By Lily / Last update November 20, 2024

Choose a Right SSD for Your PC

Before we talk about Western Digital migration software, there is one more important thing to be noted: choose an appropriate WD SSD for your PC. There are a few steps required before purchasing the SSD.

1. Check Computer Hardware Support

Before purchasing an SSD, check with your hardware manufacturer's user manual and specifications to determine the type and how many slots are available. Most newer computers support both 2.5" SATA and M.2 slots.

Note: Not all M.2 slots support PCIe which is required for NVMe SSD. Some only support SATA SSD, some only support PCIe SSD, and some support both SATA and PCIe SSD.

2. Know Your Specific Need

  • WD Green: Ideal for everyday light computing tasks, suitable for students and casual home users
  • WD Blue: Ideal for everyday larger computing tasks, suitable for desktop, laptop, and all-in-one computers
  • WD Red: Uniquely engineered for use in Network Attached Storage (NAS), useful for small home offices to medium sized businesses
  • WD_BLACK: Offers superior performance and experience, suitable for high performance needs and gaming
  • WD Gold: Reliable, performance drives for enterprise applications, designed for use in small business data hubs and corporate storage

Does Western Digital SSD Have Cloning Software?

It's not surprising that you would think so, because many SSD drives come with a cloning software, like Samsung Data Migration, Seagate DiscWizard, Intel® Data Migration Software, NTI Echo cloning software, etc. As a matter of fact, Western Digital (WD) does not come with cloning software.

You can download the WD SSD clone software - Acronis True Image WD Edition from the WD sites. However, it has some limitations that users should be aware of:

  • WD Drives Required: The software only works if at least one Western Digital drive is connected to your system. This restriction makes it unsuitable for non-WD setups.
  • No Dynamic Disk Support: The software does not support dynamic disks, limiting its usefulness for users who rely on advanced storage configurations.
  • Basic Cloning Capabilities: While it supports disk cloning, the functionality is limited to basic needs. Advanced cloning options, such as sector-by-sector cloning, may not be available.

Is there such Western Digital SSD clone software that breaks all the limitations? Please read on.

Best Western Digital SSD Migration Tool

 AOMEI Backupper Professional is the best Western Digital SSD migration tool for Windows PC. It provides you with 2 ways, namely using "System Clone", "Disk Clone". The previous is to migrate OS only to WD SSD, while the latter one is to transfer the entire hard drive. You don't need to reinstall Windows and installed programs after cloning. And you can enjoy the following advantages during the process:

🌟2 Cloning methods: By default, it uses "Intelligent Clone" method, which clones only used sectors, making it possible to clone larger HDD to smaller SSD. You can also clone all sectors of a hard drive using "Sector By Sector Clone". 
🌟SSD Alignment: This feature uses 4k alignment technology to improve the read and write speeds of SSD disk and prolong its lifespan.
🌟Multi-brand hard drive support: AOMEI Backupper is a specialized WD SSD migration tool that can be used to clone any WD SSDs including WD Green SSD, WD Blue SSD, etc. It also works with SanDisk drives, Samsung drives, Toshiba hard drives, Crucial SSDs, etc.

What's more, AOMEI Backupper has a user-friendly interface, so anybody can complete the cloning process on their own with just a few small clicks. Please download the Western Digital cloning software and install it on your computer first.

Easiest WD SSD clone software for Windows PC.

Free Download Win 11/10/8.1/8/7/XP
Secure Download

How to Safely Perform Western Digital Data Migration

Two ways will be described below. Pick one way according to your situation.

Way 1. Clone OS to a Western Digital SSD

To safely migrate Windows 10/11 OS from HDD to Western Digital SSD without reinstalling Windows operating system and installed programs, follow these steps:

Step 1. Launch the best Western Digital SSD clone software - AOMEI Backupper Professional. Select Clone -> System Clone at the left side panel. 

System Clone

Step 2. The program will automatically select the system partitions, including C: system partition, EFI system partition, Recovery partition, and system reserved partition (if exists). Please choose the Western Digital SSD as the target location to save the Windows OS.

Select Destination Partition

Helpful Tips:
✍Please backup all essential data on the WD SSD in advance, because the Western Digital SSD will be overwritten during the cloning process.
✍If your WD SSD drive has more than one partition on it, please choose the first partition on WD SSD as the destination. Otherwise, the system may not be able to boot from the Western Digital SSD.

Step 3. Tick the SSD Alignment option to optimize the performance for WD SSD, and afterward click Start Clone to do Western Digital data migration.

Start System Clone

>> Make full use of disk space: This option is available when you clone to a larger drive. Use it to extend existing partitions on the destination disk with extra space.
>> Sector by sector clone: Check this option to clone all the sectors in the system partitions, and it will take a longer time. Or just keep the default option to only clone the used part and clone quickly.

After a while, you will have safely migrated the OS to a Western Digital SSD. Naturally, how long it takes depends on the data size of your system partitions.

Once it’s complete, enter into BIOS and set SSD as the first boot disk. If you're migrating Windows 10/11 from MBR HDD to GPT SSD, you should also change boot mode from Legacy to UEFI.

Way 2. Clone HDD to a WD SSD

If you would like to transfer everything from HDD to Western Digital SSD, here’s how to do it:

Step 1. Click Disk Clone under the Clone tab on the main window.

Disk Clone

Step 2. Select your current Windows 10/11 HDD as the source disk, and click Next >>.

Select Source Disk

Step 3. Tap to select the Western Digital (WD) SSD as the destination disk, and press Next >>.

Step 4. Tick SSD Alignment and press Start Clone >> to clone HDD to Western Digital SSD easily in Windows 10/11.

Start Clone

Note: If you are cloning a smaller disk to a larger disk, such as cloning 500GB to 1TB, please click Edit Partitions and use Add unused space to all partitions or Manually adjust partition size to fully use the storage space on the Western Digital SSD.

Edit Partitions

Conclusion

As you can see, AOMEI Backupper is a powerful Western Digital SSD migration tool that can help you migrate Windows operating system (OS) to a WD SSD, and clone HDD to WD SSD effortlessly in Windows 10/11 or previous systems. And it uses Intelligent Clone to clone only used sectors, thus cloning large HDD to smaller SSD is very easy and safe.

Besides, it supports to clone all kinds of HDDs and SSDs, such as migrate OS from MBR HDD to GPT SSD, clone HDD to Samsung SSD, clone SATA SSD to NVMe SSD, clone NVMe to larger NVMe, etc. Why not give it a shot?

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