Operating-system install the popular Clonezilla to clone a Mac OS hard drive (basic usage) Example Naturally, being able to install hard drive cloning utilities can be an important aspect of installing and maintaining your operating system. Features of Clonezilla are Free (GPL) Software, Filesystem supported ext2, ext3, ext4, reiserfs, xfs, jfs of GNU/Linux, FAT, NTFS of MS Windows, and HFS+ of Mac OS, Multicast is supported in. All versions of Clonezilla live support machine with legacy BIOS. If your machine comes with uEFI secure boot enabled, you have to use AMD64 (X86-64) version (either Debian-based or Ubuntu-based) of Clonezilla live. Checksum files are GPG signed by DRBL project, which has the fingerprint: 54C0 821A 4871 5DAF D61B FCAF 6678 57D0 4559 9AFD. How to Clone Mac with Bootcamp running Windows 7,8,10 Cloning Mac with Clonezilla Guide IT 24 Seven www.ads24seven.com http://www.ads24seven.com/2016/10/22/c.
/PowerMyMac /Guide on How to Clone Mac Hard Drive to SSD
When it comes to the cloning topic, what do you expect from the process? If you are planning to clone Mac hard drive to SSD, let us take a close look at what is the cloning process all about. Generally, it is recommended to clone the hard drive of your Mac in case you decide to upgrade the hard drive with a solid state drive (SSD), replace an old or corrupted drive with a new one or if you are going to create a bootable hard drive.
In most cases, all these demands can be achieved with the help of cloning. Essentially, when you clone the hard drive, you will no longer worry about reinstalling the operating system as well as transfer folders, files, applications and some configurations on the new hard disk. Another advantage with the cloning process is that if you have a duplicate hard drive with setup volume, it can aid in booting your Mac easily in case of unexpected disasters.
Article GuideWhat are solid state drives (SSDs)?How to clone Mac hard drive to SSDShould I backup or clone?Let's wrap it up
What are solid state drives (SSDs)?
Before you decide to clone Mac hard drive to SSD, let us take a close look at SSDs. Solid state drives or SSDs utilize flash memory to keep data. If built into a computer, they are usually seen as chips on the circuit board. You can also find them in 2.5” format that you can install in a laptop or an external enclosure.
Generally, SSDs are quiet, compact and fast, especially if you are starting up a computer or waking up the device. Remember that hard disks might go into sleep mode when not used for a certain span of time and takes a few seconds to spin up. SSDs also utilize less power, run cooler, lighter and do not have any movable parts which make them suitable for laptops.
When you accidentally drop your laptop when the hard drive is spinning, there is a likelihood for the drive to be damaged and lose data. SSDs are generally more dependable, and in case they fail, you can still read data whereas you cannot do this with a hard disk.
Nevertheless, SSDs are considered as a costly option if you are considering the cost to storage ratio. At present, you can purchase an 8TB external drive for less than $150 while that same amount of money will only provide you with a 500GB SSD.
People Also Read:How to Partition A Hard Drive on Mac?How to upgrade your MacBook Pro with an SSD?
How to clone Mac hard drive to SSD
There are several reasons why it is best to boot from an external hard drive. In case you prefer to keep your files synchronized from a desktop and laptop, enlarge your storage or have an on-hand bootable backup duplicate of your system, there is an unseen feature in Disk Utility that makes the process an easy task.
Essentially, booting from an external hard drive is usually slower, even if you are using the latest Thunderbolt or the USB-C drives. They are relatively sluggish than the solid state drives (SSDs) that are found in most of the latest Macs. Although this is not suggested for daily use, it is a possible option.
Using Disk Utility
If you are going to clone Mac hard drive to SSD, it is recommended to use Disk Utility.Simply open Disk Utility from the Spotlight (Command+Space) or on the Utility folder in your applications. You will be presented with a list of all the volumes including the internal hard drive and the external hard drive.
It is important to note that the “Restore” option in Disk Utility will work by copying the files from the backup to your core drive. It is ideally intended to the utilized for Recovery mode to reinstate the hard drive in case a failure occurs.
