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How to Clone an Existing Drive

What you need

  1. How to Clone an Existing Drive, Install the drive into the enclosure: step 1, image 1 of 1
    • Before you begin, look at your hard drive's ports and make sure that it has the right connectors:

    • Narrow data port

    • Wide power port

  2. How to Clone an Existing Drive, Open the enclosure: step 2, image 1 of 1
    • Use the included screwdriver to remove the two Phillips screws.

  3. How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 3, image 1 of 2 How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 3, image 2 of 2
    • Slide the plastic tray out of the aluminum housing.

  4. How to Clone an Existing Drive, Install the SSD: step 4, image 1 of 3 How to Clone an Existing Drive, Install the SSD: step 4, image 2 of 3 How to Clone an Existing Drive, Install the SSD: step 4, image 3 of 3
    • Set the drive in the plastic tray and align the drive ports with the tray socket.

    • To prevent strain on the enclosure socket, lay the drive as flat against the tray as possible.

    • Carefully push the drive into the tray socket to seat the ports.

    • Press the drive's raised edge down into the plastic tray.

    • If the drive edge catches on the foam block, the drive is not fully seated against the tray socket. Continue pressing the drive into the socket until it clears the foam block.

  5. How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 5, image 1 of 1
    • Flip the drive tray over.

    • Use the a Phillips screwdriver to install the four mounting screws (included in the kit) to secure the drive to the tray.

  6. How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 6, image 1 of 3 How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 6, image 2 of 3 How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 6, image 3 of 3
    • Slide the tray back into the aluminum housing.

    • Reinstall the two Phillips screws to secure the tray.

  7. How to Clone an Existing Drive, How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 7, image 1 of 2 How to Clone an Existing Drive, How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 7, image 2 of 2
    • Power on your Mac and wait for it to fully load.

    • Plug the enclosure into your Mac's USB port.

  8. How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 8, image 1 of 2 How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 8, image 2 of 2
    • Under the Go pulldown menu, select Utilities.

    • Open Disk Utility from the Utilities window.

  9. How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 9, image 1 of 3 How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 9, image 2 of 3 How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 9, image 3 of 3
    • Select your new hard drive from the left column in Disk Utility.

    • If the new drive is not showing up, disconnect the enclosure and check if the hard drive is properly connected to the enclosure.

    • Select the Erase option near the top row of buttons.

    • Select a name for your new drive, and select "APFS" for the format.

    • Warning: Pressing the erase button will erase the entire contents of the drive. Make sure you have selected the new hard drive!

    • Press the erase button.

    • This process may take up to 10 minutes, so be patient.

    • Quit Disk Utility once the erase is complete.

  10. How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 10, image 1 of 2 How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 10, image 2 of 2
    • Download and install SuperDuper!

    • Under the Go pulldown menu, select Applications.

    • Open SuperDuper!

  11. How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 11, image 1 of 1
    • In the copy pulldown menu, select your current drive.

    • In the destination pulldown menu, select the new drive.

    • In the method pulldown menu, select "Backup—all files".

  12. How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 12, image 1 of 3 How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 12, image 2 of 3 How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 12, image 3 of 3
    • Press the "Copy Now" button.

    • If prompted, provide your password.

    • Click "Copy" when warned about erasing the drive.

  13. How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 13, image 1 of 3 How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 13, image 2 of 3 How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 13, image 3 of 3
    • Wait for the drive to copy (this could take several hours if you have a lot on your hard drive).

    • When prompted for registration by SuperDuper!, either choose "Register" to purchase the software or "Later" to register later.

    • After the copy is complete, click "Ok" and quit SuperDuper!

  14. How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 14, image 1 of 1
    • At this point, your new hard drive should be a clone of your existing drive and ready to install.

    • However, we recommend testing the cloned drive before physically swapping the drives. This can be done by attempting to boot from the new cloned drive through the USB enclosure.

    • Keep the enclosure connected to the computer and restart the computer. Hold down the "option" key as it reboots until a boot option menu shows up.

  15. How to Clone an Existing Drive: step 15, image 1 of 1
    • Select your new hard drive from the boot option menu.

    • Wait for the computer to boot up to verify if it works properly.

    • Your new hard drive is now ready to be installed in your computer.

Conclusion

Remove your new hard drive from the external enclosure and install it in your computer. Installation instructions are available for a variety of Macs.

110 other people completed this guide.

Mike

Member since: 11/01/10

14,240 Reputation

3 Guides authored

Team

24 Comments

This guide was straightforward and helpful along the way when I replaced my hard drive! My only comment is that this should be a link in the "MacBook Pro 13" Unibody Early 2011 Hard Drive Replacement" article, since the Youtube videos link to each other, but the articles do not. Thanks for all your help with these fantastic guides!

Melissa Smith - Reply

Great except you extol the use of the SATA Wondercable but you don't sell it hen I followed the link to eBay, it listed dozens of various adapters. I did not see this SATA Wondercable.

Disappointed with the answer

jimkidd1 - Reply

Wow! Thank you Mike.

Everything went very well with a big bonus. My older version of Photoshop does not work with the newer Mac operating systems. Now that I installed a new 1TB hard drive, I can upgrade OS if I want. Then I can use the old drive in an internal enclosure replacing the DVD running the old OS X keeping all of my older Adobe apps!

Ifixit rocks!

charlesspowell - Reply

If I have a BootCamp partition, will it clone that as well?

BuckNYC - Reply

Hi BuckNYC,

As far as I know, SuperDuper will not clone the BootCamp partition. You will have to use something like Winclone to do that.

Arthur Shi -

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