Replacing 40GB HDD with 64GB SSD - Image restore question

[vram]

As the title says, I will be replacing my old 40GB HDD in my laptop with a 64GB SSD drive. My intent is to image my current install using the built-in system image functionality, install the SSD and then restore the image to the SSD. Since my install is recent and fresh, I would prefer not to have to install from scratch. I'm also using a Win 7 upgrade CD, so I don't want to place extra wear on the new SSD by having to install the OS twice. Will I run into problems restoring an HDD image to an SSD and will it give me the option to use the full 64GB during the imaging process or make a 40GB partition and force me to extend the partition after imaging is complete?

 

[ignatzatsonic]

You could also consider a clone process (direct transfer) rather than imaging.

You are likely exaggerating the so-called problem of wearing out an SSD by installing Windows twice. At any rate, even with an upgrade DVD, you don't have to install twice. There is another way around it.

I assume you have a 40 GB drive, with a single C partition? In that case an ordinary image restoration should give you the choice of using the entire 64 GB SSD as a single C also. In fact, that may be the default.

But it's very easy to extend after the fact if you had to.

 

[vram]

You could also consider a clone process (direct transfer) rather than imaging.

You are likely exaggerating the so-called problem of wearing out an SSD by installing Windows twice. At any rate, even with an upgrade DVD, you don't have to install twice. There is another way around it.

I assume you have a 40 GB drive, with a single C partition? In that case an ordinary image restoration should give you the choice of using the entire 64 GB SSD as a single C also. In fact, that may be the default.

But it's very easy to extend after the fact if you had to.

I don't have access to any cloning software. My understanding of a fresh install using an upgrade CD is installing Windows 7 and then installing over the first install. Not really any different than me installing Vista first, honestly.

 

[whs]

1. Windows imaging may give you problems.

2. do you have a 100MB active system partition on the HDD. Depending on that I may be able to give you a safe procedure.

3. If you image, you first have to align the SSD.

 

[ignatzatsonic]

Regarding cloning: Macrium Reflect version 5.0 is free and supports cloning. See the pic below. You can see the "clone this disk" choice near the center of the screen.

My point in the original post was that you do NOT have to do the double install thing in Win 7.

You can, but you don't have to. Double install is one of several methods to do a clean install with an upgrade disc.

See this link:

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/31402-clean-install-upgrade-windows-7-version.html

Cloning works, but it not used as often on this forum. Most choose imaging or an outright clean install.

 

[vram]

1. Windows imaging may give you problems.

2. do you have a 100MB active system partition on the HDD. Depending on that I may be able to give you a safe procedure.

3. If you image, you first have to align the SSD.

What Kind of problems? Yes, I have the 100MB partition you speak of. This is my first go involving SSDs so I'm not familiar with aligning them. Can you explain?

Regarding cloning: Macrium Reflect version 5.0 is free and supports cloning. See the pic below. You can see the "clone this disk" choice near the center of the screen.

My point in the original post was that you do NOT have to do the double install thing in Win 7.

You can, but you don't have to. Double install is one of several methods to do a clean install with an upgrade disc.

See this link:

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/31402-clean-install-upgrade-windows-7-version.html

Cloning works, but it not used as often on this forum. Most choose imaging or an outright clean install.

Thank you for your help. I will look at Macrium

 

[ignatzatsonic]

Windows imaging is fussy and not particularly intuitive. Macrium much less so.

If you have the 100 MB partition, you would need to image it as well as C.

But you can get rid of the 100 MB partition entirely, so then you would only have to image C.

 

[whs]

ignatz, did you ever clone to an SSD. Does it align the SSD. If not, how do you go about it - with Diskpart ??

 

[ignatzatsonic]

ignatz, did you ever clone to an SSD. Does it align the SSD. If not, how do you go about it - with Diskpart ??

No, I have not. It is relatively rare on this forum.

DeaconFrost had a successful experience with cloning that he posted about--no more than 10 days ago. You should be able to find that thread quickly.

He used Acronis if I remember correctly?

I'd certainly assume that Diskpart would be the proper choice---BUT--for all I know if the source disk is properly aligned, the clone will be as well. I cannot confirm as I have not done it.

 

[vram]

Windows imaging is fussy and not particularly intuitive. Macrium much less so.

If you have the 100 MB partition, you would need to image it as well as C.

But you can get rid of the 100 MB partition entirely, so then you would only have to image C.

