How to clone Windows 11 NVMe M.2 SSD to smaller NVMe M.2 SSD

I assumed I would see an option to upload files DiskManatement.png

Does the system have two m.2 slots to have both connected?

The other vendor of m.2 or ssd look at the tools they offer.

Some provide acronis image as a OEM tool.

Down shifting as you want requires that the total space used on the larger storage not exceed the total space available on the smaller.


Did 11 fail, or the storage in use failed?

Was an update interrogated that made the system unstable ...?

Your system partition is about 1TB in size. Only about 100GB is currently in use. As the system partition should normally only be used for the OS, that is a much too large size in my point of view. I always install other programs to a separate partition, & also the user data is elsewhere.

Since your partition only uses a fraction of it's size, I'd reduce it's total size. You should be able to do that in Diskmanagement. I'd suggest you make it smaller than 500GB SSD you bought. Then you can clone that partition to the new SSD. You can use Clonezilla for that:

https://clonezilla.org/

If Diskmanagement is unable to reduce the size of the partition to 500GB or below, you can also use GParted for that:

https://gparted.org/

Both tools are OpenSource, Free, & Linux based.

You don't need any Linux knowledge to use them, you just nee to boot them from a USB stick, that is shown on their sites.

here is how to do it :  Best Way to Clone Windows 11 to NVMe SSD (ubackup.com) 

now, how to connect the second NVME depends on the fact if you have 2 NVMe slots or not. If not, you can connect it to any usb3 port with an adapter like this :  Amazon.com : nvme to usb 

IMHO Windows 11 seems much more stable than any previous version of Windows

Are you using non-standard hardware and 3rd party software

If your systems are crashing and are not recoverable you are doing something wrong

could be a power problem also

DiskManagement_2.png

Thank you all so much for your comments and solutions. 

I shrunk the partitions on my SSD so that the combined partition used space is less than 500gb.

I think this mini PC has only 1 M2 slot so I have an enclosure to house the backup SSD.

Regarding the crashed PC's:

   PC [1] is a 2 1/2 year old PC that had run without issues for 2 years. This PC crashed 2 days ago with the blue screen of death. I had been having issues periodically with the sleep function as I would wake up the system with NnjaTrader 8 having crashed.

I followed all of the repair options displayed on the blue screen and finally had to resort to Reset.

   PC[2] is an old Dell system, probably 5 yrs old, that had been running fine until 1 month ago. This system would not boot at all with no indication of life displayed on the monitor.

These old systems were all used almost daily via my KVM switch. Both were previously my main work/go to systems.

I am so lucky that I just purchased this new Mini PC 1 month ago!!!

Regarding POWER: all systems were connected to a CyberPower UPS.

I now have to decide which Cloning software to use/purchase to migrate the systems. With so many options, how do I choose?

I was hoping I could boot from the enclosure drive to test but will that work? I don't want to risk removing and replacing the SSD in my new PC.

Thanks again for your assistance.

When cloning you can't boot from the disk you are cloning. The disk must not be mounted. When you are cloning you must always boot the PC from the cloning tool, the easiest way is to use a USB stick to boot from. Both tools I mentioned earlier can be installed to USB sticks.

You can't easily boot Windoze from an SSD connected to the PC via USB, so to test the cloned disk you would have to replace the internal disk. You would also need to clone the special EFI Partition (100MB, the first one you can see in DiskManagement. It is required for booting the OS.

Another suggestion rather than cloning would be to make images of your partitions to the external SSD. Images can be easily restored without needing to replace the internal SSD. CloneZilla can also create Image backups.

i always make a bootable usb stick from the software i'm using to clone the disk, and boot from it.

all cloning tools have this option

Status update:

I'm sorry for taking so long to continue with this issue as I have some medical issues consuming my time.

I watched a few videos about cloning SSDs to see if I could determine how to best clone the SSD in my new computer. I looked at CloneZilla, Acronis, and DiskGenius, and a couple others.

I felt that with my level on knowledge being limited in this area, I needed to pick the software that seemed to be easiest to use and least complicated. I picked DiskGenius.

