Can I clone a PC hdd using a Mac?

[cosmichobo]

G'day,

My son has a Dell Optiplex. *sigh*

The SSD in it appeared to be failing, as it was no longer booting, and the diagnostics could not see it. So I helped him get a new Samsung SSD.

My problem is... Installing Win10 the first time round was an absolute nightmare. The ISO image wont fit on an optical disk, and when I tried to create a bootable USB that wouldn't work either. I frankly have no idea how I ultimately managed to get it installed... I just remember hours and days of agony trying to get the bloody thing working. (Even tried using his Win-based Laptop, to run the installer and choose the SSD when connected via a USB dock, but the Win installer would not allow me to choose an external drive..!)

When I put the old SSD into the USB docking station now, the drive mounts on my Mac Mini. (Guessing it's on its last legs) So - I was wondering if I could clone the old SSD onto the new one, including any special partitions etc that Windows may need...? Either via Terminal, or Carbon Copy Cloner?

Thanks

cosmic

 

[DaveFromCampbelltown]

So long as the old SSD is exactly the same size, or smaller than, the new drive, you could use the terminal command 'dd'.
However, using Winclone is much easier.

 

[Joeronzk]

Create a bootable USB, pull off the old SSD from the laptop and plug in the new ones. This could be much easier to go with. There would be potential issues (software/hardware) for direct disk cloning.