SSD - Install and Transfer the Operating System

Thanks, Wolfgang. The included software with the Samsung 830 comes with a manual Trim function that supposedly keeps the drive optimized under XP. We'll see how functional it is. I plan to move most of my data to the HDD. Even with data I still have 72% of free space on the SSD. Nevertheless, I will heed your advice and do a Secure Erase when I notice a slowdown.

I wasn't going to get any upgrades for my old Dell clunker, but couldn't help myself when I saw the 128GB Samsung 830 on sale for $90 on Newegg. Now that I've seen what a solid state drive can do, I feel compelled to spring for a new system to do it justice.

By the way, the drag and drop feature in Macrium WinPE is top-notch. I'm really impressed with the tools that are available today.

Hello whs,

I've joined the forum to request a bit of hand-holding for a problem that's just different enough from anything I've read in the 34 pages of this thread (yeah, took me 2 days) for me to want the best advice available before trying anything that could devastate my system. Like many before me, I'm a user not an IT dude, itrw I'm an industrial engineer. I'm a gamer, browser & sometime video producer on the PC, apart from that it's my entertainment system.

So - when I bought this PC, about 18 months ago, it came with just the 1TB hitachi HD and no installed OS. Before leaving the shop I bought the 2TB WD & the 40GB Intel SSD as well as Win7 Pro. I fitted them and then installed win7 to the SSD, which became my C: drive.

Even though I put every 3rd party app etc that gives me a choice into D:/program files (x86)/... about a fortnight ago I got a warning that it was nearly full (200MB left, I think!) so I started thinking about a solution.... a bigger SSD of course!

Yes, I did my research, moved a few files out of C:/users/me...gamesaves, uninstalled a few apps that were on C that I didn't need anymore, that gave me 850MB free. The I found the link to doing the sp-1 clean-up, that gave me 4.2GB free, which will keep me afloat until I solve my real problem. I dealt with the pagefile/hibernation issues after installing the OS if I remember correctly.

I bought a 120GB ADATA SSD, which comes with Acronis HD, and a USB-Sata thingy, followed the instructions, cloned my C: to the new F:, checked that the files had all copied, no problem.

Closed down, opened the case, swapped out the drives - no boot.

OK, to stop this turning into a novel, what I've discovered since, mostly as a result of this thread and some links in it, is that it's actually my D: drive which has the 100MB system partition on it, not C: Either the drive had that 'as standard' or when windows installed it put that on the first SATA location instead of the new SSD - I think I just plugged that into the next available SATA slot, never thought it would matter

- I did actually wonder why my WEI for drive speed was only 5.9 with an SSD but never chased it up, I'm guessing that the drive speed is calculated from where the system bit is, not the SSD with the OS.

What I want to do is make the 120GB SSD the bootable OS drive & eventually turn the 'old' 40GB SSD into a drive purely for my "Skyrim" game folder.

I have EasyBCD, Partition Wizard & Paragon awaiting instructions.

Please walk me through what I need to do. I can post screenies of anything you need, I'm used to doing that.

Thanks in advance.

Aslan Freeman
(English Exile in the Netherlands)

Impressively quick reply :) It came in just as I was leaving for work so this is my first chance to comment.

I'm not an "SSD Purist", but I certainly respect the opinion of one who is, so I'll do the secure erase before anything else. I still feel the need to ask for a wee bit of clarification on other things though, for the reasons stated earlier...

In 1. This has me confused! The 40GB installation IS the SSD & has no bootmngr, do you mean move the bootmngr from the 1TB drive to the 'old' C: drive which is the 40GB SSD?

2. Can I ask the REASON for imaging to another HDD? (Rather than a straight clone to the new SSD) -Just to help my understanding What software do you recommend for the imaging? Anything to be aware of?

Can you confirm that I don't need to do anything with the order of the SATA cables to the (4) Disk Drives?

-I'm already aware that the missing 'last step' is to alter the BIOS load-order for the new SSD (and I suppose to check that it's in "ACHI" mode, I expect so as the OEM drives (HDD&DVD-R) were both SATA from day 1

I'll have a good cuppa & read the Secure Erase tutorial while I wait...

To avoid further confusion, you should probably post a screen shot of Windows Disk Management if possible, so we can properly ID your partitions and their status.

We need to know the details of C and System Reserved, where they are, status, size, etc. A picture is worth more than the proverbial thousand words.

I think what he wants you to do is:

Move the boot files from System Reserved (apparently now on the 1 TB drive) to C on the 40 GB SSD with Easy BCD. This eliminates the need for the System Reserved. Then make an image of C (which now contains boot files) and store the image on some HD. Then pre-align the new SSD with Diskpart. Then restore the image of C from wherever you put it to the new SSD.

But let him confirm that.

WHS typically recommends Macrium as a preferred imaging program--and he prefers to use imaging rather than cloning.

Re cabling: ideally, you want the new C on the new SSD to appear as drive 0 in Windows Disk Management, but it's rarely critical.

Something like this then?



I don't think I'm going to do the secure erase, I got scared by all the linux talk

btw-the data on F: is the paragon clone of C: but it should be gone now, I did this while waiting....



If I was to do the cabling correctly (I AM an engineer, after all!) i.e. putting the new big SSD where the D: drive is now, when is the right time to do that, after everything else is done & running or before doing all the migrations? Does the 'bootable' drive have to be on location (sata?) "0" to work at all?