HP EliteBook 840 G2 - replace SSD drive with larger capacity one

[GeofC]

I have a HP EliteBook 840 G2 with System SKU G8R97AV - I am trying to replace the original nominal 250 Gb SSD hard drive with a nominal 500 Gb one. 

I have successfully cloned the original drive using another PC with both drives attached and EaseUS Todo Backup Free 9.1 software.  When I put the new cloned drive into the laptop it does not recognise the operating system on the new drive and will not boot. 

Messages are: Media Test Failure
Boot Device not found
Please install an operating system on your hard disc
Hard Disc - (3F0)
F2 System diagnostics
For more information --------
etc.

The internal hard drive test for the new drive comes out as OK.

Clearly, there is something I do not know re setting the BIOS or something else in order to do this.

Please help as I do not want to attempt to install Win 11 onto the new drive until I have it working as Win 10 and do not want to attempt a Win 11 upgrade on the original working drive in case I end up with nothing.

Yours Geoff Christopher

[Paul_Tikkanen]

Hi, Geoff:

The only suggestion I can offer would be to try clean installing W10 on the 500 GB SSD and see if that works.

Make a bootable W10 USB installation flash drive with the Microsoft media creation tool from the link below:

Download Windows 10

After W10 has completed installing, you can install the drivers and available software from your notebook's support page.

HP EliteBook 840 G2 Notebook PC Software and Driver Downloads | HP® Support

Your notebook does not meet Microsoft's minimum W11 hardware requirements of needing an Intel 8th generation core or newer processor and a TPM 2.0 security device.

In order to upgrade to W11 you will need to employ one of the many different W11 hardware bypass checks that are out there in cyberspace.

I found this method to be the easiest way to perform an in-place upgrade from W10>W11 or from an older build of W11 to a newer one.

I have tried many different ways to do in place upgrades during the last 3 years.

Watch this video:

How to Install Windows 11 on Unsupported PC in 2025 (New Easiest Method, No CMD)

Download the W24H2 ISO file and use that (3rd option).

Download Windows 11

You can download the free 7-Zip file utility from the link below. The top line is for 64 bit.

7-Zip

You'll have to repeat this procedure each October when Microsoft rolls out the new builds because a PC that does not meet Microsoft's minimum W11 hardware requirements will never automatically get the update to the next build.

Other than that, your PC will continue to get the monthly cumulative and other updates.

That's only a minor inconvenience to have continued OS support beyond October of 2025.

[GeofC]

Thanks for your information.  I will try that over the next few days and repoert back.

Geoff

[Paul_Tikkanen]

You're very welcome, Geoff.

[GeofC]

Hi - I have found the solution to the original problem.  The hard drive I had cloned onto was a GPT partition and the original SSD disc was MBR.  I realised this after starting a Win 10 installation which required MBR.  I guess some setting in the BIOS prevented the laptop from seeing the GPT partitioned disc.

I therefore took my new disk, deleted all partitions and cleaned the disk then converted it to MBR using diskpart from command line then convert mbr. Finally I recloned the original disk onto the new larger one again.

Then I replaced the original disk with the newly cloned one in the laptop and no problems.

I must remember this one for future reference.

Thanks again for the support.

Now to try to install win 11 using your procedure.

Geoff

[Paul_Tikkanen]

You're very welcome, Geoff.

Glad you got it to work.

Too bad the OS you cloned was MBR.

It should have been installed with the GPT partition table.

Maybe it had W7 installed originally and then upgraded to W10.

You can convert to GPT without losing data.

Watch this video.

How to Convert MBR to GPT for Free on Windows 10 without Losing Data (Easy Method)

After you make the conversion, you will have to disable legacy mode in the BIOS and enable secure boot.

[GeofC]

Watched the video but for some reason the win 11 ISO file download did not do as expected.  In the end used rufus to set up Win 11 installation files on a USB drive then ran the setup file from there.  Now happily installed Win 11 on the new cloned hard drive.  Thanks again for your support and workaround to change partition table back to GPT.

Geoff

[Paul_Tikkanen · Accepted solution]

Anytime, Geoff.

Glad to have been of assistance.

Yes, that is the method I used to use all of the time.

Make a bootable USB flash drive with Rufus, check the bypass boxes and run the setup application.

Cheers,

Paul