How to Migrate OEM OS Disk to SSD

by Matthew Jett

What You'll Need 

• AOMEI Partiton Assistant Pro Edition 5.5
• External Source to Save System Image
• Windows 8 or 8.1 Recovery Drive or Disk
• Additional Cables for Second HDD

Goal

Migrate the OEM 1TB HDD to the faster, smaller, 120GB Kingston SSD with all OEM partitions intact, use the included Windows 8.1 license, and use the 1TB HDD for storage for programs, data, etc

My hardware consists of the following:

• HP Envy 17 - J120US Laptop
• Intel Core i5-4700MQ (Haswell)
• 12GB RAM
• 1TB WD Blue HDD (OEM Drive)
• Kingston 120GB V300 SSD
• SATA 3 (6GB/s)
• Package came with an external enclosure
• USB to SATA Bridge or an External HDD
• Allows attachment of a SATA or PATA device via USB
• 1.5 TB Seagate HDD
• 7200 RPM
• SATA 3 (6GB/s)

Instructions

Let me first start by saying that this, initially, was difficult for me. A lot of trial and error (heavy on the error) was involved and I was successful with the method that I'm going to detail here. I will tell you that the following methods DID NOT WORK:

• Cloning OEM HDD to SDD using AOMEI Partition Assistant, EaseUS Todo, Norton Ghost, and many others
• Cloning partition by partition over to the SSD using AOMEI Partition Assistant, EaseUS Todo, Norton Ghost, and many others
• Fresh Installation to SSD
• Using built in Recovery Partition to restore
• Using Recovery Media to restore

That being said, by following my instructions, you will save yourself A LOT of time and effort by not even attempting the methods above.

1. Setup and configure your computer exactly the way you want it. Install all programs and download all files you would like before the operation begins. This ensures that you will have enough space on your SSD after you're done. Bear in mind that the more an SSD fills up, the slower it becomes.
2. Defrag your HDD. You want to have all the data on your drive as compacted as possible. Type "defrag" into the search charm. Defragment your source drive, in my case was my 1TB drive. You want to make sure you do this BEFORE the next step to ensure you can make your partitions small enough to fit on your new SSD.
   
3. Shrink your C: Drive to as small as you can get it. Make sure that when finished, the sum off all the partitions is smaller than your SSD or source drive. Do this by opening Disk Management. and right clicking the "C" Partition. Select "Shrink Volume". You should end up with a big chunk of unallocated space in the middle of your drive. This is a problem for creating the system image we're going to restore from. When you make a system image, if there in unallocated space in the middle of the drive, the System Image utility will include this in the size required for the target drive.
   
4. Reorganize your partitions using AOMEI Partition Assistant. We are going to push all of the unallocated space to the end of the drive. This way, it won't be included in our System Image. 
   
5. Click "Apply" on the toolbar in the top left. Your computer will reboot to execute the command as you cannot reorganize your HDD when Windows is running. After the operation is completed, open up "Disk Management" again and make sure ALL of the unallocated space is at the end of the drive. This is critically important.
6. Create a System Image. Attach an external source like a large flash drive or external HDD to save your system image. The System Image creation utility is somewhat buried in Windows 8.1. Go to Control Panel then select File History, in the bottom left hand corner, low and behold, there it is.

   

   Select your external source to save your system image.

   

   Make sure to select ALL partitions to ensure you keep all OEM diagnostic and recovery partitions intact.

   

   My backup will take approximately 107GB of disk space. Using an external HDD is almost required since flash drives really only go up to 128GB.

7. Create a Windows 8.1 Recovery Drive. Go to Control Panel, Recovery, Create a Recovery Drive. You will need a flash drive of at least 1GB for this. Do NOT select copy the recovery partition to the recovery drive.

   

   Make sure not to select the drive where you just saved your system image

8. Remove old HDD and install SSD. Now that we have our System Image with the unallocated space pushed to the end of the drive and our Recovery Drive, we are ready to install the SSD. The process to do so is going to vary from machine to machine, consult your manufacturer's service manual for more information.
9. Boot from Recovery Drive. You may have to reconfigure your BIOS settings and boot order to ensure you can boot from the flash drive you made. Secure Boot should be off. Boot from USB should be enabled. These settings are going to vary from machine to machine. Consult your manufacturer's manual on how to boot from a USB drive.
10. After you've successfully booted from your Recovery Drive, select your Language settings,  Select Troubleshoot. Select Advanced Options. Select System Image Recovery. Your PC may reboot. Select your username and type your password. The system image you just created should automatically populate in the "Latest System Image" field. If it doesn't, use the "Select a System Image" option and navigate to it. Ensure the drive you saved the image on is on and connected to the computer. Check the Format and Repartition Disks option if not greyed out. Make sure to uncheck "Only Restore System Drives" option as this will not include the valuable OEM recovery partition.
11. You will get to a dialog box that says "All data on the drives to be restored will be replaced with the data in the system image. Are you sure you want to continue?"
    
    *****IMPORTANT******
    Unplug the recovery drive BEFORE clicking "Yes". If you don't the recovery will fail. This is because the drive setup has changed from when the system image was created due to the addition of the recovery drive.
    


12. Click Yes. Let the system image run uninterrupted. Do NOT stop for ANY reason. If on a laptop, make sure you have your system plugged in. If you followed all these steps, you should have successfully restored the system image and you now have your OEM drive restored to your SSD.
13. Use AOMEI to move the last partition on the drive to the end of the drive and expand your C drive. This is very similar to when we did this before. Follow the same procedure, but this time make sure the unallocated space ends up after the C drive so we can expand this partition in Disk Management. Make sure to click "Apply". Your system may reboot to complete the operation.
14. Open Disk Management to expand the C Partition with the space we just moved around in AOMEI. 

You may chose to optionally install the OEM HDD into your system as a data drive for additional programs and files and such - and I recommend doing so if you are migrating to a 120GB SSD. Space is going to be tight. In my situation I had to order a specialty cable to do this. Many laptops cannot accommodate a second HDD, so make sure you choose an SSD that is large enough for your programs and files. If you are lucky enough (like I am) to have a second HDD bay, follow the instructions in your manufacturer's service manual on how to add the second drive and order any cables and trays that are necessary to do so. If you are in a desktop it should be as easy as screwing the HDD in an empty drive bay, attaching a data and power cable.

Be sure to format the HDD before adding it to the computer. It could cause boot issues as there would be identical boot drives showing up. Do so by hooking up the drive with a USB to SATA Bridge Adapter and formatting in Disk Management. (they can be found pretty cheap online - or if you're lucky enough to have a computer parts store such as Tiger Direct in your area, they sell them).