I proceeded to clone my new computers SSD.

The above image shows results after cloning.

It appeared that the cloning was successful but I was concerned that I could not assign the needed drive letters to the cloned SSD in disk management. I suppose this would need to be done in the bios during boot. I looked at the folders and files via the File Manager and everything looked identical, except for the data partition.  I was not concerned about the data partition as I have multiple backups.

I just swapped the SSDs to see what would happen.

The first message was that that Windows attempted to do a Repair. Then it finally booted up and it appeared that the cloning was successful. The icons on the task bar were there and I was hopeful that I could go into disk management and resize and assign drive letters.

The following image shows an error message when I attempted to open Google Chrome from a shortcut icon.

what was the disk setup when you cloned the drive, and how is it when you boot up? 

tell us what steps you took plse

The drive letter will be C automatically once you boot to the cloned SSD.

I inserted the new blank SSD into my Ugreen enclosure, loaded DiskGenius, selected Tools / Clone Disk / and proceeded to clone. DiskGenius indicated that the cloning was successful.

After cloning I loaded disk management. At one point (can't remember if I did that in the DiskGenius program or Disk Management), I think a mistake, selected the drive letter D for the primary partition. I tried to delete the drive letter later but for some reason was not able to do so.

The first 2 images above show the results of cloning.

I then replaced the SSD in my new PC with the cloned SSD and booted it up. I did not open the BIOS on that bootup.

look if the suggestions here help you :  FIX: (Application Name) is either not designed to run on Windows or it contains an error - Appuals.com 

Thanks Nobus,  The link you sent suggests that the issue could be a Windows Update that needs to be uninstalled. Since I don't have that issue with my new source PC, what do you suggest I do? I see 2 options possible. I could uninstall the latest update on my new PC and clone again. Or I could boot with the existing cloned SSD and then try to uninstall the latest update.

I am still wondering if my assignment of Drive "D" on the C drive partition could be causing the issue. Should I boot to the bios and make any changes there? Or will booting from the cloned SSD automatically change the drive letter to "C"?

Also, with me being ignorant of what to do with Experts Exchange notifications. Am I supposed to select "Mark as Helpful" on every comment as they appear? And then after the final successful solution, selecting "Mark as a solution"? So it appears that I can selet "Mark as a solution" to multiple comments? I was a member a few years ago and I thought I could only select 1 solution? 

Thanks so much to all of you!!

i would use another cloning tool, and tedo the cloning

that way you will know if - the cloning tool is the problem, or maybe your selection of settings

look here for top rated tools  (free)

Top 5 Free & Reliable Hard Disk Drive Cloning Software for 2023 (techrepublic.com) 

i have used paragon, and it worked perfect -  but other tools are just as good imo

as for EE  -  just do what you deem right -AFTER you close the Q; ignore all the rest

The error you get probably comes from and ATI (AMD) driver. Make sure your drivers are current. You should get them via Windoze Updates, Optional Updates. Also, it seems to be a 32 bit version. If you have a 64 bit version of Windoze installed, which should the normal version, you might have installed an older version of the AMD software, or something you downloaded from the AMD site. On Windoze 64 Bit I'd only install 64 bit software, particularly drivers.

ATI / AMD catalyst Software often had problems when installed.

This is what the error also suggests.
Go to amd.com lok for drivers for your graphics card and download the catalyst and see if after the install it fixes her issue.

Potentially, chrome has hardware acceleration enabled by default and this might explain the error when you opened Chrome that the current scenario has an issue accessing the graphics HW.

Again, sorry for my delay in proceeding with this issue.

I downloaded Macrium Reflect and recloned my new computer's SSD. Macrium noted that the cloning process was successfu.

After installing the Cloned SSD I received messages on bootup noting Repairing PC and Analyzing PC a couple times before opening Windows 11.

The following applications seemed to open without issues:  Google Chrome (links to various web sites worked), Malware Bytes Premim, Snipping Tool, File Manager.

