Migrate NVMe to NVMe

  • Tom
  • 1st March 2019

How to migrate NVMe to NVMe, Transcend TS128 to Kingston A1000?

The above title expresses the nature of this article, therefore I will cut the rubbish introduction. We all want to get to the bottom of this problem. I will list what you need first and how to do this based ONLY on my personal experience, using ONLY software I had to migrate from and to! I know you may have different software that worked for you and you also may have a different system configuration… If this article will help you migrate your SSD using a different environment than – BONUS 🙂

 

From:

transcend ts128

To:

kingston A1000 SSD

 

 

Migration Environment

Windows 10 including all apps and documents to new, unformatted disk.

Migration Hardware

Laptop MSI 72GP with Transcend TS128 to Kingston A1000 480GB (photo below). Kingston Pendrive 8GB and Toshiba portable USB SSD drive. Enclosure from Nvm Express – didn’t needed in the end, but will use it as it’s a superb bit of kit!

Migration Software Used

AOMEI (free), EaseUs (free), Macrium (free), Kingston Default that came with an SSD, but please read more below because some of them simply did not work for me.

Expected Final Result 

Increase the SSD memory by swapping drives. Copying system and all files (clone) 1:1. Please read the spec for both NVMe’s before proceeding with these updates.

Please Note

When migrating NVMe you have to make sure your motherboard is compatible and BIOS can read your new drive. The best option, in my opinion, is to send a quick email to your manufacturer for both, the PC and new drive asking for confirmation. That’s exactly what we’ve done.

 

Get Free Software:

macrium software

Here you can get free Macrium Software – really good stuff 🙂

easus software

Here you can get the EasUs software – only their Partition Manager worked for me

aomei buckuper

Type in Google Aomei Backuper to get this app – I didn’t use this in the end

 

 

In case you find yourself in a position where cloning is working but your Windows don’t want to start up your cloned version this is what we recommend. Apparanetally, same happens to Samsung NVMe and the same would of happen if we use Transcend drive. If whatever you’ve tried so far not working – please see below for details.

 

The Enclosure I’ve purchased works just fine. The problem was the cloning process.

 

NVMe to NVMe migration process

1. Do not Clone! – this will not transfer files for system boot.

2. Create a system Image instead (I’ve used EaseUs, Macrium) only Macrium worked for 100% image. We followed this NVMe to NVMe article. Some will say why did you not formatted your new drive first. If you have to do it I didn’t have to as this is imaging.

3. Macrium has an option to check your image and redeploy files that may have been dropped or corrupted when Imaging.

4. After checking, two additional files here downloaded for us. Wow – none of the previous software had this option (or we could not find this anywhere… sorry).

5. Created bootable USB – also with Macrium. Check this on to how to create rescue media with Macrium

5. Swapped the drive in your motherboard

6. Boot from USB. F2 on load or other depending on your PC and in Boot tab change to start system from USB you’ve just created.

7. Upload the Image System using your options from recovery.

8. Check for workability – Macrium option (loaded for me additional files…) perhaps for boot. Again this is something that no EasUs or AOMEI could detect in previous attempts – strange.

9. Reboot your PC. Now the tricky part, I couldn’t whatever boot from UEFI and Legacy. Simply because BIOS did not see the drive on Legacy and UEFI just created the look of constant rebooting. Perhaps because of GPT, not MRB – not sure. The only option that worked for booting was UEFI + CMD.

10. System booted up but very slow – everything worked fine but lagging.

11. Run windows trouble shutter and any other windows applications to make sure he checks the windows for any updates or missing files. In fact, this option opened for me after the windows loading, so I just run the scan to make sure all works.

12. Reboot your PC. While booting go to BIOS (F2)and change you booting back to just UEFI – > F10 to save and “Voila” – I got extra free space and faster drive – love it. Despite the fact that combining it took me approx. 26hours of cloning plugin unplugging and testing different software.

 

How to move partitions in NVMe

Once all done I’ve moved to accommodate the extra space for my drive as you are probably aware the Imaging copied all partitions like for like.

This is a bit tricky too, we didn’t know that you have to have free space to the right of the partition you want to extend.

Handy in this case proved the EasUs – but not the backup software only EasUs partitions. Really simple moving some other partitions to finally bring my empty space next to the C:/ and increase the value. Please see this article for help no to how to move NVMe partitions.

Good Luck 🙂
Tom