In this article we will show how to copy (move) your Windows installation without reinstalling to another hard drive using built-in tools (without any third-party software like Paragon, AOMEI?or Acronis). For example, this guide will help you to migrate your Windows from an HDD to a new SSD, clone an installed and configured Windows to another computer (there are some nuances) or a new larger hard drive.

As an example, we will clone an installed Windows 10 to a new drive using a bootable USB stick, command prompt and built-in robocopy tool.

You can clone a hard drive to a new smaller drive if Windows occupies less space on the current drive than your new drive is in size. Otherwise, you will have to delete/move some files from the source drive. The most often, a question like this arises when migrating to SSDs, which are usually smaller than classic HDDs.

The procedure of migrating Windows to another drive depends on your computer’s firmware: BIOS or UEFI. Run the following command:

msinfo32

If you see Legacy in the BIOS mode value, your computer is using BIOS (or UEFI works in the Legacy/CSM mode). If you see UEFI, you have got a modern computer, and Windows is installed in the UEFI mode.

• If a computer works in the native UEFI mode and uses GPT partition table for a boot drive, I will tag commands for such computers with UEFI GPT
• If you have an old computer with BIOS or UEFI working in the Legacy mode and the drive partition table is MBR, the commands will be marked as BIOS MBR

First of all, you must create partition table on your new drive. You can do it directly from running Windows 10 using diskpart. If the disk is new, initialize it with diskmgmt.msc or using the Initialize-Disk PowerShell cmdlet:

Get-Disk | Where-Object PartitionStyle –Eq 'RAW' | Initialize-Disk

Then create a partition table on the new drive. Open the command prompt as an administrator and run this command:

diskpart

In the diskpart context, run the following commands:

list disk
select disk 1 (depending on the number of the new disk the previous command returned)
clean

Then the commands will differ depending on your platform type.

For UEFI GPT:

convert gpt
create partition efi size=100
format fs="FAT32" quick label="EFI"
create partition msr size=16
create partition primary
format fs="NTFS" quick label="NEW_SYSTEM"
exit

We have created a GPT partition table, two small service partitions (EFI and MSR) and a large partition occupying all the left space on the new drive (learn more about the GPT partition structure in Windows and EFI partition).

Use the following commands for BIOS MBR:

convert mbr
create partition primary align=1024
active
format fs="NTFS" quick label="NEW_SYSTEM"
exit

To clone Windows to a new drive, you will need a boot USB stick with a Windows 10 install image (it is easy to create it using MediaCreationTool).

Restart your computer and boot from the Windows 10 install media. When the Windows installation window appears, press Shift+F10 to open the command prompt. Run the following commands:

diskpart
list vol
exit

In the screenshot below, you can see that the E: disk letter is assigned to the original Windows partition on the old drive, and D: is assigned to the large partition (with the NEW_SYSTEM label) on the new drive.

Then copy files from the old drive with the installed Windows to the new one. The easiest way to do it is to use robocopy. The following robocopy command will copy all symbolic links, files and folders containing attributes, NTFS permissions and file timestamps. The copy log will be saved in the root of the target drive:
robocopy E:\ D:\ /E /COPYALL /COPY:DAT /SL /XJ /R:3 /W:3 /UNILOG:"D:\rcopy.log" /TEE