The following applications would not open and displayed errors: Microsoft Excel, Turbo Tax Delux, Disk File Manager.  I will import error images:

TurboTaxErrorAfterClone.pngErrorLoadingExcelAfterCloneBoot.pngErrorAfterBootMacrium.png

DiskManagementErrorAfterClone.png

When trying to load one of the applications (might have been the first one I tried) I received an error that a reboot was necessary. I did not try rebooting again after the initial startup and I am wondering if that might have fixed thie issues?

i suppose the power was OFF when you swapped disks?  so it was booted 

Yes the machine was shut down and unplugged before swapping SSDs.

it can be there were problems with drivers, and other apps, and at 1st boot it downloaded them, but needed a reboot

I contacted Macrium support and have pasted their response below. I don't understand how if the disk is cloned how the ID could be different. Any idieas?  

Thanks!

Also, I spent about 4 hours with 2 technicians from Microsoft and neither of them could solve my issue. At the end of both sessions they advised me to reinstall Windows 11 (with the option to save files and applications).

I tried that both times and was greated with the following message:  "Undoing changes made to your computer".

The second technician had me uninstall and reinstall Microsoft Office 365 and that worked as Office now runs peroperly.

However, Disk Management will still not run. If I ever need to use this cloned SSD it will not be sufficient as I am unable to resize the partitions which I made very small to facilitate cloning to a smaller SSD.

It almost appears that this SSD is UNCLONABLE??

Thanks again for your assistance.

i suggest you try another cloning tool, to clone the WHOLE drive in one go

it should work; there's even no need to shrink partitions, most apps do that automatic

that's a crucial disk - right?

Yes, the disk I'm CLONING TO is : 
Crucial P3 500GB PCIe Gen3 3D NAND NVMe M.2 SSD, up to 3500MB/s - CT500P3SSD8 

The disk that I am CLONING FROM is the 2tb SSD that was installed on the computer I just purchased below:

GMKtec Mini Gaming PC AMD Ryzen 9 7940HS 2TB PCIe4.0 SSD 32GB DDR5 5600 MHz RAM, Desktop Mini Computers Windows 11 pro, Radeon 780M Graphics, 2.5Gbps LAN, HDMI 2.1, 8K USB 4.0

The issue I will have if I try different cloning software is that Microsoft Office 365 was deleted and reinstalled on the Cricial SSD. I asked Microsoft about the licence for that version and they said the license was preinstalled. I'm guessing it is probably not the same licence on the source SSD.

So if I use different cloning software I should probably purchase another SSD to clone to rather than overwrite the Crucial.

Any thoughts about how to proceed and other cloning software?

Thanks so much for sticking with me on this.

Are you logging on to Windoze with an M$ online account? If so, all your product keys which you got via the M$ store should be saved somewhere in your account on OneDrive, & you should be able to reinstall the software without issues that way.

M$ makes it hard to setup Windoze without an M$ online account, so it is likely you have setup your PC's that way.

So you probably won't have any licensing issues.

When the nvme is connected via the USB does the crucial nvme reflected in device manager as one of the disks?

If you do not have a system where both nvme's can be connected/attached at the same time for cloning.

Though it is unclear given the cloned nvme boots something else might be at issue, but not clear as it does not make sense.

Yes, when the Crucial is in my enclosure and connected via USB, it displays in Disk Management.

Image attached:

lots of partitions on the c: drive - how comes?

I actually had 2 partitions, "C:" drive and a Data partition. However, I had to shrink those partitions to reduce the size to less than 500gb to clone to the Crucial SSD. I assumed I would have to do that manually if the cloning software didn't automate that process.

i agree with shrinking the big C: drive,  but where do the other partitions come from ? 100 GB E: and 1.85 GB ( maybe restore partiition?)

Something that just caught my eye is the OS partition of your new disk says "Wim Boot". That is different from what I can see on your original disk. This suggests that it hasn't really been cloned. Cloned disks should be an exact copy of the original disk, & not have anything extra.