Once you decide to set your external drive as the restore target, you can switch that action around and copy files from the main drive to the backup. Choose your external drive in the sidebar, tap on the “Restore” button in the menu and select your main drive as the “Restore From” option. You have the option to choose an ISO image, but it does not have much use.
Tap on the “Restore” button and Disk Utility will initiate the copying process. In most cases, the process is relatively a long one which is based on the speediness of your external drive as well as its link to your Mac. Due to this, it is recommended to have a rapid hard drive with USB-C, Thunderbolt or USB 3.0 connections.
Once Disk Utility completes the task, you can turn off your Mac and press on the Option when it starts to restart again. You will be presented with the boot switcher and you are allowed to boot from the external hard drive. You can utilize your Mac as usual but remember that it is separate from the installation on the main internal hard drive. Take note that any settings that you alter or files that are saved there will not be reflected on the primary installation.
You can perform the same process in a reverse manner if there is a need to copy the files back over or to restore the backup in case your computer malfunctions.
Should I backup or clone?
Generally, hard disks can be backed up or cloned. Remember that there are differences between the two with their own advantages and drawbacks.
Backing up a hard drive
If you are going to back up a hard drive, the entire content of the chosen drive or partition is backed up into a file on the targeted location. All data is saved into a single file. When a complete backup of the hard drive is carried out, the whole operating system along with the installed applications and settings are also set aside. The file can be protected or encrypted with a password.
The advantage of this approach is no other than simple management since a single file contains the whole backup. You can also compress the backup file so that it utilizes less space.
As for a drawback, you need a backup software to be able to reinstate the system or data to a previous state or to access documents and files.
Cloning the hard drive
If you are going to duplicate or clone Mac hard drive to SSD, a copy of the drive is created directly on the target location. This simply means that you have an instant copy including the hard disk structure. A cloned disk or drive includes all the partitions from the source drive or disk.
An advantage with cloning is that the data is directly copied to the specified location and can be utilized and edited directly. The duplicated system drive which includes the operating system can be mounted as a fresh drive and booted right away.
As for the drawbacks, a clone requires more space since the partitions are created immediately on the targeted disk. Due to this, it is not likely to compress or add encryption to the data.
Let's wrap it up
If there is a need for a backup to be created regularly, it is recommended to opt for the hard drive backup. This usually takes up less space and allows the creation of extra backups.
In case you require a bootable extra drive to be operational after an unforeseen crash and to lessen the downtime period, it is best to clone Mac hard drive to SSD.
Generally, both methods have been proven to be the ideal choice. A consistent drive backup for daily data along with a clone of the system drive is essential for easy accessibility in case of emergencies.
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Free DownloadAbout Clonezilla disk to disk clone
Clonezilla is one open source cloning and imaging software which has three available typesincluding Clonezilla live, Clonezilla lite server and Clonezilla SE. Clonezilla livesupports single machine backup and restore, while Clonezilla lite server or SE is formassive deployment. The tool supports various system including Linux, Mac OS, Windows,FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, and more. Users can use Clonezilla for system backup, full driveclone, system deploy, etc.
Now you are planning to replace your old hard drive to make computer perform better. To makeit, Clonezilla is a good choice that can help you clone your entire drive to the new drive directly. It just makes use of these used blocks to save and restore files which increasesthe clone efficiency. But since Clonezilla does not have a user-friendly GUI, some users mayfeel difficult to use it. In addition, there are some limitations you should know:
- The destination partition must be equal or larger than the source one. In otherwords, Clonezilla cannot help you clone larger drive to smaller drive. This maydisappoint users who tend to clone to a different size disk.
- It’s possible to meet error during the clone. Many users have reported the Clonezilla failed to cloneissue. Where there’s a bad sector on your disk, there’s a high probability that you willencounter this problem. A bad sector is a tiny cluster of storage space that cannot beused to read or write data, so likely Clonezilla fails due to the bad sector.
In the next part, we will show you how to use Clonezilla disk to disk clone to copy your harddrive. If you want to clone larger drive to smaller drive, please refer to Part 2 to get thesolution.
