New Hard Drive Advice

[Snprphnx]

I just got a new HDD, a Samsung 500Gb SSD, and plan on using it for all major programs, like Windows 7/10, Office, FFXI/XIV, etc, etc. I'm planning on using my current 500Gb drive for non-program files, like personal files, movie storage, music, and such, and erasing all the old OS and program files.

My question is, what is the best process to go about accomplishing all this. I'd like to reduce as much redundancy as possible, so i don't have copies of iTunes files on both drives.

Any suggestions?

[xerodok]

Here is the process:
1. Clone your current HDD using Clonezilla or Acronis and mirror it onto your new SSD
2. Remove SATA cable from old 500GB drive
3. Attempt to boot from SSD - leave everything the same
4. Attach your old 500GB drive, make sure it's not set to boot. May be easier to attach it to your computer via USB to clear / clean it up first
5. Format / move files as you wish. Reinstall any programs to it

[Waraji]

Welcome to the +500GB SSD Club brother.

Pretty much what Xerodok said. Clone the drive. As far as the aftermath, start changing the default paths of your Documents/Music folders to the HDD off of the SSD (Leave Desktop and do not move your actual User Folder). I would also change the path of the Downloads folder.

Only thing I have on my Evo is W7, Steam, and other essential programs. Hell I threw my Google cache to my HDD's instead. I think I threw my Windows Page Files to the HDD at one point, may have not redone that after my last reformat. Oh and make sure to Disable (through cmd prompt) Hibernation mode, google it its fairly simple. Iirc it will shave off same amount of RAM you have off the SSD?

[Snprphnx]

Welcome to the +500GB SSD Club brother.

Yea. I've been wanting to upgrade to an SSD for a while now. I was originally going to simply do a 128GB for my OS and main 3-4 programs, and a 1TB-1.5TB HDD for the rest, bust when I got on Amazon, and saw an Evo 850, 500gb for $173, I jumped on it. can't wait till it comes in.

Thanks for the advice.

[xerodok]

Yea. I've been wanting to upgrade to an SSD for a while now. I was originally going to simply do a 128GB for my OS and main 3-4 programs, and a 1TB-1.5TB HDD for the rest, bust when I got on Amazon, and saw an Evo 850, 500gb for $173, I jumped on it. can't wait till it comes in.

Thanks for the advice.

Congrats on the big upgrade - post here if you need any help.

[Stromgarde]

If you're looking to get the cloning done with minimal fuss, you might want to consider using an external enclosure like this ($10!):
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...ilpage_o04_s00

It only fits laptop sized (2.5 inch) hard drives though, so this particular one might not be usable to format the old drive you're replacing if it is a larger desktop-sized drive.

[Snprphnx]

Got the hard drive in yesterday. It recommended that I connect via USB to my existing HDD. But the local stores didn't have the adaptor, so I decided to try this like it was an all new build. I connected it via SATA to my SATA 3 slot. Started up windows and nothing. Windows wasn't seeing the SSD. So I shutdown and checked my Bios. The SSD wasn't listed. So I shut down and tried swapping the SATA cable to a different spot, to the SATA 4 slot. Started up, went into Bios, and it was there. Made no changes to the Bios, exited, and started up Windows. Still wasn't seeing it. Read one several sites that newer hard drives need to be set up and connected by AHCI. I made that change in the Bios, and after that, non-stop Blue Screen of Death. I immediately changed it back to IDE, and it didn't work. I can get into the Bios and make changes, but once Windows attempts to boot up, the colors of the logo barely start to appear and it freezes and BSoD. It doesn't matter if I startup normally, safe mode, or even booting from the install CD like I'm trying to recover my system.

Help please.

[Snprphnx]

Got by the blue screen. I botched the Bios by trying to switch to AHCI the wrong way. Has to reset CMOS and am not good to go.

[xerodok]

I would assume you used some third party software that was included with your SSD instead of what I recommended? If so, what did you use? AHCI is irrelevant, you need to boot from a bootable SATA device which would be your SSD.

[Isiolia]

Read one several sites that newer hard drives need to be set up and connected by AHCI. I made that change in the Bios, and after that, non-stop Blue Screen of Death. I immediately changed it back to IDE, and it didn't work. I can get into the Bios and make changes, but once Windows attempts to boot up, the colors of the logo barely start to appear and it freezes and BSoD. It doesn't matter if I startup normally, safe mode, or even booting from the install CD like I'm trying to recover my system.

AHCI is the preferable way to set things up, but you can't readily swap between IDE/Legacy mode and AHCI for an existing Windows install. There are settings in Windows related to it, and simply changing the mode in the BIOS will result in your system bluescreening at boot. When it's not showing up in Windows, do you mean to the installer, or do you mean booted up via your old drive? If so, where are you looking for it? It's not partitioned or formatted, it's not going to show up in My Computer or whatnot.

I would also try swapping SATA cables. I've seen some that fail to work right with 6Gb/sec SSDs that worked fine with the slower spec that the HDD was using. Or just ones that went bad.

[Snprphnx]

AHCI is the preferable way to set things up, but you can't readily swap between IDE/Legacy mode and AHCI for an existing Windows install. There are settings in Windows related to it, and simply changing the mode in the BIOS will result in your system bluescreening at boot. When it's not showing up in Windows, do you mean to the installer, or do you mean booted up via your old drive? If so, where are you looking for it? It's not partitioned or formatted, it's not going to show up in My Computer or whatnot.

I would also try swapping SATA cables. I've seen some that fail to work right with 6Gb/sec SSDs that worked fine with the slower spec that the HDD was using. Or just ones that went bad.

I got it all up and running. It was several issues. Some were technical issues, and some were my own fuck ups. Here is step by step on what I did, including what I did wrong, and how I fixed it.

1. The new SSD cam with instructions and Samsung software to clone my existing hard drive, but connecting it to a USB port via an adapter. The adapter was not included with the SSD, nor did my local Best Buy or Radio Shack have it. Plus, I wanted to start the SSD off like it was a completely new build. So I opted to connect it to my motherboard via SATA, to my SATA3 port.

2. Booted up, Windows 7 didn't see the SSD. So I shut down, and and checked for it in the Bios, and it wasn't there. I switched it to the SATA5 port, rebooted, and it was then visible in the Bios.

3. Proceeded to Windows 7, and it still was not visible. I had forgotten that the drive, being brand new, needed to be partitioned, so I looked for other reasoned why it wouldn't be seen, and that is when I saw the AHCI/IDE issue, saying SSDs should be connected by AHCI.

4. I went back to my Bios, and switched my SATA controllers to from IDE to AHCI. This was a mistake on my part. As you stated, if you change these in your Bios for an existing Windows build, you will cause continual blue-screening as soon as Windows starts to load, since the Bios is attempting to load up the SATA controllers under one code, while Windows was setup to run under the other set of code. Now, you can enter into into the Windows registry and change some stuff to allow going from one to the other, but I did not do this.
*** Simply changing back to IDE die not fix the blue screening. I had to turn off, unplug, and remove the battery from my motherboard, thus resetting the CMOS, and starting my Bios from scratch***

5. Disconnected my HDD, inserted my Windows 7 disc, and booted up from it. From there, I was able to go ahead and do a fresh Windows 7 install, followed by a Windows 10 upgrade, and FFXI install. Everything is running fast and quiets so far.

Thank you for you advice and support in all this. I definitely made it harder on myself, by not cloning my existing HDD, but I wanted as clean of a drive as possible.