Wim Boot also is usually what Windoze PE uses, that makes me think you aren't trying to boot from the cloned disk, but rather the one you are using to do the restore from. So it probably just is an in between step.

The 2 partitions nobus refers to a were also on the original disk, the 100MB one is the boot partition (EFI partition), & the other is a recovery partition. These are normal.

i conclude what you did was not a clone.

so you'll have to redo it  imo

I spent another couple hours on the phone with Microsoft support. They had me copy from the source SSD and replace on the cloned SSD the file "Atiadlxx.dll". They also had me reinstall Windows 11 the option to save files and apps. I received the message after the reinstall: "undoing changes made to your computer".

They also thought that I should have cloned to an SSD that is the same size as the source:

So I have purchased a new 2TB SSD and enclosure from Amazon that will arrive later today and clone again.

What cloning software should I try this time? Is the third time a charm? The previous 2 were "DiskGenius" and "Macrium Reflect".

both should work fine. if the problem came from the SSD ( how did you find out?)  you won't have any troubles

I purchased the new 2TB SSD cloned with Macrium Reflect and the exact same issue remains with the new SSD. On the first boot up Windows entered a Repair mode and then booted up with the exact same error as above:

I wonder if I should try booting directly from the new SSD? I entered the bios to see what the Boot options look like and it shows 6 Boot options:

Boot Option #1

Boot Option #2

etc....

Boot OPtion #6

I wonder if I should select #4 which I assume would be Disk (G:) as shown above.

Thanks again for all your efforts..

You have to replace the cloned disk with the new one before booting. There should be no need to select any other boot option than the original one.

Personally I would use CloneZilla which I believe I suggested in the beginning. Although it is based on Linux it pretty easy to use & makes a true clone. You just have to be careful to select the proper Disk as source & and also for the destination.

since you have 2 2 TB disks - maybe you cloned the wrong drive?

why does disk 1 have a boot partition?

Disk 1 is the cloned disk. If it didn't have a boot partition it wouldn't be a clone of Disk 0 would it? Shouldn't they both have identical partitions?

I am starting to watch Youtube videos about CloneZilla to see if I can understand enought to give it a shot.

yes they should have identical partitions - but why does it have a wimboot?

is your Bios set to uefi?  check that also

I don't have answers to either of these questions. It is beyond my level of understanding. What do I need to do to check these out? Thanks...

i would pick one of the free imaging apps, and restart from zero

if you post the steps you take i can follow up ok?

Thank you so much for your persistance. Yes, I will be happy to do that. Which app do you think I should use? I loaded Disk Management today and removed the volumes from the new 2TB SSD. I tried but could not delete the 2 small partitions on both ends. I don't know why Disk Management didn't give me that option.

Boot from something other than Windoze, for example GParted. Then you should be able to delete all the partitions on the new SSD:

http://gparted.org

I deleted the partitions using CMD and then Clean when the new SSD was selected. I'm good to go now.

first Disk Genius can clone to a smaller drive  How To Clone a Larger Hard Drive to a Smaller SSD or HDD FREE? (diskgenius.com) 

so i would start by setting the original disk as it was in your first screenshot; and expand C: to fill the whole drive - unless you need other partitions

My source drive has been split into 2 partitions, #1 for Windows and Apps and #2 for data files. If I copy #2 data files to a backup USB and then delete them, is there a chance that any saved links between Apps and data could get messed up?  Thanks.

the first Q is : do you need separate partitions?   it's getting an old idea to have them, with the big drives available now

The only reason I have used separate partitions is for backup purposes. I would just select the data partition and copy it to a backup location. In thinking about it, I could just create a folder and treat it like a partition. I'm an old geezer so maybe I need to upgrade my thinking?

yes, you can just create a folder; but why?  MS already did that for you : My Documents, Images, Videos, MUsic

I think there is some issue with the Windows 11 install on the source SSD. The first error that appears on bootup is the Atiadlxx.dll file that is not recognized. I tried replacing the file and still got the same error. I deleted the file and no longer get that error.

