CONFUSING SSD INSTALL

Help Fellow Enthusiasts,

I want to install a 1TB SSD and make it my boot drive. Google gave me many different , confusing, answers. Many were thinly disguised ads for some product to clone or partition, ways to load WIN 7 by thumb drive or transfer the existing WIN 7 from your HDD. None of them was exactly what I needed and none of them had a downloadable list of instructions. Obviously, if I'm working on the computer; it will be difficult to read instructions on the computer. So I will cobble a list from different sources and, hopefully, someone can tell me if I'm on the right track and if not; put me on the right track.

Cloning/Migration of files is not an option since I have many problems with my current system that I've managed to work around. I really want to rid myself of the necessity to work around.

I have a WIN 7 PRO CD that came with the computer and a SATA to USB 2 adapter and a 2.5 to 3.5 SSD installation adapter.

1. After grounding and unplugging, open the case and install the SSD using the daisy chained SATA/power cables OR use the SATA/USB2 adapter outside the case. Be sure your computer recognizes the new drive.

1a.Should I disconnect my current 500 GB hard drive to prevent possible conflicts?

2. Power up the computer and go to BIOS. Set the boot option 1 to CD drive and set the SSD as destination drive.

2a. Is setting the destination drive an option in BIOS, is there another method, or do I need to disconnect SATA/power from my HDD so there is no other choice??


3.Put the WIN7PRO disc in the CD drive and turn the computer off then on. The WIN7PRO disc should then bring up the installation program on the screen and give you many, many, choices on what you want to do.

3a. The new SSD should show unallocated space. Do I need to partition the SSD for it to work? During installation is there an option to make the SSD the boot drive and not the HDD, which still has a bootable copy of WIN7PRO on it? Should I erase the WIN7PRO from the HDD?

4.Go back to BIOS and set the SSD to boot one.

I want to keep the HDD for storage (music, photos, personal files)
and reinstall my games on the SSD. I read somewhere that Steam has a program to migrate the entire Steam account; does anybody know the particulars?

I 've heard that the process of installing a blank SSD and making it your boot drive is supposed to be easy; but I've found it confusing. I'm sure I've overlooked something so any feedback will be appreciated.

many vendors offer migration software- I installed an intel ssd with no issues at all

Originally posted by bprat22 Those steps sound confusing.    Normally its simply installing your new SSD, unplug any other drive to avoid the OS conflict you mentioned, boot with OS disc in optical drive and follow install instructions.  Once it boots successfully to OS with the new drive, then you can plug in the other drives and do what you want with them.If the pc doesn't see the new SSD, go into Disc management and Initialize or Format it, but you normally don't have to.You can check in Bios that the new drive shows first, but if all is well, you can ignore doing that unless you have issues.Hope this helps.

bprat22,

Thanks for the help. I started with your advice and went on from there. After many, many, trials and tribulations it's done and up and running. The 2017 upgrades are listed below. I also have a new Hcman programmable keyboard, but only 200 digits for descriptions.


fixed broken quote

Edited by Snaike - 01 Aug 2017 at 9:16am

Originally posted by bprat22 Good to hear. Enjoy. Curious what problems you had. It's usually pretty simple but every system is different.

bprat22,

I should have been more clear. The few problems I had installing the SSD were due to my inexperience and clumsiness. I had trouble getting the SSD and the HDD to stay wired; when one set of cables was attached, the other would become unplugged. I finally installed in the correct order and the problem vanished. I reseated the HDD in it's original slot and the SSD in the one below.

I had trouble in the bio trying to make the SSD the load drive. The instructions said to move a drive up to the load position, I needed to use the + key. I tried and reread and tried and reread etc. and it would never move the SSD up. I finally realized the bio was telling me to use the + on the numpad and not the shifted one.

The real trials and tribulations came when I had to reinstall 2008 version of Win7/Pro. In one day there were 200 updates with many more to come. Since Microsoft no longer supports Win7, I had to wait for them all to trickle in. All my favorites were on IE11 and it would not update or load ANY IE other than 8 until I had Service Pack 1. Microsoft has an inane version of a smiley face where you would normally down load the service pack.

The service pack was finally complete due to the numerous updates and I could load IE11. My favorites were finally available (Three favorites lists actually; one imported from Vista, one from a few years of before I did a complete reload with the DS disc provided, and the latest from the past 4 years or so.). It's been great fun paring it all down to one list.

Now it was time to load the games . For a number of years I played online games and used the e-mail I have with DS. During that time my original e-mail expired and I could not recover it.
Why a problem? Steam, Origin, D2D, and many other sites were under the original e-mail address and I could not return their confirmation mails; a la Steam Guard. I had to log in to change the e-mail address. So I contacted support for each site and then had to prove to each site who I was by name address, phone, last mode of buying (credit card, pay pal, etc.); as well as the last four digits of the cards. I waited for a never to come request for DNA and birth certificate; just kidding.

Then the games from D2D would not download for some reason and I spent hours with their support people as well as support from Steam, Origin, etc.

Finally it all came together and I'm loving the 26 second initial load times as well as the shorter time between the game starts as well as shorter times between game doors.

It's all in the past now and soon forgotten and I hope this reply is a lesson for anyone wanting to install an SSD in a nine year old computer when cloning is not used.

Thanks for the narrative. It really helps in similar situations.

Hopefully it will become a bad memory in years of enjoyment.