Chosen Solution

how do I transfer data to new hard drive

We here at iFixit usually use SuperDuper.

carbon copy cloner

You can use Stellar Drive Clone which gives you choice to clone/image & restore your data to an external hard drive (device). You can also create a boot DVD to clone your Mac start-up disk which can be helpful in drastic situations. Further it can clone HFS, FAT and if NTFS then it clones it to Ex-fat partition. Hope this info is helpful for you.