How can I tell if my SSD I just cloned to is "bootable" ?

It is worth running chkdsk on the cloned partitions, if you haven't already.

Then assuming there is no file corruption or if chkdsk claims to have fixed it, try what I suggested a few days ago. You should be able to do it in a minute.

post 16

Bansaw said:

I looked at the Macrium Reflect boot fix feature and created rescue media.
I clicked on fix boot problems and it found my Win10 partition. But then the next step in the wizard said, "no active partition" and would not go any further. GPT disks are not supposed to need an "active partition" as far as I know.
I was running Reflect in UEFI mode.

By cloning partition by partition, you cloned to a disk that is MBR. You would have to convert the new SSD to GPT before cloning. Macrium Reflect is now looking at the new SSD and detects that it is MBR, so it is also looking for the active partition that would make it bootable.

This my strong recommendation. Create a system image of the bad SSD stored on a separate HDD or SSD, either external or internal does not matter. Install the new SSD into the computer and do a clean install of Windows 10. That way you negate any bad effects of the bad sectors that may carry over if you had cloned. Then simply mount the system image of the old SSD and copy any of your needed data files from the image.

Just to satify navylcdr that it is a gpt disk.

Are you having a nap Bansaw?

I might go for a little lie down myself in a minute.

SIW2 said:

Just to satify navylcdr that it is a gpt disk.

Are you having a nap Bansaw?

I might go for a little lie down myself in a minute.

What worked for me was to initialise the disk as GPT, and then have Macrium create a disk image. Then I restored that image to the new target disk. This meant that it maintained the paritiotns etc... and this ...booted!

However, the Macrium image making process did reveal more bad sectors that I thought - I had initially thought there were only one or two. Chkdsk /f didn't report any disk errors actually, but there are some.
I may have to contemplate a fresh Win10 install which would be a major pain.

The new SSD did not boot to the Windows login, but I got it into safe mode with networking. I might try a few things before conceding that I might have to do a fresh install.

You have done something different now. It was gpt as you can tell by looking at the diskmgmt screenshot you posted.

I may have to contemplate a fresh Win10 install which would be a major pain.

I always found it quick and easy. Transferring your data and programs might be tedious.

SIW2 said:

You have done something different now. It was gpt as you can tell by looking at the diskmgmt screenshot you posted.

Yes. Now I'm looking at doing an sfc/ scannow, and a Dism /RestoreHealth to see if it starts to behave better.

yes that is certainly worth trying

SIW2 said:

Just to satify navylcdr that it is a gpt disk.

Are you having a nap Bansaw?

I might go for a little lie down myself in a minute.

Disk 3 in the screenshot in post #29 appears to be MBR, which explains the error message in post #27. Look closely at the first partition on disk 3. It is not an EFI System Partition. It is a FAT32 Basic Data Partition with ESP for a volume label. If disk 3 were GPT when cloning, the EFI System Partition would have cloned as an EFI System Partition, not as a Basic Data Partition.

Also on Disk 3, the 128 MB MSR partition from disk 4 cloned to disk three as a partition with no file system (RAW), which would not have happened if disk 3 was GPT.