Migrating to SSD - drive letters?

Case closed! Looks like EaseUS was to blame and wasted a lot of my time. Many thanks for the fool-proof step-by-step guide, dsperber!

Oh btw, one more thing: can I shrink the system partition on the SSD to something like 64GB and create another (logical) partition on it for my games or should there ever be only one big partition on a SSD? I've read conflicting suggestions.

elpollodiablo12 said:

Case closed! Looks like EaseUS was to blame and wasted a lot of my time.

Excellent!!! You have emerged victorious. It just took the right tool for the job.

As far as why the cloned Win7 partition is slightly smaller "used" than the original, it just might have something to do with how Macrium Reflect works, in copying the "file system". It's probably not actually a sector-by-sector duplication. Maybe some over-allocations got reduced in the process. Anyway, I wouldn't worry about it.

Oh btw, one more thing: can I shrink the system partition on the SSD to something like 64GB and create another (logical) partition on it for my games or should there ever be only one big partition on a SSD? I've read conflicting suggestions.

You've already got 138GB unallocated on the SSD, so that's already available for another partition. And yes, you can of course shrink your 100Gb Windows partition and add the reclaimed additional space to the 138GB already free, for a larger "data" partition if that's what you want to do.

Doesn't matter whether primary or logical, since you're not yet close to the max of four primary partitions in an MBR drive (which your SSD is). There's no harm or benefit one way or the other, as long as you have no more than four partitions on the drive. The real value of "logical" partitions comes if you want to have five or more partitions on an MBR drive.

Personally, I have my own Windows partitions "trimmed" to a reasonable size, and allocate the rest of the drive to one or more "data" partitions. That's just my style. Others will have their own opinions, but I feel having user data off of C and onto some other partition(s) D->x just makes backing up and restoring (should that be necessary), and recovering from unexpected problems or disasters, that much simpler. The C partition can be restored from a "system image" without much concern about losing data (other than what you've got in C:\Users), since the bulk of your data is on D->x and is "immune" to being impacted when you have Windows integrity issues requiring recovery more elaborate than a simple "system restore point".

More importantly, you have a 2TB drive that is fully allocated to "games", with over 900GB free. I don't know if that's an internal drive or an external USB drive, but I don't see in your screenshots an indication that you are performing regular "backups" to some target partition/folder. Perhaps you have no irreplaceable data (though that seems unlikely), but I'd bet you do have lots of data you would cry over if you lost it. So while you're contemplating how to partition your new SSD, I'd also contemplate how to do regular backups.

Note that in addition to cloning, Macrium Reflect Free can also do "system image" backups (say of C, to an .MRIMG file in some target partition/folder). That "system image" can also be restored either by Macrium Reflect from (a) an additional item on your boot menu (that's one of the "other tasks...", namely "add recovery boot menu option" to boot to Macrium Reflect via WinPE from your hard drive), or (b) from the standalone boot CD you can create (other tasks -> create rescue media). If you're not already doing it you really should think about running regular automatic scheduled weekly "system image" backups (say on Sunday nights) to either an external USB drive, or to a partition/folder on your 2TB drive.

Furthermore, Macrium Reflect Standard (non-free) has some additional nice features over the free version (e.g. "space management", so that older generation backups are automatically deleted when you create new ones). In particular, the non-free version can also do "data" backups (of folders/files), which also supports selective folder/file recovery. A good plan here is to run automatic scheduled monthly FULL "data" backups, and nightly INCREMENTAL (i.e. everything changed or created in the past 24 hours) "data" backups.

A well thought out backup scheme should include both (a) "system image" backups, and (b) "data" backups. That way you guarantee you'll always have a way to recover from any Windows integrity corruption, getting you back to the operational condition you were last weekend. Worst case, you can go back additional weeks (depending on how many generations you retain), if for some reason the most recent "system image" isn't satisfactory. And then you can use your monthly/nightly "data" backups to "catch up data on C" from the date of whatever "system image" you just restored, to the date of the most recent nightly "data" INCREMENTAL backup. Since the rest of your data is off of C and lives on D->x, you only need to worry about "catching up data on C" after restoring a "system image" if that becomes necessary. Note that ordinary "system restore point" recovery does not lose any of your data on C.

I, myself, use a different product for "data" backups: NovaBackup. I prefer it's interface and capabilities, to the folder/file backup feature of Macrium Reflect. NovaBackup can also do its own "system image" backup, but I prefer the interface and features of Macrium Reflect for "system image" backups. In other words I myself use Macrium Reflect for "system images" run weekly, and I use NovaBackup for monthly/nightly "data" backups. But you might find Macrium Reflect perfectly acceptable for both.

Bottom line: a good regular backup scheme is mandatory. If you have one already, great. If you don't, you should seriously consider it.