How to Fix | Clonezilla Failed to Clone Bad Sectors

On a Windows forum, there was a question: "Clonezilla can't clone bad sectors on my laptop's HDD. Can chkdsk fix it?" Most of the replies suggested that the asker replace the hard drive. But what if you don't want to give up on your old HDD? This article will tackle the topic from a tool's perspective, guiding you on how to clone a hard drive with bad sectors.

Why do bad sectors occur on hard drives?

A hard drive is composed of multiple small storage spaces called clusters. A cluster is equal to one or more sectors, the number of which depends on the hard drive's file system. Thus, a cluster is the smallest allocation unit while a sector is the smallest addressable unit. When a hard drive has bad sectors, these sectors will fail to respond to read/write requests.

Generally, there are two types of bad sectors on a hard drive: physical bad sectors (hard bad sectors) and logical bad sectors (soft bad sectors). Physical bad sectors can result from damaged read/write heads, dust on the platters, worn-out flash memory units in an SSD, or other defects or wear issues.

Soft bad sectors occur when the operating system tries to read data from a sector on the hard drive and finds that the error-checking code (ECC) does not match the sector's contents.

Unfortunately, if your hard drive has bad sectors, the damage is irreversible, and you should consider purchasing a new one. However, if the bad sectors are soft bad sectors, you might be able to fix the hard drive by zero-filling it or by formatting it.

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How to Fix Clonezilla Failed to Clone Bad Sectors Issue

If you encounter the "Clonezilla clone failed" or "Clonezilla bad sector clone failed" error, try the following methods to help you solve this problem.

Method 1: Cloning Your Hard Drive with a Clonezilla Alternative

In Clonezilla, there is an option to skip bad sectors and continue cloning. If you have tried this method without success, we recommend trying an alternative to Clonezilla – the Disk Copy tool.

AOMEI Backupper Free specializes in disk cloning. You can use it to replace HDD with SSD, upgrade to a larger disk, transfer data from one computer to another, migrate system to SSD without reinstalling Windows, or clone hard drive to USB flash drive, etc.

Here, the way to go with a disk cloning tool is to help you clone a hard drive with bad sectors, that is, skip over the bad sectors and retrieve your data as much as possible. If you haven't got one, download and install a disk cloning software, and then follow the guide below on how to clone a hard drive with bad sectors.

Step 1: Download, install, and run the Disk Copy utility on your computer.

Click “Disk Mode,” then select the hard drive you want to copy or clone. If your hard drive has bad sectors, check the “Clone bad sectors” option as well. Click “Next” to continue.

Step 2: Select the target disk.

Note: If you are cloning or copying the source disk, the target disk should be at least as large as the source, or larger.

Step 3: Check and edit the disk layout.

If your target disk is an SSD, remember to check the “Target is SSD” option.

Click "OK" if the program prompts you to wipe data from the target disk.

Step 5. Click “Continue” to start the hard drive cloning process.

Method 2: Check for Bad Sectors on the Source Drive

If you encounter the "Clonezilla can't clone bad sectors" error while cloning a hard drive with Clonezilla, try using Windows' built-in CHKDSK tool to repair or mark bad sectors before cloning. Here's how to run the CHKDSK command.

Step 1: Type “cmd” in the Windows search bar, then click “Run as administrator” to open the Command Prompt.

Step 2. Type in "chkdsk g: /f /r /x" and press "Enter." (In this example, "g" is the letter of the drive. Replace it with the letter of your target drive.)

Note: "/f" is used to fix disk errors; "/r" locates bad sectors and tries to recover readable information; and "/x" forces the volume to dismount.

Step 3. Type “exit” and press “Enter” to close the CMD.

After the bad sectors on the hard drive have been remapped, you can restart Clonezilla to clone the drive.

[[3]] Conclusion

That's it for the solutions when you get the “Clonezilla unable to clone bad sectors” error. Generally, whether a hard drive with bad sectors can be cloned depends on the type of bad sectors. If they are hard bad sectors, don't waste your time and buy a new one directly. If they are soft bad sectors, you still have a chance to clone the hard drive with a Disk Copy tool. But you need to remember that this is not a 100% working method. It still depends on how severe the sector damage is.