Disk cloning takes ages; what's wrong?


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I have bought a new 2 TB SSD (Kingston KC3000 2 TB), and would like to clone my current SSD (Samsung 980 1 TB).

However, several software - EaseUS Partition Manager & DiskCopy, AOMEI Backupper Professional, O&O DiskImage Professional & Acronis Cyber Protect Home Office - takes ages to clone around 500GB of data. Via a USB-C connection.

And by ages I mean over 12 hours. Throughput is about 2-5 MB/s, or even less.

What can be the case? Why is this taking so long?
[I remember cloning the Samsung one, took me about less than an hour]

Is there other, faster, software available. I also read about Clonezilla, but that kinda seems difficult to use in comparison with the abovementioned software.

The computer I use has 32 GB RAM, Samsung 980 TB SSD, Intel Core i7 9750H [see sig]

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Clonezilla is easy as pie. (As soon as you understand it)

Are any of those cloning programs run in Windows? Because transporting data on the system takes a while..

Just my $0.2..

On 16/03/2023 at 07:26, Mindovermaster said:

Clonezilla is easy as pie. (As soon as you understand it)

Are any of those cloning programs run in Windows? Because transporting data on the system takes a while..

Just my $0.2..

I get the following error message using Clonezilla...

I cannot find the log-file.

 

image.jpeg

On 16/03/2023 at 10:06, kiddingguy said:

Bitlocker is turned off

That is odd!! Have you tried using Hirens? That is usually my go-to for one off things like this.... Download | Hiren's BootCD PE (hirensbootcd.org)

There are a few clone/copy tools on there that may help!!

If it is consistently faulting in multiple software applications, then perhaps the issue is hardware. If we assume that it is unlikely that the drives are the issue (for you to prove, perhaps do a quick clean OS install on the new 2tb drive to see if it is working). Then are you in a position to try and eliminate common elements? Try a different USB cable/port. Use a USB-A port on a different controller. If the motherboard has 2 m.2 slots, try cloning directly on the board rather than via USB. Or even try a different drive caddy.

I would remove the USB-C connection as that might be the issue as a post over on the Clonezilla forums (from Jan 2022) a person said (in relation to "Fsync error : errno 5")...

"The answer was that the SSD was connected using a usb3/usbC enclosure but went through usb3/usbA cable and so the pcie pass-through did not seem to work right. Direct connection of enclosure to thunderbolt via proper cable made mirroring work, no slowdowns and the new SSD is now fully functional."

so basically I would try more of a proper way to clone it on more standard connections. so something like...

1)Make a image of the Samsung 980 1TB to a image file on another hard drive you may have that's large enough to hold all of that data. note: I highlighted the 'image file' part as this won't erase data on other hard drives you are using since it will just write a image file to it as the rest of your data will remain intact. just make sure you got enough free space.

2)Remove the Samsung 980 1TB from your computer and physically install the Kingston KC3000 2 TB.

3)Restore the image file from your hard drive to the Kingston KC3000 2TB.

that might work better ;)

NOTE: if you don't care about storage space (like if this image is only needed temporarily), it will probably go faster if you disable compression. off the top of my head, you might need to use the 'expert' section in Clonezilla to do this.

p.s. but if i recall correctly I think it's best to shutdown the computer when on Windows then try booting back up into the Clonezilla from bootable USB stick.

Edited by ThaCrip
  • Like 2

Thx for all the replies.

I will clean install Win 11 on this new SSD. So hopefully no issues there.

Plus, after an upgrade from W10 to W11 incl 2 major 11-upgrades/updates in 3 years having my notebook, maybe it’s wise to clean install after all.

Edited by kiddingguy
  • Like 3
On 16/03/2023 at 20:21, kiddingguy said:

Thx for all the replies.

I will clean install Win 11 on this new SSD. So hopefully no issues there.

Plus, after an upgrade from W10 to W11 incl 2 major 11-upgrades/updates in 3 years having my notebook, maybe it’s wise to clean install after all.

Will do in the weekend. Keep you guys updated if it worked.

On 17/03/2023 at 23:06, goretsky said:

Hello,

Out of curiosity, was the NVMe SSD in the external USB-C enclosure getting noticeably hot? 

Regards,

Aryeh Goretsky
 

Yes. I was getting pretty hot indeed.

It's a SSK SHE-C325 casing.

==

I reinstalled Windows 11 on the new SSD. All going well.

Will reinstall all software & games later this weekend.

Thx for all the help & comments!

  • Love 1

Hello,

That makes sense.  SSDs will begin to throttle as they overheat and slow down in order to try and reduce their temperature.  It was less of an issue when SSDs had lower-density components spread out on 2.5" drive-sized boards, but with higher-density components mounted in proximity on a board that's 22×80 mm, I can definitely see why things would heat up when performing heavy I/O operations for an extended period of time, like when cloning a drive. 

Some drives come with heatsinks, and some USB to NVMe enclosures come with thermal pads.  These can help somewhat to help radiate excess heat away from a drive, but there's still going to be some heating up I/O intensive activities.

Regards,

Aryeh Goretsky
 

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