Need a "partial" system image file

Harmand said:

In addition to the Windows 10 environment, my 128GB SSD system disk contains about 55GB of non-system data. I'd like to create a "minimal" system backup image file from which to restore just the system (boot sectors, Windows files and installed programs, totalling about 30GB), without those non-system data.

In other words:
I'd like to obtain a single file from which to be able, in the event of SSD failure, to quickly restore just my system environment in a new (possibly bigger) SSD disk.

I was able to do something similar quite easily last year (when I added the SSD disk to my PC) by using a software that came with the SSD. I just had to "clone" my system HDD to the SSD, then change the boot order in the BIOS and finally reboot the system. In less than 20 minutes the SSD had become the "new" C: and everything was OK.
What I liked the most in that software was the ability, wisely designed for cases where the SSD is less spacious then the existing hard disk, to exclude from the operation (by selecting them) some folders, obviously provided they are not related to the Windows environment itself.
Sadly that software does not work the opposite way, which is what I need know.

Such a task, which looks quite obvious to me, seems to be very... weird, as it's almost never mentioned in any articles or reviews or tutorials about backups, disk cloning, system imaging and so on.
Maybe I am the weird one, but I'm still hoping to find a solution.

Thanks in advance for any help or advice. :]

As a rule imaging programs image a complete partition. Partition your SSD into two partitions - one for OS+Programs, other for data. Then you can backup OS drive but ignore data drive.

It will be a bit of a hassle moving data from C drive to (say) D drive as drive is fairly full.

Best way is to backup data to external drive, delete it from C drive, Shrink C drive to say 55 GB, create a new partition D (say) and copy data back.

There are some imaging programs that have the function to exclude files/folders from an image.

1. O&ODiskImage - the Pro v11 was available on giveaway last time I looked - this has a number of unusual and useful functions - worth getting if it is still on giveaway.
O&O DiskImage v11 giveaway

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2.Paragon backup and restore v16.5 ( try and get 16.5 rather than v16 there was a free version on the paragon site last time I looked - avoid the beta v17)

3. DiskGenius can do it as well. Not the quickest, and has a lot of functions which might not be obvious to beginners. The free version can do it.

Harmand said:

to exclude from the operation (by selecting them) some folders, obviously provided they are not related to the Windows environment itself.

it's almost never mentioned in any articles or reviews or tutorials about backups, disk cloning, system imaging and so on.
Thanks in advance for any help or advice. :]

Harmand said:

Such a task, which looks quite obvious to me, seems to be very... weird, as it's almost never mentioned in any articles or reviews or tutorials about backups, disk cloning, system imaging and so on.
Maybe I am the weird one, but I'm still hoping to find a solution.

It's a little out of the ordinary, but not unique. Permanently moving your data to another partition (that can then be safely excluded) is possibly the best solution.

cereberus said:

Best way is to backup data to external drive, delete it from C drive, Shrink C drive to say 55 GB, create a new partition D (say) and copy data back.

...or if you want the data to stay on C:, take an image once you have deleted it, then copy back to C: when done.

S1W1 said:

There are some imaging programs that have the function to exclude files/folders from an image.

1. O&ODiskImage - the Pro v11 was available on giveaway last time I looked - this has a number of unusual and useful functions - worth getting if it is still on giveaway.
2.Paragon backup and restore v16.5 ( try and get 16.5 rather than v16 there was a free version on the paragon site last time I looked - avoid the beta v17)
3. DiskGenius can do it as well. Not the quickest, and has a lot of functions which might not be obvious to beginners. The free version can do it.

So can Macrium. But note that any imaging solution that relies on VSS to perorm exclusions will have the same limitations...

Microsoft VSS includes the ability to exclude file patterns from snapshots. Although this can be useful in removing unnecessary files from images and clones the functionality isn't 100% reliable. Removing files is reliant on the VSS Optimization Writer and the if the files are not removed before the VSS timeout time has elapsed then snapshots may not exclude all the desired files. However, In general, unless you are removing many thousands of files then there shouldn't be a problem.

How to exclude files from Disk Images and Clones - KnowledgeBase v7 - Macrium Reflect Knowledgebase