Why Do You Need to Clone Disk to Kingston SSD?
SSD (Solid-State Drive) and HDD (hard disk drive) are two common types of computer hard drives. When you plan to get a new computer, you need to decide to choose either an SSD or HDD as the storage component. Which one is better? It depends on your needs.
If you want an economical product and need a lot of storage capacity, an HDD is the best choice for you. However, an SSD tends to replace a traditional HDD with its excellent properties like speed, performance, ruggedness, noise and more.
Among so many SSDs on the market, which one do you choose? Kingston is a famous storage device brand and its SSDs are highly valued for their reliable performance and quality.
To get a better computer performance, you can consider cloning disk. Under the circumstances below, you need to resort to Kingston SSD migration software:
- Upgrade disk to a larger Kingston SSD
- Transfer data from HDD to Kingston SSD
- Back up disk data without data loss
- Migrate operating system to Kingston SSD without reinstalling
How to perform a disk cloning on Windows 10/11? It is a good idea to turn to some clone software for Kingston SSD. In the second part, we will show you some free methods to clone your HDD to Kingston SSD.
Best Kingston SSD Clone Software
Some Kingston SSDs offer a license for the SSD migration tool – Acronis True Image OEM to help you migrate OS to Kingston SSD. However, you may find Acronis clone disk failed while cloning sometimes. If you are unable to fix this error, you can turn to some free Kingston SSD clone software – MiniTool ShadowMaker and MiniTool Partition Wizard.
Option 1: MiniTool ShadowMaker
MiniTool ShadowMaker is a piece of free and professional Windows backup software. This powerful tool comes with multiple features, enabling you to create a file backup, system backup, disk backup, partition backup, and sync your files.
MiniTool ShadowMaker TrialClick to Download100%Clean & Safe
What’s more, MiniTool ShadowMaker even supports cloning a data disk or system disk to another hard drive. This useful allows you to transfer all data from HDD to SSD without reinstallation. Here, let’s see how to clone your HDD to the Kingston SSD with this tool:
Step 1. Download and install MiniTool ShadowMaker for free.
Step 2. Launch this tool and hit Clone Disk in the Tools Page.
Step 3. Choose the system disk as the source disk and Kingston SSD as the target disk.
Step 4. After hitting Start, you will be prompted by a warning message saying that Data on the target disk will be destroyed. Hit OK to confirm this action.
Step 5. MiniTool ShadowMaker doesn’t need a reboot even when you are cloning the system disk, that’s why we recommend this Kingston SSD clone software. Once the cloning process is complete, you had better disconnect the source disk or the target disk because they have the same signature.
Windows operating system doesn’t allow two hard drive disks to work at the same time if they have the same disk signature, or else you will encounter disk signature collision on your computer.
Option 2: MiniTool Partition Wizard
Apart from cloning HDD to SSD with MiniTool ShadowMaker, you can also rely on another Kingston SSD clone software – MiniTool Partition Wizard. This free partition manager offers two features for you to clone your hard drive:
- Copy Disk Wizard – is designed for both system disk clone and data disk clone.
- Migrate OS to SSD/HD Wizard – is only aimed at OS migration.
Here, we will show you how to use the two features to clone a hard drive with MiniTool Partition Wizard respectively:
# Copy Disk Wizard
This feature is similar to the Clone Disk feature in MiniTool ShadowMaker, which helps to copy all partitions and data from one disk to another. Whether you want to copy a system disk or data disk, it can meet your needs. Here’s how to use this feature to clone your disk:
Step 1. Launch MiniTool Partition Wizard to enter the main interface.
MiniTool Partition Wizard DemoClick to Download100%Clean & Safe
Step 2. In the left pane, click on Copy Disk Wizard and choose the source disk.
Step 3. Choose your Kingston SSD as the destination disk and hit Yes to confirm this action.
Step 4. Choose one copy option:
- Fit partition to entire disk – all the partitions will occupy the entire disk of the SSD proportionally.
- Copy partitions without resizing – the partition size of Kingston SSD won’t be changed. Here, we select this option as an example.
Step 5. Since MiniTool Partition Wizard will need a reboot to complete this cloning process, you should change BIOS settings and ensure the new disk is the default boot disk.
It is noted that if you need to clone the system disk or migrate the system to an SSD with MiniTool Partition Wizard, you need to register it with a license to apply the last cloning operation. If you want to clone a data disk, it is totally free.
Click Finish to go back to the main interface and hit Apply to begin the disk cloning process.
How long does your disk cloning process take? If it takes much more time than expected, you can seek some solutions in this guide - [Full Fixed!] Disk Clone Slow on Windows 10/11.
