) and I would need to run sudo sgdisk --zap /dev/sdx on it. I did that. I proceeded to try the clone again. All seemed to work, but when I tried to boot from the SSD, it was a no go.

This was the point where I was at my wits end. I created an Aptik backup of my HDD, then I decided to do a complete fresh install onto the SSD and restore the Aptik backup. It worked like a charm! There were only a couple of items I had to redo (my desktop picture, login picture and options, and others that I don't recall).

Thank goodness for Aptik!!!

[AndyMH]

When I had to do this moving from a 240G SSD to a 480G SSD I used redo to backup the partitions and restore to the new SSD. Problem - it wouldn't boot. Fired up boot-repair, fixed the problem, easy! Then gparted to resize the partitions.

[Pierre]

on the odd occasion, where I've cloned a few partitions onto another drive,
& what I've usually done, is to leave a spare partition, in order to install another Linux System.
- that will then, of course, detect any other Operating System, and then add them to it's Boot Menu.
this avoids that Boot Failure Issue, which I've also experienced, as well.

[smurphos]

Thank goodness for Aptik!!!

Indeed, i did the same about a month ago except I skipped attempting to clone the old HDD. An Aptik assisted fresh install and all up and running within an hour of taking the old HDD out. I like Aptik a lot.

[JerryF]

When I had to do this moving from a 240G SSD to a 480G SSD I used redo to backup the partitions and restore to the new SSD. Problem - it wouldn't boot. Fired up boot-repair, fixed the problem, easy! Then gparted to resize the partitions.

I tried boot-repair several times. Much to my surprise, it didn't work.

[JerryF]

Thank goodness for Aptik!!!

Indeed, i did the same about a month ago except I skipped attempting to clone the old HDD. An Aptik assisted fresh install and all up and running within an hour of taking the old HDD out. I like Aptik a lot.

It's funny, so many praise Clonezilla, but I've never found it to be easy and effective.

If I ever need/want to replace my disk, I'm not even going to try cloning.

[WharfRat]

JerryF,

I've never used Aptik - I've cloned numerous disks and always used the dd utility with 100% success

[srq2625]

I recently moved an LM install from one HDD to another but opted to:

• Boot up LM LiveUSB
• Shrink one partition with gparted because it was larger than it needed to be
• Copy all the partitions from the source to the destination using gparted
• Fix grub:
  • $ sudo os-prober to get the device on which LM is copied
  • $ sudo mount /dev/sdaX /mnt to mount that partition
  • $ sudo grub-install --root-directory=/mnt /dev/sdX
• Reboot the computer to the new disk

Of course, the above works with BIOS and not with UEFI (haven't figured that part out yet).

[JerryF]

JerryF,

I've never used Aptik - I've cloned numerous disks and always used the dd utility with 100% success

I've never tried dd. Many swear by it, but I was reluctant to use it.

[AndyMH]

It funny, so many praise Clonezilla, but I've never found it to be easy and effective.

Likewise, which is why I use redo.

[JerryF]

I recently moved an LM install from one HDD to another but opted to:

• Boot up LM LiveUSB
• Shrink one partition with gparted because it was larger than it needed to be
• Copy all the partitions from the source to the destination using gparted
• Fix grub:
  • $ sudo os-prober to get the device on which LM is copied
  • $ sudo mount /dev/sdaX /mnt to mount that partition
  • $ sudo grub-install --root-directory=/mnt /dev/sdX
• Reboot the computer to the new disk

Of course, the above works with BIOS and not with UEFI (haven't figured that part out yet).

I tried that. I had to shrink the / and /home partitions to a size that would fit the new disk. Then I wanted to copy a logical partition from the old disk to a primary partition on the new disk which Gparted won't do.

That's when I found out it wouldn't boot and tried boot-repair several times, which didn't work.

[srq2625]

I tried that. I had to shrink the / and /home partitions to a size that would fit the new disk. Then I wanted to copy a logical partition from the old disk to a primary partition on the new disk which Gparted won't do.

That's when I found out it wouldn't boot and tried boot-repair several times, which didn't work.

I don't know, but I'm guessing it was the copying of a logical (i.e., extended) partition that caused the issue.

