Guide to Disk Cloning with SupportAssist OS Recovery

Affected Products:

• Dell SupportAssist OS Recovery

Affected Versions:

• v5.5.1 and later

Dell SupportAssist OS Recovery v5.5.1 and later supports Disk Cloning functionality. Disk cloning is the process of creating a one-for-one copy of a hard drive or solid-state drive (SSD).

Disk cloning may be needed during:

• Hardware upgrade
• Disaster Recovery
• Computer replacement

Requirements to use disk cloning:

• The primary drive must be bootable into Windows.
• BitLocker must be disabled.
• Secondary hard drive, SSD, or USB drive with greater disk space as the original hard drive or SSD
• A power adapter is connected for the entire process.

To create a disk clone:

1. On boot, hold the F12.
2. In the One-Time Boot Settings menu, click SupportAssist OS Recovery.

Figure 1: (English Only) One-Time Boot Settings menu

3. Click Back Up Files / Disk Cloning.

Figure 2: (English Only) SupportAssist OS Recovery

4. Select Disk Cloning and then click Next.

Figure 3: (English Only) Disk Cloning

5. Select and then click Next for one of the following options:
   • Hard drive that is already installed
     • This option should be selected when cloning an internal hard drive or SDD to a secondary internal computer hard drive or SDD.
   • Hard drive in a USB housing
     • This option should be selected when cloning an internal hard drive to an external USB enclosure that contains a hard drive or SDD.
   • USB storage device
     • This option should be selected when cloning from an internal hard drive or SDD to an external USB drive.

Figure 4: (English Only) What are you cloning to

6. Select the appropriate destination drive and then click Next.

Figure 5: (English Only) Select where to clone to

7. Click Next to confirm disk cloning.

Figure 6: (English Only) Your disk copy was a success, continue the cloning process

8. Once the cloning process is complete, click Continue to turn off the computer.

Figure 7: (English Only) Continue the cloning process.

9. On shutdown, swap the old hard drive or SDD with the replacement drive.

Figure 8: Hard drive location

Figure 9: Replace hard drive

10. Ensure the cloned drive (step 6) is connected and then turn on the computer while pressing F12 to access the one-time boot menu.
11. Select the cloned drive and then press Enter.

Figure 10: (English Only) One-Time Boot menu

12. On SupportAssist OS Recovery launch, click Okay.

Figure 11: (English Only) Welcome back!

13. Click Continue to clone the destination drive (step 6) to the replacement drive (step 8).

Figure 12: (English Only) Continue cloning process

14. On success, click Continue to boot from the newly installed primary drive.

Figure 13: (English Only) Unplug USB

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• How to Identify the Dell SupportAssist OS Recovery Version
• SupportAssist OS Recovery Error When Performing Disk Cloning With External USB