Hard drive cloning?

[roweder]

I've got a few questions. I'm thinking about upgrading to a SSD. I have an Alienware 17 that I just got this summer and it has a mSATA port and two 2.5" HDD ports (both of which I use) so I was thinking of installing a mSATA SSD. Since it is a windows 8 PC I don't really have the ability to re-install windows on a different hard drive without buying a new copy of windows 8. So how exactly could I go about cloning my hard drive? And I looked a little bit into cloning on my own (didn't quite know where to look), and one website said that the two hard drives must be the same size. Is this true? I've got separate partitions for recovery or whatever, can I copy those too? And what the heck's gonna happen with secure boot? I also have the ability to create a factory re-install disk, but I'll need to use it with the original hard drive with those partitions on it. If I get the process started, is it possible that I'll be able to reinstall onto a different hard drive?

Also, is this a decent mSATA disk? Any reasons to go with a different one than this?
accessories.us.dell.com/sn...

 

[Trotter]

If you use something like Acronis then the drives can be different sizes. It can get tricky moving from a larger to a smaller, though, unless the larger has a lot of empty space.

There are better deals, like this:
Amazon.com: Crucial m4 256GB mSATA Internal Solid State Drive CT256M4SSD3: Computers & Accessories

 

[carnageX]

About the recovery partitions.. don't copy those. The Alienware recovery won't allow you to run the recovery from a different HDD than what it was installed on, even if you copy it over. I know this from experience as I've done it with my friend's 17x R3.

 

[roweder]

About the recovery partitions.. don't copy those. The Alienware recovery won't allow you to run the recovery from a different HDD than what it was installed on, even if you copy it over. I know this from experience as I've done it with my friend's 17x R3.

What a load
Maybe I should just buy a copy of windows 8. I made a YouTube video just to demonstrate the slow motion effect that is possible with cameras that record in 60fps, and the video was of me juggling oranges, and some fast food place bought the video for $750. That's why I'm planning this upgrade haha, but I'd rather blow $200 on this than $400.

 

[carnageX]

Do you not have the reinstall discs? Why can't you just install Win8 on a new drive?

 

[roweder]

New windows 8 pc's don't come with disks now, they come with recovery partitions and the ability to create recovery disks, but windows recovery works without that. And the recovery disks don't work unless the recovery partitions are present, so if I use a recovery disk to try and install windows on a new hard drive, it won't work because those partitions aren't there. I bought this with win 8 on it.

 

[carnageX]

Does the laptop have a Win8 serial sticker on the bottom?

 

[roweder]

No, it does not

 

[PP Mguire]

If you're utilizing Secure Boot you will need to do a full reinstall.

 

[roweder]

Ok thanks! Will I be able to do a clean install with this? Or is this upgrade only?

Newegg.com - Microsoft Windows 8.1 Pro - 64-bit - Operating Systems