Part 1. Clone disk with Clonezilla
Here in this part, you will know how to use Clonezilla disk to disk clone feature. Pleasemake sure the destination partition must be equal or larger than the source one.
Step 1. Prepare Clonezilla live.
Go to Clonezilla download page to get Clonezilla live. Here we put Clonezilla live on the newhard drive and use it to boot Clonezilla. Please make sure there’s a bootable partition onyour hard drive to boot it. Or you can put Clonezilla live in bootable CD or USB.
Clonezilla Docs
Step 2. Boot the Clonezilla.
Insert the new hard drive that is bootable with Clonezilla live to your computer and bootClonezilla live.
Step 3. Choose “ToRAM” option in the boot menu.
Select “Other modes of Clonezilla live” in boot menu. The choose “Clonezilla live (TO RAM,Boot media can be removed later)”. In this way, all the Clonezilla live file on SSD will becopied to RAM, so the partition of SSD can be released.
Step 4. Select language.
Step 5. Choose keyboard layout.
Step 6. Choose “Start Clonezilla”.
Select “Start Clonezilla” > “device-device work directly from a disk or partition to adisk or partition” > “Beginner mode: Accept the default options”.
Step 7. Choose “Disk-to-local-disk”.
Step 8. Select source disk.
Step 9. Select target disk.
You can choose to check the source file system, or you can just choose to “Skipchecking/repairing source file system”.
Step 10. Start cloning.
Clonezilla will ask confirmation several times like asking about cloning boot loader totarget disk, and asks confirmation about cloning data from source disk.
Step 11. Disk is cloning.
Select “Poweroff” and then your machine will be halted. And your new hard drive is ready tobe used.
As you can see, the whole process is kind of complicated also time-consuming, especially forthe newbie. Cloning disk with Clonezilla needs lots of steps which may make you confused.And it cannot help you clone larger drive to smaller drive. Fortunately, there’s oneeasy-to-use Clonezilla alternative which can help you finish the job without effort. Justkeep reading to get it.
Part 2. Clonezilla alternative - available to clone larger drive to smaller drive
AOMEI Backupper Standard is one freebackup, clone, sync, and recovery software for Windows users. Supports all Windows OSincluding Windows 10/8/7. It can help you clone hard drive easily with its DiskClone feature. Compared to Clonezilla disk to disk clone, AOMEI Backupper canprovide you a more wonderful performance.
1. It supports cloning larger drive to smaller drive, such as clone 500GB HDD to 250GB SSD.
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2. It offers different cloning solutions: disk clone and partition clone. You can choose toclone the entire hard drive or only selected partitions as per your needs.
3. It will ignore bad sectors while cloning to ensure a successful clone.
In addition, AOMEI Backupper has an easy-to-use interface unlike Clonezilla’s text-basedinterface. You can easily achieve clone job with AOMEI Backupper’s friendly GUI. Check thefollowing steps to see how to clone hard disk with this powerful tool.
Step 1. Download,install and launch AOMEI Backupper.
Step 2. Click Clone and then choose Disk Clone. (If youonly want to copy OS to new drive, please use SystemClone in AOMEI Backupper Professional.)
Step 3. Select the source disk and click Next.
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Step 4. Select your new hard drive as the destination to clone the source drive to. Thenclick Next to continue.
Step 5. Check the operation summary and click Start Clone.
Notes:
1. 'Edit partitions' allows you to resize partitions on thedestination disk.
2. Select 'Sector by sectorclone' if you want to clone every sector no matter it is used or not, even it’s ablank sector or a logical bad sector.
3. If the target disk is an SSD, check 'SSD Alignment' to improvethe speed of reading and writing as well as prolong the service life of SSD.
Conclusion
Now you know how to use Clonezilla disk to disk clone feature. Compared to Clonezilla, AOMEIBackupper is a better choice when it comes to cloning hard drive. It can help you easilyclone larger hard drive to smaller hard drive.
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Besides, it is more than an alternative to Clonezilla. It is also regarded as anextraordinary free backup and restore software. It offers various backup & restoreoptions to keep your data safe. Such as restore computer to anearlier date when you need.