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Cloning drive with bitlocker. Can disk cloning overwrite actively used disk?

I'm using Windows 10 with AOMEI Backupper Professional Edition 7.2.0.
Q1: When cloning a whole disk, I noticed that the destination disk does not have bitlocker enabled on the drives. Is this expected?
Q2: I worry about overwriting the wrong disk when cloning. Is it possible to overwrite the same disk that is currently in use? By "in use", I mean the operating system and AOMEIBackkuper executable files are located on the "source disk".
Thank you for all your assistance, and most excellent product!

Comments

  • edited March 2023
    Q1: Please post a screenshot of your destination disk from Partition Assistant.
    Q2: If you select the same destination disk as the source disk, it will grey out the "Next" button, and display the message "Note: The source disk cannot be specified as a destination disk."
    Any technician will tell you to always backup your Bitlocker recovery key, I recommend backing it up in multiple places.  You must do this even if you have memorized your Bitlocker password, those are 2 different things, one does not replace the other.
    Bitlocker is a good feature for the users that need encryption, such as laptop owners during travel, however if you do not want it, you can disable it in Control Panel > Bitlocker.
    If you are concerned about using the correct destination disk, keep in mind of the # of each Disk. For example, if you turn your PC off, and unplug all external disks, then power on, in Backupper you will see your Disk 0, then if you insert your external disks, they will have a higher #, and the # will not change. If you use Windows > cmd > Diskpart > lis dis , you can see the same Disk numerical order, but with a little different info that may help you. Be careful with Windows > cmd > Diskpart, because it is made for technicians only, and sometimes a single command can delete all your data, without any extra warning.
    If you wanted to, you could also make a tiny new empty partition, and give it a name like "InternalSSD", or "MyBackupDisk", then you would have another way to make sure which disk you are looking at.
    I don't recommend connecting SATA drives when PC is powered on, because I have never read an article that said that 100% of PCs support that, so to be safe only connect SATA drives when PC is off. However you can connect SATA drive to PC when it is on, if you are using a SATA to USB adapter.
    Create Backupper WinPE USB:
    Please add custom drivers, such as NVMe, if necessary
    https://www.ubackup.com/help/create-bootable-disk.html
    Backupper Professional Edition
    Keeps your license activated when updating version
    https://www.ubackup.com/changelog.html



  • @Bitpusher1010, Q1: when the drive is decryption status during clone, the cloned drive doesn't have BitLocker enabled. For example, you clone the system drive. because the system is running, it is decrypted.
    Q2: No, it doesn't clone to the wrong disk unless you select a wrong disk as the destination.
  • edited March 2023
    Bitlocker has many modes. When you are outside of Windows, such as when the PC is off, or still booting, Bitlocker will be Locked. When you are inside of Windows, it is unlocked. Bitlocker can also be Suspended. And it can be in Recovery Mode with a blue screen, that is the worst mode.
    bitpusher1010, your question about the Destination Disk is a good one, because for example I saw an interview with the CEO of Redhat Linux, and he talked about when he was not using Aomei software, but some other software, and the software allowed him to accidentally erase the same hard drive that the software was running on. He was upset because his PC gave him too much freedom, and he also already had an appointment for a major meeting soon after that incident. So it is ok to ask questions.
  • 1. I think I understand. Because at the time of disk cloning, the bitlocker drives were unlocked, the cloned drive will have unencrypted data. 
      1B) Would a "sector by sector" clone do a better job of retaining the bitlocker enabled status?
      1C) Would running AOMEI off a USB boot drive give me the desired result? Thank you.
  • edited March 2023
    Now that you have said your goal is to have your backup encrypted, you could click the Encrypt backup option when you are making your image file in Backupper. I have not read an official independent audit report of their encryption, and I have not heard a complaint from someone that had their image unwillingly decrypted either. If you are an average user, that should be fine. However, if the data on your disk is very expensive financial data, you could use Bitlocker encryption instead, or use both, as Bitlocker has had many independent audits. If you want to use Bitlocker encryption, click the Backupper USB link I posted above.
    Please reply letting us know how you backed up your 48-digit Bitlocker recovery key, prior to performing this backup.
  • aiArtisan: NOTE: I'm cloning a disk, not making an image.  I don't believe encryption is an AOMEI option in this case, correct?

  • My apologies.
  • @aiArtisan No worries! Thank you for all your help.
    Say, is it possible to encrypt an adi image file after it has been created?
  • @admin If I clone the drive using a USB Boot-able version of AOMEI Backupper, will the bit-locker state also be preserved? I'm guessing it is. Thank you.
  • @Bitpusher1010, Yes, if you boot the computer from WinPE bootable media of AOMEI Backupper to clone BitLocker drive, yes, it will retain Bitlocker on the cloned drive.
  • @admin Thank you. Say, is it possible to encrypt an adi image file after it has been created?
  • @Bitpusher1010, You can use third-party software to encrypt the adi image file. AOMEI Backupper can't encrypt the image file again.
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