Seagate DiscWizard Free Alternative | Review and Guide
Quick review for Seagate DiscWizard
Seagate DiscWizard, developed by Acronis, is a software for Seagate and Maxtor hard drives. You can download it from here and use it to backup or clone the disk, migrate hard drive to another, recover from a disaster and so on.
As a disk cloning tool, it is pratical and easy to use, but also insufficient in some respects. So I'd also introduce a Seagate DiscWizard free alternative later in this post.
Now let's take a look at the abilities of DiscWizard.
◆ The advantages of Seagate DiscWizard:
Supported OS: Seagate DiscWizard supports a wide range of Windows OS including Windows 10/8/7/etc.
Hard drive replacement: It can help you migrate the data from the old hard drive to the new one.
Backup and restore: You can perform sector-by-sector backups, and store backups on external hard drives, network attach storage, USB flash drive, CD/DVD, etc.
Disaster recovery: It also enables you to create a recovery media in case the operating system fails to boot.
Simple operation: Check how to clone disk with Seagate DiscWizard in this tutorial.
◆ The shortcomings of Seagate DiscWizard:
Seagate DiscWizard does not support cloning dynamic disk, nor cloning a single partition.
It only supports partitions and disks backup. File and folder backup are not available.
It takes up a lot of space. The installation file alone is over 500 MB.
The backup image can only be restored to the exact same computer and could not restore to other locations.
Sometimes you may find Seagate Disc Wizard fails to clone due to various reasons.
Most of all, Seagate DiscWizard only supports Seagate and Maxtor hard drives.
After this brief reviewing, you should have come to a conclusion that whether DiscWizard is for you. If you are discontent with any of the downsides, a free alternative with more complete features, higher compatibility and efficiency may be a better choice to perform disk backup or clone.
Best free alternative to Seagate DiscWizard
After trying some products of this kind, I consider Qiling Disk Master Standard as one of the best free alternatives to Seagate DiscWizard, which helps you backup and restore files & folders, partitions, OS and disk, as well as data disk cloning.
It supports Windows 11/10/8.1/8/7/XP/Vista just like DiscWizard and has no restriction on hardware brands. With its Disk Backup and Disk Restore feature, you can achieve data protection on any hard drive that can be detected by Windows.
- The Disk Backup feature will backup everything on the disk, if it is a system disk, it will include the operating system, boot-related partition(s), and other data you don't want to lose, such as, installed programs, personal data etc.
- The Disk Restore feature allows you to restore backup image to a new disk, larger or smaller. And you are capable of improving SSD disk perform and adjust partition size of the target disk if it is larger.
In the following part, you can get the full guide on how to clone disk using Qiling Disk Master with its disk backup and restore functions. Also, you can get another simple way to migrate the whole disk. Keep on reading to grab more details.
How to clone disk using free Seagate DiscWizard alternative?
This part will show you how to use the Disk Backup and Disk Restore features. Just read carefully to catch the detailed instructions below.
Section 1: Make a copy of your computer disk
Step 1. Download and install Qiling Disk Master Standard then open it. In the main interface, select Backup > Disk Backup. If you only need to backup Windows and crearte an image of system partition, you can click System Backup to have a try.
Step 2. Click Disks button to select the system disk that you want to clone. Then, click the folder-shaped button and select the destination disk to store disk image file.
Step 3. Click Proceed to perform disk backup.
Schedule Backup: you can click Schedule and select Daily, Weekly, USB plug in, Event triggers to run your backup tasks, the last two modes are available in paid versions.
Options: you can enable email notification, choose the compression level for the backup image file and select intelligent sector backup or sector-by-sector backup, etc. If you want to encrypt your backups, the higher version may help.
Section 2: Restore the disk image securely
Now that you have the disk image in hand, you can easily restore the backup image to the new SSD and boot from it securely and for free.
Step 1. Connect external drive containing system image as well as new SSD to the target computer that you want to make the disk recoverd to. Open this freeware, then click "Restore" and "Select Task" option. If you can't find the image file in the list box, you can browse the backed up image file by clicking the "Select Image File" button.
