How to Clone a Hard Drive with Multiple Partitions? See a Guide!

It’s OK to Clone a Hard Drive with Multiple Partitions

Over time, you may store a good deal of data on your hard disk, leading to slower PC speed. In addition to speeding up the PC via some common ways in the guide – How to Make Windows 11 Faster for Good Performance (14 Tips), some of you wish to transfer all the disk data to an SSD with better performance or a larger HDD by cloning.

Also see: How to Improve Disk Performance in Windows 10/11? 7 Ways

Then, a question comes: usually, a hard drive is repartitioned to multiple partitions including system drives and several data partitions for various types of data. Can you clone a hard drive with multiple partitions without messing up the system or data?

Of course, you can easily clone multiple drives to one disk if you use a piece of professional hard drive cloning software. Move to the next part to learn MiniTool software.

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Run MiniTool ShadowMaker for Cloning

When it comes to cloning a hard disk that contains multiple partitions, some of you may be concerned about whether to create the same partitions on the target disk to store disk data from the source drive. In fact, this is not necessary since the cloning process will completely overwrite the target disk.

Speaking of disk cloning, the factor you should consider is the disk size of the target drive. Make sure your SSD or HDD has enough disk space to hold the source disk data. If you clone a 500GB disk (200GB data), the target disk with 256GB can satisfy the demand.

To easily clone a hard drive with multiple partitions, you can run a specialized tool like MiniTool ShadowMaker.

As professional backup software, MiniTool ShadowMaker can help you to backup files, folders, disks, and partitions. Besides, it can be hard drive cloning software that supports cloning HDD to SSD and moving Windows to another drive. During the cloning process, all the data including Windows files, apps, registry keys, personal data, etc. is copied and you won’t need to reinstall Windows after cloning.

This software offers a very friendly user interface. Now, download MiniTool ShadowMaker, install it on Windows 11/10, and then start cloning all partitions to an SSD with its Clone Disk feature.

MiniTool ShadowMaker TrialClick to Download100%Clean & Safe

Then, let’s see how to clone a hard drive with multiple partitions.

How to Clone Multiple Partitions to SSD

Follow the step-by-step guide to clone all partitions to a disk:

Step 1: Double-click on the icon of MiniTool ShadowMaker and click Keep Trial to go on.

Step 2: Move to the Tools tab and then click Clone Disk.

Step 3: In the new window, you need to choose the source disk (HDD) and target disk (SSD) for cloning.

Before the selection, you can make some settings for the cloning by tapping on Options.

Disk ID mode: By default, New disk ID is selected. That is, the target disk uses another disk ID so that you can restore Windows from it. If you choose Same disk ID, the target disk and source disk use the same ID and one disk will be marked as Offline after a clone.

Disk clone mode: MiniTool ShadowMaker only copies the used sectors of the file system by default. If your target drive (but needs to have enough space to hold all the data) is smaller than the source drive, this mode should be chosen. If your target drive is larger than or equal to the source disk, you can perform a sector-by-sector cloning.

Step 4: After that, tap on Start to begin cloning multiple partitions to SSD.

Now, you know how to clone a hard drive with multiple partitions with MiniTool ShadowMaker. If you want to try this software, get it now.

MiniTool ShadowMaker TrialClick to Download100%Clean & Safe

Related post: MiniTool Programs Help to Clone Hard Drive to Smaller SSD

How to Clone System Partitions and Data Partitions Separately

For a hard drive with several partitions, sometimes you don’t want to clone all partitions to a disk but wish to only clone the system drives to an SSD for a fast speed and keep data partitions on the source disk or clone data partitions to another large hard drive.

In this case, MiniTool ShadowMaker cannot help but you can use another hard drive cloning tool – MiniTool Partition Wizard. As a partition manager, it enables you to easily manage your disks and partitions. In cloning, it supports copying a partition, migrating the OS, and cloning the entire hard drive.

To deal with system-disk cloning, you also need to purchase MiniTool Partition Wizard Pro or higher.  You can first download its trial edition to preview some steps.         

MiniTool Partition Wizard DemoClick to Download100%Clean & Safe

Step 1: Launch MiniTool Partition Wizard to enter its main interface.

Step 2: Click Migrate OS to SSD/HD Wizard.

Step 3: Choose the second option to only clone the system partitions to an SSD.

Step 4: Finish the rest cloning operations by following the wizards on the screen.

Final Words

That’s information on two cases of cloning multiple partitions to an SSD. Using MiniTool ShadowMaker, you can easily clone a hard drive with multiple partitions. If your disk has multiple partitions and you only want to clone the operating system, run MiniTool Partition Wizard.