However, there is still an error I get when trying to run Office 365 and Disk Management. The error "The external backing provider is not recognized". the file "mmc.exe" in the System32 folder is not working. I tried to rename it and then delete it but could not do either.

I also found on google search that others have had similar issues with Windows when cloning to an M.2 SSD. But it appears that MIcrosoft has no other solution than reinstalling Windows.

did you run sfc /scannow   or dism before cloning?

Sorry no, I did not. I don't know what those are. Are those Windows apps?

They are both Windoze commands that check the System files for corruption, and they can be used to replace corrupt system files with good versions. You need to open a CMD prompt as Admin to run those commands. The link below shows more details about DISM:

https://www.windowscentral.com/software-apps/windows-11/how-to-use-dism-to-repair-local-image-on-windows-11

sfc and dism are windows commands, to check and repair OS files

you run     sfc / scannow       from an elevated prompt  see  Use the System File Checker tool to repair missing or corrupted system files - Microsoft Support 

dism :  DISM Overview | Microsoft Learn 

you usually use these :  

Open cmd.exe with Run as Administrator.

 DISM.exe /Online /Cleanup-Image /Scanhealth 

 DISM.exe /Online /Cleanup-Image /Restorehealth (takes 15 - 20 minutes).

I ran the DISM routines and they both indicate that everything is ok.

This is the new 2TB SSD. So this cloned SSD still has the error (The external backing provider is not recognized) and will not run Disk Management, Microsoft Office 365, and NinjaTrader. 

The first cloned SSD that is smaller has the same errors but Microsoft Office 365 runs fine. That is because one of the Microsoft Technicians had me uninstall, delete, redownload, and reinstall.

Both cloned SSDs run Google Chrome and all its links just fine.

I have posted questions on the Amazon site for this Mini PC to see if they can assist but have not heard back.

>>  (The external backing provider is not recognized) and will not run Disk Management, Microsoft Office 365, and NinjaTrader.     << post the erros for each one

OK, I first connected the cloned 2TB ssd in Enclosure to my source PC. There was previously unallocated space so I created a new partition,formatted and copied all of my data partition from the source PC to this new partition. I knew I would have to have data available when running Microsoft Excel.

I swapped SSDs and booted from the cloned SSD. First Notice:

I tried to load Disk Management

I then tried to run Excel:

I then tried to run NinjaTrader

I then tried TurboTax

I then tried Outlook

Then I opened Macrium Reflect to see what it would recognize

It appears that it did not see the cloned drive unless there was some way of enabling it that I did not know about.

I then opened some other apps that worked fine:

MalwareBytes

Google Chrome

NotePad

Calculator

File Manager

Xbox

Snippng Tool

did you enter your "sign-in info " for one drive?

Sorry for my note above that Macrium did not see the cloned drive. The primary drive shown above would have been the cloned SSD. I don't know what I was thinking when I wrote the above note..??

No I didn't, I have never used One Drive.. Could that be an issue?

imo - when i receive an error, i try to fix it; so i would either enter the info, or click it away, or uninstall one drive

it can be that you have been working (and saving data) to one drive - so check that first!

The default user setup of Windoze 10 & 11 is that the user is an M$ Online Account. Those accounts automatically connect to OneDrive. The user's data as well as Software purchased via the M$ Store, including product keys etc is then stored on OneDrive. The User will usually not even notice this & so won't know anything about OneDrive.

When I setup Windoze on a PC I never use an M$ account, but M$ makes it more & more difficult to bypass this.

So even if you aren't aware of using OneDrive, it may still be the case!

Sorry for my delay, I had surgery last week and am just now getting back. I tried to clone one more time using a USB3 connection rather than the USB C connection and that made no difference.

I emailed the manufacturer of my mini PC GMKtec.com and explained the issue and they are ending me a new replacement SSD with Microsoft Office 11 installed. This will allow me to install all my apps and then use the existing SSD as my backup. When the new SSD arrives I will try cloning it before installing to see if that works. 

All of you have been so helpful, how can I reward you? 

Phil, do me a favor plse?  select other people that helped also too as solution, to show your gratitude