Step 2. In the next interface, you can select backup image from the list, and then click "Next".
Step 3. Next, you can choose how to restore the backup image, including Restore the entire disk, Restore a partition in the disk.
Step 4. The source disk and the destination disks will be listed in this step. Confirm the operations and click "Proceed".
When the restore process has been completed, click Finish and now you can enjoy the exact copy of the Windows OS and configuration of your current PC.
How to migrate Seagate hard drive directly
In addition to the free backup and restore methods, you can still use the clone features of Qiling Disk Master. With the free Standard edition, you can data disks easily. If you want to clone system disk with Windows installed, you can upgrade to Qiling Disk Master Professional to enjoy advanced cloning function. It simplifies the whole transfer process and sharpely reduces time consumption.
As an adequate Seagate DiscWizard alternative, it allows you clone hard drive with different size, such as:
- Clone hard drive to larger drive to get more storage space and better performance.
- Clone larger disk to smaller disk with intelligent mode, like from larger HDD to smaller SSD.
- You can also clone dynamic volumes, restore system image to different computer, auto delete old backups, etc.
No matter what are your specific needs, the steps to clone disks with Qiling Disk Master are as simple as in Seagate DiscWizard.
1. If your target drive is an SSD, please connect it on your computer in advance. Install and launch the software, navigate to Clone tab and select Disk Clone. If you want to migrate only operating system, choose System Clone instead.
2. Specify the disk you want to clone, and the destination disk to save the copy of source disk, click Next to continue.
It supports cloning all data disks and MBR system disks, clone system disk GPT to GPT, MBR to GPT or GPT to MBR.
3. In Operation Summary, you can Edit Partition, tick SSD Alignment or Sector by Sector Clone according to your needs. Then confirm your operation and click Proceed.
SSD Alignment: This option can accelerate the reading and writing speed of the target SSD.
Sector By Sector Clone: Copy all the sectors, including unused or bad sectors to create an intact duplication of hard drive. If requires a larger or equal-sized target disk.
Edit Partition: Adjust partition size and drive letter of the target disk.
4. Wait patiently till the cloning has been completed. Click Finish to quit the wizard.
The target disk will be overwritten after cloning. If you've stored some important data on it, please go to Backup tab to save it in advance. Meanwhile, the source disk won't be auto formatted, you can also go to Tools tab and use the Disk Wipe feature of Qiling Disk Master to erase it as you like.
Other helpful features:
◉ Create Bootable Media: If you're worried that your computer will suddenly go down and won't boot, try use this tool to create a bootable USB or disc. It can boot a crashed computer to Windows PE and enables you to restore your computer from a system image created by Qiling Disk Master. It's also a qualified alternative to Seagate DiscWizard bootable USB or ISO.
◉ Scheduled Settings: You can set up a schedule to perform automatic backup or sync. There are 5 options in total - Daily, Weekly, Monthly, Event triggers and USB plug in.
◉ Image Compression: For backup files that are too large, you can choose the compression level of the image. The higher level you choose, the longer time it will take and the smaller the image file can be.
◉ Universal Restore: This feature allows you to restore a system image to another computer with dissimilar hardware, and make sure the PC can boot after restoring.
Verdict
Seagate DiscWizard is a practical software for Seagate and Maxtor hard drive users. If you are not one of them, or simply not satisfied with the functionality of this software, you can consider the Seagate DiscWizard free alternative - Qiling Disk Master Standard. You can choose the free backup restore method to clone the disk or upgrade to the pro version to use the disk cloning feature to complete the process faster and easier. It depends on your personal needs.
Compared with other backup and clone software, it's easy to operate and rich in functions, containing what Seagate DiscWizard can do and what it lacks. In addition to conventional operations, Qiling Disk Master also helps you to replace hard drive without losing data, restore Windows from boot, clone dynamic disk and so on.
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