To clone a disk including a Windows system, the disk style (GPT/MBR) of the source disk and the destination disk must be the same. However, do note that the free standard edition only supports a data disk clone. Instead, there's a paid-for version available from $39.95 for a single PC license. The whole process means that you end up with a full copy of your harddrive and won't need to reinstall Windows when copying your clone over to a new harddrive. Although the software is Freeware, there's no adware bundled with the software. There's also an intelligent cloning option, which only copies over used space on the harddrive. Sectors and partitions are copied over, along with key files such as boot.ini, NTLDR, BCD, winload.exe and MBR. A key feature of the software is the ability to clone a large disk to a smaller SSD drive. It can also be useful when simply looking to upgrade your hard drive, such as to one with a higher capacity, or to a different type entirely such as from a mechanical hard drive to a solid state drive (SSD).ĪOMEI Backupper is a disk cloning utility that's free to download and use. This helps avoid the need to completely reinstall system software and copy across all data, allowing you to continue to work much more quickly.Ī backup drive could be set up and cloned within your existing PC chassis, or you could set it up as an external drive to allow you to store it off-premises as needed.

That way, in the event that the original hard drive fails you can swap it out for the clone. The ideal disk cloning software will allow you to easily copy your entire hard drive, regardless as to whether it's a traditional SATA or more recent SSD, and make a full and faithful copy of it. If you also want to back up your applications and your computer registry, in order to restore a complete and working version of your operating system, you will need to use disk cloning software. While you can use backup software to save your work, this will only save your files and folders. Click the links below to go to the provider's website:

Hard disk backup software free download