[dXTC]

JerryF,
I was wondering if you've noticed any performance boost or improved battery life with the SSD upgrade. I had just finished doing the same type of upgrade for my Dell Inspiron laptop earlier this afternoon.

(I didn't have anywhere near the problems you had with Clonezilla, but I attribute that to the SSD's having exactly the same capacity of the hard drive it replaced. My problem was getting the laptop disassembled-- on my particular model, just about everything but the display must be taken apart in order to get to the hard drive bay.)

[JerryF]

JerryF,
I was wondering if you've noticed any performance boost or improved battery life with the SSD upgrade. I had just finished doing the same type of upgrade for my Dell Inspiron laptop earlier this afternoon.

(I didn't have anywhere near the problems you had with Clonezilla, but I attribute that to the SSD's having exactly the same capacity of the hard drive it replaced. My problem was getting the laptop disassembled-- on my particular model, just about everything but the display must be taken apart in order to get to the hard drive bay.)

I can't speak with regards to the battery life because I use my laptop at home and rarely is it unplugged. The startup time from cold boot to login screen is 20 seconds and from login to desktop is 3 seconds.

Sorry to hear that yours was difficult to replace. Mine was a removal of the battery (two latch releases) and slide out the bottom panel. Three screws to release the hard drive holder and slide out the hard drive with its case. Four screws to removed, put in the new SSD, and then do everything in reverse. The physical replacement took about 5 minutes.

[AZgl1800]

It funny, so many praise Clonezilla, but I've never found it to be easy and effective.

Likewise, which is why I use redo.

I have had more failures with Clonezilla by far, than success.
the menu system is a poorly crafted guide....
I have stuffed it into the waste basket....

ReDo works on some hardware, but not others that I own.

Macrium Reflect's Rescue Disk with all of the Extra Hardware Options added to it,
works on every piece of hardware I have tried it on.
the only Caveat with MR, is the boot up process while it is searching for the right drivers for a PC, is just a black screen w/o any progress indicators.

So, I just make sure the DVD light is blinking, and go mow the grass.

[rickNS]

I took the plunge and got an Samsung EVO 250 GB SSD. My laptop had a 320 GB HDD. I attached my Samsung with my USB to SATA adapter. No problems there; it was instantly accessible.

I tried cloning the the HDD to the SSD using my bootable USB EaseUS Todo Backup (purchased) that has cloning.

I got the same drive awhile ago. All my drives in use are cloned, The master as I call it is like a backup.
I also used TODO Backup (FREE version from a long time ago don't recall which version though) I am surprised that it didn't work for you, it worked flawlessly for me every time including the dual boot stuff.

[AZgl1800]

Thank goodness for Aptik!!!

Indeed, i did the same about a month ago except I skipped attempting to clone the old HDD. An Aptik assisted fresh install and all up and running within an hour of taking the old HDD out. I like Aptik a lot.

I have espoused upon Aptik for a long time.
It is much simpler, and usually faster to do a fresh install of the OS, and then let Aptik put the house back in order.

No Pain, No Strain.... just tell it to go, and get another six pack out.

[Portreve]

Sounds to me like it would have been easier to just maintain current backups of your data and so a fresh installation, repatriate your data, and call it good. That's what I did when I changed out my MBP's HDD for what is probably the same SSD that you have.

[sgtor]

Sounds to me like it would have been easier to just maintain current backups of your data and so a fresh installation, repatriate your data, and call it good. That's what I did when I changed out my MBP's HDD for what is probably the same SSD that you have.

This is generally how I do it too. I agree with the rest of you about clonezilla, it's language is super cryptic and I actually find dd easier to use. If it's cloning I want to do then dd is the goto tool for me.

[Portreve]

I've known people on several major platforms — Mac OS, Mac OS X, Windows 9x -> Win7, and assorted GNU+Linux distros — who use or have used hard drive cloning utilities, and automated backup utilities, and I've really never taken a shine to any of them, including Apple's very own Time Machine. I'm not at all trying to poo-poo backup utility software, and I fully acknowledge in certain settings, like in a business with multiple desktop systems and servers and all that, that such utilities are essential. But personally, I've just never found them to be particularly useful.

My data is all backed up, and super critical data is backed up redundantly. As such, I can most of the time blow away my computer whenever I want, and easily repatriate my data afterward. What do I need a utility for?