I recently received a new laptop, my old one is really in a stage in which productive work is not possible anymore. The new laptop is equipped with an Nvidia GTX 4080 12 Gb and a 12900 processor and an upper level equipment option.
I purchased, however, a model with the basic RAM and SSD configuration and I am about to open the system to install the new ram and two 4TB SSDs. I just received a ESD mat to be extra careful not to damage any components. The original ssd is 1TB.
Now I am wondering: Is it better to clone the 1 TB drive that was shipped by the manufacturer or just to do a fresh windows install on the new SSD 4TB SSD after install?
Are there any problems in terms of sector allocation or any disadvantage in terms of performance when I directly clone instead of doing a fresh install?
It is a Dell PC and obviously the advantage of cloning is, that all drivers will be installed right away and there are probably less problems with windows activation I imagine. When I clone, and I am setting a sector provisioning first (5-7 Percent), is this provisioning actually considered by the cloning software or will the cloning start at sector 1 of the new drive with no provisioning after the copy?
I am considering to use Clonezilla and to connect the old drive with an SSD USB enclosure, so that I have to open the laptop just one time only.
