Windows 7 - Partition Wizard Question

I just bought a Samsung 1T HD502HJ. Should be receiving a Dell 8100 with a 250gb drive (Windows 7) any day now. I would like to move my system to the Samsung, with a "C" partition of 100gb, and 2 data partitions "D" and "E", 400gb each.

Would it be better to partiton the 1T first, then move (clone) the C drive into the 100gb partition; or just copy the existing "C" to the 1T, then start making/resizing partitions after I get that one to boot?

Or should I just leave the 250gb as is, and use the 1T as back-up? The Samsung should be much faster than whatever comes in the Dell. The Samsung is rated up there close to SSD drives.

True, the Samsung is about twice as fast as an average HDD but still about 50 times slower in access time than a good SSD (5.3ms versus 0.1ms). You should expect a slight performance improvement if you move the system on this drive. Before cloning the system, you have to create the partitions. But make sure you make a clone and not an image if you move your OS to a smaller partition (which must be active - unless you have a seperate small partition for the MBR)

Hello tcat7, welcome to Seven Forums!


Have a look at the tutorial at the link below.

Partition Wizard : Use the Bootable CD

You should have a backup strategy of some kind.

If you don't have any backup plan, then I would suggest that using the 1 TB as a backup destination is a better use for it than using it as a boot/system drive.

I assume the Dell 8100 is a new machine. Given that, it should have a modern high quality HD and I am not sure you would notice any performance benefit by using the 1 TB Samsung as a boot device. You'd have to know the details of the Dell drive to speculate on that.

Be aware that any clone/image you make of the Dell drive will include whatever lovely stuff Dell may have put on C at the factory.

Another idea:

Shrink the Dell 250 gig C to maybe 50 or 60 gigs. Make a new D partition with the new free space (roughly 200 gigs). Put all of your data on D. Install any new applications to C. Back up all of your data on D to the Samsung 1 TB. This assumes that all of your data can be contained in about 200 gigs--that may not be the case if you have a lot of video.

But it appears you don't require a lot of space for data or you would not have ordered the Dell with only a 250 gig drive.