If you clone a disk with no errors

cereberus · 29 Apr 2017

Caledon Ken said:

Cloning a disk moves the data from one storage device to another bit by bit, mapped exactly as original.

It really does not impact the speed of the computer but it can impact the rate at which the data is read and we interpret that as computer speed.

If you clone your data, say from an SSD to a 5400 rpm HDD, and the data that was cloned is highly fragmented then the new computer will appear slower as it takes longer for the data to be read from the drive.

Of course the opposite is also true. If you clone data from an old 5400 to an SSD, data retrieval will be significant faster and we feel the computer is faster.

If you are thinking of buying a new computer, and plan to add this cloned drive to your storage pool it should not impact things like boot speed, browsing. Where you may notice a slow down is when you ask for the data.

The key with spinning drives and speed, see how fast it rotates, (5400 or 7200 for retail drives), how much cache does it have (computer sends data to drive memory, allowing computer to move on while the drive puts it away) and don't let them get to fragmented.

Others may have differing opinions.

Ken

Modern cloning software is much cleverer than just doing straight bitmap copies i.e. defragmentation gets sorted out as well.

Samuria · 29 Apr 2017

If you are planning to clone your disk to another drive then put it into another PC it may not work as the drivers will all be wrong and it may not activate as you need to buy a new version of Windows and try running two PC's with same licence it won't work and is illegal

jimbo45 · 04 May 2017

Hi there
For moving say an OS to a different HDD / SSD especially if the TARGET device is bigger it makes sense to IMAGE the HDD rather than clone it -- for example if you were cloning a 320 GB HDD to a 1TB one you'd have approx. 700 GB of unallocated space. Imaging also does essentially "defragging" automatically so files are optimised decently --no long chains etc. With an SSD this doesn't matter a lot but it does on Spinners.

Imaging means you copy the partition(s) and you can resize them on the target disk. Note though it's more complicated than a simple clone as you will need to backup and restore the image to / from another device i.e not the device being "imaged" or the target device (unless to a different partition).

Provided you obey the rules most backup / restore software WILL restore to different hardware -- these days there's enough generic stuff in Windows that the new computer WILL boot - it can then usually get any special drivers from the Internet etc. - It's perfectly legal to move various flavours of Windows from one machine to another one -- see the EULA for the specific allowable conditions. You can't though legally use the same copy of Windows in more than one machine unless you have a VL type licence.

If it's a valid machine move and the Windows version is of a type that CAN be moved (e.g Retail) and it fails on activation Ms will almost certainly activate by phone -- it's a fairly simple automatic painless process these days -- no more long waiting at call centres -- you will get some type of Robot (a real one - not a Human Robot call centre worker !!) which will ask a question or two and then you will be asked to enter some numbers -- then All done !!!.

Cheers
jimbo

RolandJS · 04 May 2017

Jimbo, I found out that both cloning and imaging of a source HD onto a different-size target HD can lead to un-allocated space. Within my MR6, I had to "tell" it to use all available target space during my restoring a full image made of a slightly smaller source.

ScottTe · 17 May 2017

If the cloned disk runs normally, it won't influence the speed as there is no reason.

The GPS example makes sense to explain.