Nitro N50-600 Can I clone my hdd to any brand ssd?

KenBo
KenBo Member Posts: 10

Tinkerer

edited February 2022 in Nitro Gaming
I viewed a Youtube video today that said Acer locks down their desktops preventing you from cloning to any ssd other than Samsung EVO. Is this true? I purchased a WD Black SSD.
I have a Nitro N50-600 desktop and plan to replace the Optane memory in the NVME slot with the new ssd and then make it the boot disk. 

Thread was edited to add model name to the title


Answers

  • brummyfan2
    brummyfan2 ACE Posts: 28,457 Trailblazer
    edited February 2022
    Hi,
    I don't think so because another user has installed WD Black SN750 in this model, I am sure that it will work in your system too.
    https://www.userbenchmark.com/UserRun/45930852
  • ttttt
    ttttt Member Posts: 1,947 Community Aficionado WiFi Icon
    @KenBo

    Even though I have an Acer desktop other than Nitro 50-N600, I am using one WD SN 750 Black NVMe SSD as one of the drives for that desktop.

    Yes, go ahead and replace that Optane Memory. NVMe SSD is better than Optane Memory in all aspects.

    To clone your existing drive you may need cloning software such as Macrium Reflect, Acronics True Image, Aoemi...etc. or use the Win 10 Create system image to an additional drive.
  • KenBo
    KenBo Member Posts: 10

    Tinkerer

    ttttt said:
    @KenBo

    Even though I have an Acer desktop other than Nitro 50-N600, I am using one WD SN 750 Black NVMe SSD as one of the drives for that desktop.

    Yes, go ahead and replace that Optane Memory. NVMe SSD is better than Optane Memory in all aspects.

    To clone your existing drive you may need cloning software such as Macrium Reflect, Acronics True Image, Aoemi...etc. or use the Win 10 Create system image to an additional drive.
    When I open the BIOS it has the disk boot order as "Windows Boot Manager". Currently I have only a hddd and the Optane memory that I am removing. After I install the nvme ssd, initialize it in the Disk Management in Windows and clone it, will that BIOS setting change and allow me to chose which drive to boot from? Will it change which drive is seen as Disk 0?
  • ttttt
    ttttt Member Posts: 1,947 Community Aficionado WiFi Icon
    @KenBo

    Personally, I use several M.2 NVMe SSD of different brands, and WD Black SN 750 is one of those, need not be from Samsung. I am satisfied with all the NVMe SSDs.

    Currently, the Windows Boot Manager that you see is from your existing drive, I believe it must be traditional spinning hard disk.

    To clone the disk:

    1) You may want to get a good heat sink for the NVMe SSD when using it permanently in the desktop, as NVMe SSD runs warmer than 2.5" SATA2 SSD, particularly when you move/copy sizable data of more than 10 GB. The heat sink will prevent thermal throttling (sudden drop in write speed to protect the NVMe SSD from overheating damages). A good heat sink with all copper fins can be less than USD $20. Other reasonable heat sinks can be as low as USD $5-$10 each.

    2) Put your new NVMe SSD to the original Optane Memory M.2 slot.

    3) Using one of the cloning software to clone from the old HDD (the source) to this new NVMe SSD (the target). Will take quite a while. Shut down.

    4) Remove the old HDD temporarily and leave just the new NVME SSD in the M.2 slot and bootup. This will force the PC to boot from the new SSD. If you have problem booting it up, try go to BIOS, hit F9 (Load Optimized Defaults), then F10 (Save and Exit). Don't have to worry which is the right Windows Boot Manager if you just have one there.

    5) After a few reboots, you can put back in the old HDD and format it for data only. I'll suggest not to use this old HDD as a boot drive again, as the bootup speed is nowhere close to booting from NVMe SSD. Windows knew that the NVMe SSD is the boot drive.