Cloning a hard drive to a new bigger SSD!

[cap2587]

I am currently using a Kingston 240 GB SSD as my main drive and I want to swap it out for a Samsung Evo 850 500 GB. What would be the best procedure to do this. I was thinking of using super duper/CC Cloner to clone my Kingston drive to my Samsung Evo. What about my EFI partition with my clover boot info on it. I am sure plenty of people have done what I am trying to do, therefore would love some feedback on the options and best way to do this. Thanks

 

[Verki]

recently, i upgrade my hard drive to Kingston ssd. as for me, I use aomei backupper (free version)to clone my original hard drive to new ssd. it works great and there is no error after cloning. furthermore, this software allows users to clone to a smaller disk.
more about this free disk cloning software
hope i can give you some help

 

[cap2587]

Thanks for the tip on the aomei backupper software. I am worried about what happens to my EFI partition on my old drive I am cloning. Does that put the EFI partition on the new drive and make it bootable? Once it clones to the new drive do I then take out old drive and connect new drive to same Sata connection as the old working drive. Really appreciate the input and help.

 

[esafeddie]

Don't know about the others but the paid version (not the free) of Carbon Copy Cloner does an excellent job of cloning your disk. It copies every thing, EFI partition, Recovery Partition and also make the new disk Bootable a really good piece of software, I have been using it since I got into Hacks and its never let me down. What ever choice you make Good Luck.

 

[cap2587]

Here is how it all worked out: I used the free version of carbon copy cloner to clone my Kingston SSD to my new Samsung Evo SSD. I then kept both drives connected and tried to boot from my Samsung, but it would not let me. I rebooted back into my Kingston drive, installed clover on my new Samsung drive in the EFI. I then copied all of my EFI folder from my Kingston drive onto my EFI folder of my Samsung Drive. Then rebooted with Samsung drive and Kingston drive removed and all smooth sailing. Hope this is understandable and someone gets something out of this post and the good feedback I received.

 

[sentur]

I need to do this exact procedure. Going from a smaller 128gb OCZ drive to a 500GB Samsung 850.

Did you notice that the serial or any of the important OS info changed after switching drives?

I currently have iMessage and App Store working with no issues and want to avoid this breaking due to switching out a bit of hardware?

 

[sentur]

It was a success.

I think I had to reinstall a few Applications, but the base OS didn't seem to change in any major way. I didn't lose Mac App Store or iMessage to my recollection.

 

[maleibow]

Hello! I'm a bit lost in all of this and was wondering if someone could help me understand this:

I have Super Duper and am currently making a clone of a Samsung 250gb drive to a Samsung 500gb drive. I'm almost positive I didn't use clover with the initial install (it was a few years ago and I'm running Mavericks). After I make the clone, what are the next steps? Will I be able to just swap out the drive and go from there, or do I need to first make some tweaks? I have't been able to find an EFI folder.

Just as a side note, I'm cloning to the SSD in an external enclosure, then I plan to swap it out internally with the older SSD. Not sure if that makes a difference or not. After this is finished, I plan to upgrade to Yosemite (and possibly beyond depending on the complexity of the upgrade.)

Any help would be GREATLY appreciated!!

Matt

 

[sentur]

@maleibow If it's a direct clone / bit for bit, then you should be able to swap the drives straight out.

The EFI is a separate partition on the primary boot drive. You can use the Clover Configurator to mount the EFI drive and then check what version or even if you have Clover installed.

 

[davebyford]

I've struggled with this problem for some time: back in the early days I used a Mac exclusively as a graphic designer but more recently use PCs.

However, there are times when I still need to run Apple software to work on clients material and I built an early Hackintosh using the instructions on this forum. The drive was small and I recently decided to back it up and clone it to a larger SSD but every method I tried, even a paid for Carbon Copy clone image wouldn't boot and I became paranoid that I'd lose my only copy and spend many, many hours trying recreate it.

I've tried all sorts of methods, scoured the internet and then finally found a program called 'EaseUS Todo Backup Home 10.6'. The free trial lasts 45 days and it cloned my drive using Windows 7 on my usual PC then installed it in the Hackintosh and it booted without a hitch.

I spent many, many hours setting up the first Hackintosh and getting it to work (and can't remember how I did it) but this software has solved the problem.

I have nothing to do with EasUS and had never heard of it but it may help others in the same situation.