Switching To SSD Questions

ignatzatsonic said:

If you use a cloning program and it works as advertised, the cloning process would mark the SSD as the active C drive. The old drive would no longer be C.

I don't know if EaseUS Partition Master has a clone capability---I'm not sure it does.

Macrium 5 has cloning capability. And probably certain versions of Acronis.

The other choices:

1: Make an image of the current C and restore that image to the SSD.

2: clean install to the SSD.

Well, EASEUS has a "copy"-function, which is probably the exact same thing.
I never used it before, I just used it for partitioning, but I guess it would just ask me what letter the copy should be?
I'm not sure if it would ask me and also if it would give the possibility to change the original C: to something else.
What I can do for now is just let it make a copy of C: to the SSD once I have it connected.

Here's another thing I found in EASEUS (from the online manual):

Set active

If you have several primary partitions, you must specify one to be the boot partition. As a rule, a disk can have only one active partition.


To set an active partition:
1. Select a primary partition to set as active from the list in the main window of EaseUS Partition Master.
2. Select Partitions -> Set active.
3. By clicking OK, you will add the pending operation of setting active partition.


Attention:
If you set a partition as active but there is another active partition on the disk, it will be unset automatically. This might also prevent your PC from booting.

You may find this tutorial useful: SSD / HDD : Optimize for Windows Reinstallation

I still haven't figured out how to make the cloned partition the partition used as the main C-drive...
It doesn't even appear I can make it do so... Partition Master won't let me change the letter of the System/Boot-drive.
And of course I can't assign C to another partition as it's already in use.
What's the way to do this?...

Did you read the tutorial I linked you to? It is very good.

I'm sorry, thanks, but these tutorials don't have the answer.

All I need to know is, now that I have an exact copy of the original (old) C-drive on my SSD, how can I make the SSD to be C?...
Because I was told I could simply use a clone. Well, I have one. Now what? :P

I have already tried this: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/w...tion-as-active

I set the partition on the SSD as "active", then I rebooted and set the SSD as the first drive.
But it doesn't boot. Even though according to that page it should read the OS from that partition. But most likely it doesn't work because it's not a C-drive yet.

I'm surprised as the tut is very well written.

However, you may need to run a startup repair to move the boot files to the SSD, as this tutorial explains.

Startup Repair - Run 3 Separate Times

It's best to run it three times with a reboot between each attempt.

This tutorial shows you how to mark a partition as active.

Partition - Mark as Active

And this one shows you how to mark a partition as inactive.

Partition - Mark as Inactive

This is getting really confusing...

Do I need to do that Startup Repair thing?... Because, when I made an exact copy, don't I already have the exact thing needed to start the system as normally?

Also, why is the "inactivation"-tutorial described as "for when you made a partition active by accident"?
I thought that I would simply have to "deactivate" the old partition now and be done with it?

Cloning isn't foolproof.

It may have failed and you may never know how or why. You have a limited number of options to "fix" it. Startup Repair is at the top of the list.

You say you have an exact copy.

You may think so, but if you had a truly "exact" copy, you would be booting.

Depending on your patience and tolerance for frustration, your best move may be a clean install.

Or try imaging.

ignatzatsonic said:

Cloning isn't foolproof.

It may have failed and you may never know how or why. You have a limited number of options to "fix" it. Startup Repair is at the top of the list.

You say you have an exact copy.

You may think so, but if you had a truly "exact" copy, you would be booting.

Depending on your patience and tolerance for frustration, your best move may be a clean install.

Or try imaging.

The thing here is, I'm not saying it's failing to boot. I'm saying that I probably didn't set the right thing yet. I barely did anything...
I'm trying to dig out what the thing to do is. I just mean, like I said, I made a copy, now how do I test it?

As far as I know, the partition on the SSD isn't being used or seen as the boot-drive at all yet.
And if anything, it's probably because its letter is still not C.
I really just don't know what to do here.

All I was told multiple times throughout the last year or two was, when I'd finally get an SSD, I could copy the C-drive to the SSD and run it from there.
So I copied it, now how do I make the system actually USE the SSD?... Because it doesn't seem to fail because of what is on the SSD, it just seems to be wanting/expecting the original HDD to be there.
That's all I need to know really. :)