If you want to migrate OS without reboot Windows, AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional can help you a lot. It supports to migrate operating system while Windows running.
I have an Intel 120 GB SSD on my PC. I want to replace the Intel 120 GB SSD with a Crucial 256 GB SSD (and then use the Intel drive as a second drive). I've been looking for cloning software in an attempt to clone SSD on PC while OS is running. If possible, do you know how to do it?
- Question from Superuser.com
Usually, users are expecting to migrate OS without restart Windows in the following points:
✍ Allows users to migrate operating systems while working. ✍ When a computer malfunctions and an emergency backup is needed, Windows will most likely not reboot properly. ✍ Avoid performing operations in Windows PE mode or PreOS mode, making the OS migration process more convenient.
There are many cloning software on the market, but most of them need to be restarted when cloning the boot disk, and some even require the user to restart two or three times. This makes cloning very cumbersome.
In order to avoid these troubles, you can try a more convenient software - AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional. The built-in Hot Clone allows you to migrate OS, clone disk, or partition while you keep working. This means users can migrate OS without reboot Windows.
Not only that, its "Migrate OS to SSD" feature can transfer everything on the system partition to a new SSD or HDD. In such a way, anything crucial for OS boot will not be missed out so that you can boot the computer from cloned disk successfully.
Now, you can download it to see how to migrate OS without reboot Windows. There are 3 steps you should do in the following part.
✎ Install the new SSD to your desktop or laptop. If your electronic device has only one disk slot, you may need a SATA to USB adapter to connect it.
✎ If the SSD is brand new, please initialize it first.
✎ Make sure the SSD has enough unallocated space or at least equal size to the original system partition on the source disk.
✎ The partition style must be compatible with the boot mode (UEFI and Legacy BIOS). To avoid changing the boot mode after migrating, it is best to make the partition style of the SSD as the same as the partition style of the source disk. So, please convert the SSD to GPT or MBR if necessary.
1. Install and open Partition Assistant Standard. Click Migrate OS under Clone menu.
2. Select an unallocated space on the destination SSD and click “Next”.
3. In this window, you can resize the partition just being created on the SSD drive if necessary. Then, click “Next”.
4. A note about how to boot OS from SSD or HDD will appear, you can read it and click “Finish”.
5. Back to the main interface, click “Apply” to commit the operation. During the transfer, you can still use Windows and the computer will not restart when the transfer is over.
After migrating Windows OS to SSD for free, if you want to boot Windows from SSD. You must restart the PC, enter the BIOS and change the boot order to boot the computer from the cloned SSD.
If the operating system is running fine on the SSD, you can wipe the old hard drive to free up disk space and use it as a data drive.
This is the full guide of migrating OS without reboot Windows. In addition to migrate OS, AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional also allows you to clone an entire MBR disk to another MBR disk.
If you want to clone OS without reboot in Windows Server, you can turn to AOMEI Partition Assistant Server which is designed for Windows Server 2022, 2019, 2016, 2012(R2), 2008(R2), 2003 users.