How to Make an Exact Copy of Any Drive
How to make an exact copy of any drive

Sooner or later, every user needs to clone the contents of a drive, or generate multiple copies for installation on different computers. This is especially useful when those computers use the same hardware configuration and need to be up and running as quickly as possible. One of the best tools for these tasks is HDD Raw Copy Tool, which can duplicate all types of drives and disks sector by sector, regardless of the operating system or number of partitions.

Old hands in tech support fondly remember Norton Ghost, a fundamental resource for cloning MS-DOS and Windows images. Personally, it helped me save a lot of time, creating Windows 9x installations that would then be duplicated across dozens of disks. Wrestling with IDE cables wasn't the most comfortable thing in the world, but solving in minutes what usually took hours was an advantage we couldn't ignore.

Today we live in the solid-state era, and not a few users have abandoned SATA disks in favor of fast NVMe drives, but the need to transfer and back up data hasn't disappeared. That's where HDD Raw Copy Tool comes in, a compact and free tool that can clone all kinds of drives sector by sector, regardless of the preinstalled operating system, the interface, or the actual number of partitions.

How to Create Exact Copies of Your Drives with HDD Raw Copy Tool

How to Make an Exact Copy of Any Drive
The HDD Raw Copy Tool interface (I used VMware for more direct control over the drives)

HDD Raw Copy Tool supports two cloning modes: Disk to disk, or compressed images. The former is ideal for dumping everything from one drive to a new one, but it's important to note that the program does not extend partitions. In other words, if we decide to clone a 240 GB SSD onto a new 1 TB one, the final structure will still be 240 GB, and it's up to us to partition the rest correctly.

How to Make an Exact Copy of Any Drive
The program always warns the user before starting, since the process is destructive to the destination drive
How to Make an Exact Copy of Any Drive
Logically, the final speed will depend on the natural capabilities of each drive

Generating compressed images is a very convenient method for creating quick backups of any drive. In fact, HDD Raw Copy Tool includes pen drives, memory cards, and other external drives in its compatibility list. Cloning pen drives is a very common activity among users who need to distribute documents or promotional material, and although nothing prevents them from copying files manually, there are cases where using entire images is more convenient.

How to Make an Exact Copy of Any Drive
Creating compressed images is another convenient option

HDD Raw Copy Tool is compatible with all versions of Windows from XP onward, the latest available build is 1.20, and its official page offers portable editions to take anywhere. Link below!

Official site and download: Click here