# Migrate OS to SSD/HD Wizard
As the name suggests, this feature allows you to migrate OS from HDD to SSD. It also provides you with two migration methods – either to copy the system required partitions or copy all the partitions on the system disk to another disk. Let’s see how it works:
Step 1. Launch this Kingston SSD software and select Migrate OS to SSD/HD Wizard from the left pane.
MiniTool Partition Wizard DemoClick to Download100%Clean & Safe
Step 2. Choose a method to migrate your system disk. Here, we choose the second method as an example.
Step 3. Then, you need to choose the Kingston SSD as the destination disk and make sure there is no important data on it.
Step 4. Choose one of the copy options according to your actual need.
Step 5. Then MiniTool Partition Wizard will require you to change the boot order in BIOS to boot your PC from the target Kingston SSD.
Step 6. Click on Apply to start the OS migration.
How to Deal with the Old Drive After Cloning?
Some of you might wonder what to do with your old drive after cloning the operating system from an HDD to your Kngston SSD. Usually, you have two options: one is to sell it to others, the other is to use it as a data disk.
Before selling the old drive to others, you had remove all the data on it to avoid data or privacy leakage. If you want to use the old drive as a data storage device, you need to format it and re-partition it.
See this guide: Does Partitioning a Hard Drive Affect Performance? Get Answer
# Further Reading: Kingston SSD Not Detected
Some of you might find that Kingston SSD is not detected on your computer. Don’t worry! This issue might be associated with the drive or some wrong settings below:
- A missing or conlicting drive letter
- Memory issues
- Uninitialized SSD
- Faulty disk driver
Fix 1: Assign the New Driver Letter
Step 1. Right-click on the Start icon and select Disk Management from the quick menu.
Step 2. Right-click on your SSD can choose Change Drive Letter and Paths.
Step 3. If the drive letter doesn’t exist, hit Add. Also, you can hit Change to tweak the current drive letter.
Step 4. Choose the new drive letter from the drop-down menu and hit OK.
Fix 2: Initialize Kingston SSD
Step 1. Open Disk Management and right-click on the SSD that is not detected to select Initialize Disk.
Step 2. In the Initialize Disk screen, choose the disk you want to initialize and select the partition style.
Step 3. Click on OK to start the initialization process.
Step 4. After your Kingston SSD is initialized, right-click on your SSD volume in Disk Management and select New Simple Volume.
Step 5. Follow the onscreen guidelines to assign the SSD volume and drive letter.
Fix 3: Update Disk Driver
Step 1. Type device manager in the search bar and hit Enter.
Step 2. Expand the Disk drives option and right-click on your Kingston SSD to choose Update driver.
Step 3. Select Search automatically for drivers and download & install any update available.
Fix 4: Run Memory Diagnostic Tool
Step 1. Press Win + R to evoke the Run dialog box.
Step 2. Type mdsched.exe and hit Enter to launch Windows Memory Diagnostic.
Step 3. Select Restart now and check for problems (recommended) and wait for the process to complete. After completion, your computer will reboot automatically and display the test results for you.
We Need Your Voice
In conclusion, when it comes to Kingston SSD clone software, there are two recommended options for you to choose from: MiniTool ShadowMaker and MiniTool Partition Wizard. Both of them are free, reliable and easy to use, so you can choose one when you need to clone a disk.
We are sincerely looking forward to receiving any ideas about MiniTool ShadowMaker or MiniTool Partition Wizard. If you need any help when using the two Kingston SSD clone software, feel free to leave a comment below or directly contact us via [email protected].
Kingston SSD Clone Software FAQ
Some Kingston SSDs come with clone software, but not all of them include a clone tool. To clone a Kingston SSD or clone a hard drive to it, you can try two freeware - MiniTool ShadowMaker and MiniTool Partition Wizard.
To clone Windows 10 to Kingston SSD, you can perform a disk cloning with MiniTool ShadowMaker and MiniTool Partition Wizard, or you can directly migrate your OS to SSD with MiniTool Partition Wizard.
A few SSDs come with clone software, for example, a Samsung SSD has the cloning software called Samsung Data Migration. However, most SSDs don’t come with clone software. MiniTool ShadowMaker and MiniTool Partition Wizard are the best software to clone a disk to an SSD from Kingston, Samsung, WD and more, and they are really worth giving a shot.
Unfortunately, Acronis True Image does not offer a free plan. In order to use the advanced features, you must pay for a license or subscription.
About The Author
Position: Columnist
Aurelie is a passionate soul who always enjoys researching & writing articles and solutions to help others. Her posts mainly cover topics related to games, data backup & recovery, file sync and so on. Apart from writing, her primary interests include reading novels and poems, travelling and listening to country music.