Cloning my HDD to my SSD

[Gustavo]

I'm kind of knew to building computers so I had a question that may or may not sound stupid. So I currently have a desktop with a HDD and I want to install an SSD instead and then remove the HDD. I'm going to clone my HDD into my SDD and then after, I'll be removing my HDD. So only my SSD will be installed. My question is, If i remove my HDD and install my SSD then later on in the future something happens to my SSD, assuming I didnt wipe or clear my HDD, Could I then remove my SSD and install my HDD; with no problems? Seeing as Ill still have my OS installed in the HDD. Basically I want to use my HDD as a backup and want to make sure that in case my SSD fails, I could simply remove my SSD and install my HDD with no issues. Thanks in advance.

[patio]

Yes...

[DaveLembke]

If its a desktop computer, I would suggest leaving the HDD installed in the computer but both the power and data cable disconnected inside.

My daily use computer started off as running off an old 500GB Maxtor hard drive. I then installed a SSD leaving the HDD installed but disconnected. Recently I picked up a project I had been working on that I thought I copied to my external hard drive but it must not have been copied over as I had thought. I was able to shut down my computer. Move the power and data cable from my SSD to my HDD and boot my system as if it was running the old build. I then was able to get the project I was working on copied over to the external and then shut it down and swap the power and data cable back to the SSD and close the case and pick up where I left off with a project.

In the past I have removed hard drives and written on them with a sharpie marker and stored them for emergency use. However being loose they have either gotten buried among other parts, relocated and lost, or when in a pinch I have grabbed the hard drive and used them formatting them and then losing my original build in the process. As well as one Big Foot 5.25" IDE 4.3 GB hard drive fell off my wire rack and landed on the floor damaging the drive. This drive was one that went to my Windows 98 box that I play old games on. Fortunately no critical data on this drive as for it had been backed up to a single DVD-R but it was a shame that that drive was destroyed falling. It was losing that drive like that that caused me to make better use of the additional drive bays inside desktop computers to leave drives paired with their cases.

If the computer is a laptop cloning usually requires a USB/SATA docking station to clone the build from drive to drive. I bought a drive duplicator that also acts as an external hard drive dock which 2 drives can be placed into it and data cloned from one to another or it can be used with 2 drives in it for external hard drive use in the A and B slot. This cost me $50 and it has been useful for cloning my Windows 7 build. Only trick after cloning is that if the drive capacity is different between the two drives you may have to shrink or expand the partition size to fit the destination as well as make best use of the destination capacity once cloned through partition resizing.