I've re-imaged my desktop many times without trouble, but done over same HDD, never to a replacement disc. If I decided to do a fresh install, do I have to perform this alignment procedure?

 

[whs]

1. As ignatz says, get rid of the 100MB partition like this

2. Align a partition on the SSD like this. VERY IMPORTANT

3. Take an image of only the C partition like this

4. Restore the image to the aligned partition like this.

5. Shut off defrag in the SSD OS (only for the SSD).

 

[ignatzatsonic]

A clean install should be automatically aligned correctly. It was in my case and I cannot recall anyone on this forum having bad alignment with a clean install to an SSD

But you can certainly use diskpart early in the install procedure to manually make and align a partition, rather than relying on Windows to do it for you.

It's a 60 second detour to do it with Diskpart if you want to use it. You enter diskpart by hitting shift F10 when you come to the language screen early in the install.

I did not use diskpart and have perfect alignment.

 

[whs]

Windows imaging is fussy and not particularly intuitive. Macrium much less so.

If you have the 100 MB partition, you would need to image it as well as C.

But you can get rid of the 100 MB partition entirely, so then you would only have to image C.

I've re-imaged my desktop many times without trouble, but done over same HDD, never to a replacement disc. If I decided to do a fresh install, do I have to perform this alignment procedure?

No need to align with a fresh install. The installer will do the alignment.

 

[vram]

I won't get my SSD for about another week so I'll post back once I get started on it. Thanks again for all your help

 

[vram]

I got the SSD earlier than expected. Decided to load from scratch to avoid any problems. Everything seems to be working fine, but Windows didn't disable the scheduled defragmenter so who know what else it forgot to do. Used a genuine Vanilla Windows 7 Home Prem Upgrade disc. Also had to perform a double install because the enter product key and activate after install method did work. Probably could have gotten away with the regfix method had I been thinking at the time. Even in this 5~6 yr old Dell E1505 Laptop there is a noticeable speedup! Boots much faster and programs load quicker.

A few questions:

1. If I create a restore image of this SSD install, will I need to re-align the SSD if I need to restore the image?

2. Since Windows 7 didn't disable the defragmenter, is there anything else I should check to verify Windows configured itself properly for SSD?

3. Is there a way for me to verify that Windows Aligned the SSD correctly?

 

[JimLewandowski]

On the system image restore, the partition information is also checked/verified to make sure the SAME partition layout exists. If it does, off the restore image goes and everything is already aligned.

If not, it formats all partitions on the drive which is why, if one is taking a system image in preparation for a clone of their old HDD OS partition, you have to have ONLY the SYS resvd partition and the OS partition so the restore image will match.

 

[ignatzatsonic]

A few questions:

1. If I create a restore image of this SSD install, will I need to re-align the SSD if I need to restore the image?

2. Since Windows 7 didn't disable the defragmenter, is there anything else I should check to verify Windows configured itself properly for SSD?

3. Is there a way for me to verify that Windows Aligned the SSD correctly?

1: I don't think so; not positive as I have not restored.

2: If you go to defrag and check the schedule, is the SSD shown?? In my case, it is not, although it is shown in the earlier screen where you can analyze the disc.

Superfetch is disabled on my Intel SSD, but it may not be on yours---I'm not sure all firmware turns it off and there is some debate about whether it should be on or off.

Enable write-caching in Device Manager.

Take a look at the page file.

You could put your default download folders on another drive, along with your browser cache if you are antsy about too much writing.

I assume TRIM is enabled on your drive?

If it came with any software, you might see if there are any optimization tweaks available in it.

3: You can check the alignment in Diskpart. The offset needs to be evenly divisible by 4 and is typically 1024.

 

[whs]

1. no if you restore to the same partition

2. not really. I would delete the hiberfile. The command is powercfg -h off. Check whether Superfetch is set to manual - if not, set it to that.

3. Yes, see here in the Verification chapter: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/113967-ssd-alignment.html?ltr=S

 

[vram]

Thanks for the info. Unfortunately, this laptop hardware doesn't support TRIM but I am told the SSD's own garbage collection will do a good enough job. The drive I bought was a Crucial M4 64GB SSD, btw. It seemed to be a decent drive based on reviews over @ NewEgg.

* I did update the firmware based on the warning on this forum

 

[whs]

this laptop hardware doesn't support TRIM

Hmm, this is news to me. I did not know that there was a hardware dependency for Trim. How did you find that out.

The M4 is a good SSD. I have the same on this system.