Windows 7: How to Clone a Windows 7 Partition to a new Hard Drive?

If your spinning HDD is coincidentally aligned as most of mine appear to be then Windows Imaging should be fine. If not I would have thought Windows would rigidly follow the original partition structure. I don't think the article referred to by karlsnooks specially refers to the reimaging behavior of Windows. If you clean install to an SSD then Windows will do correct alignment.



I decided to prepare my SSD and use the Macrium drag & drop image method to retain the prepared alignment. After that I use my primary imaging tool - Windows inbuilt imaging.

Add: If space on the SSD is tight you can reduce the size of your pagefile and disable hibernation if not required. Have a look here:
http://www.overclock.net/t/1133897/w...tweaking-guide

chobo,
Does this computer belong to you or to your company?

It is mine.

excellent. am grabbing a bite to eat and shall return. thanks

Ok. I will will let you guys know when I try to do the steps "Kaktussoft" recommended to do.

I just saw your screenshot. Disk 0 is a bit of a mess. But you say your disk 1 is the SSD. If you disconnect disk 0 and the SSD boots then you you just need to check that it is aligned.
As for 2 Windows OSs on 2 separate partitions then
1) with one license I don't think it is legal to have an OS on disk 0 and disk 1 if that is your intention.
2) Using 2 OSs as a means of separating work seems a bit odd. Just cleanly separate work and personal data with one OS!

Did you see on Disk0 that there is an active logical partition. That is odd. I wonder how that came about.

That's interesting. Maybe the OP can answer. I gather that this was an OS drive but I always thought the active partition had to be primary. If you have a logical Boot (OS) partition then I thought you needed an active system reserved primary. That is, the boot files had to be on a primary partition.

You are right Michael. That was my understanding too.

Ok.

After re-copying the partition and then using windows 7 repair it seems I can log into my "work partition" so what is the verdict with the realigning the thing?