Installing SDD - advice please

[Scott]

On Sat, 19 Jan 2013 14:18:42 +0000, Mike Tomlinson

[snip]

No, your reading comprehension needs work.

I see. So when you said:

"It copies the whole disc sector by sector. One drawback is that the
SSD needs to be the same size as, or larger than, the source hard
drive.

"Some cloning utilities will resize on the fly, but this is tricky. If
you want to do this, try Clonezilla (also free) but it's very
intimidating for the inexperienced. Easeus is point'n'drool."

the words 'very intimidating for the inexperienced' were intended as a
recommendation to proceed.

 

[Jan Alter]

Thanks. If this cloning adventure does not succeed, I may end up
doing that.

Probably the best procedure to download a Win7 image as suggested. (you
do have the install key on hand?) Win7 will automatically align the disk for
SSD, which probably would not have been done if you were copying the clone
from Norton as Win7 was originally installed on a mechanical drive.
And of course set AHCI mode if it hasn't been done already.
If you do it that way remember not to have any other IDE drive connected
until the installation is complete.

 

[Scott]

What on earth for?

A clue lies in the name.

Like what?

Stuff I do between games of Solitaire.

Oh, it so hard to click Next, isn't it? You could have installed
*everything* in the two days you've been posting about it.

And you could have spent your time more productively than making
off-topic posts (see penultimate word of the subject line for the
topic).

 

[Scott]

Like I said, what on earth for?


Oh, you made it up. I understand.


My advice would be to do a clean install. Have you got the clone working
yet? No? Now you have had the time to clean install twice.

Windows 7 and the programmes that I have discs for, yes. Programs
downloaded, maybe. Drivers, sometimes a challenge. I may end up
following your advice though others claim that direct disc replacement
should be perfectly feasible.

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

In message <[email protected]>, Scott

I am grateful to those who have endeavoured to assist. Those looking
for confrontation would maybe be better off in a politics or other
group more suited to those that like that sort of thing.

Well said.

For what it's worth, what I have taken from the advice is that Ghost
has probably not produced a true image. I am going to try again with

One of the suggestions has been that it has produced a single (possibly
slightly compressed) file, which could subsequently be unwrapped back to
re-make the drive structure in question - i. e. it's intended to be
stored on a different drive. This ought to be easily verifiable by
examination (of the drive onto which it had put it) on another system; I
presume you've already done that.

Acronis. If that does not work, my options are to ask the technical
guy at my supplier to do the job or to reinstall Windows. If the
later, I'll wait for Office 2013 and do the two jobs at once.

[Assuming Office 2013 has something you really want ... (-:]
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

`The wireless telegraph is not difficult to understand. The ordinary telegraph
is like a very long cat. You pull the tail in New York, and it meows in Los
Angeles. The wireless is the same, only without the cat.' Attributed to Albert
Einstein 1879-1955 (Computing, 1999-12-16).

 

[Scott]

Probably the best procedure to download a Win7 image as suggested. (you
do have the install key on hand?) Win7 will automatically align the disk for
SSD, which probably would not have been done if you were copying the clone
from Norton as Win7 was originally installed on a mechanical drive.
And of course set AHCI mode if it hasn't been done already.
If you do it that way remember not to have any other IDE drive connected
until the installation is complete.

Thanks for this. What I am not sure about is whether this would
involve reformatting the entire disc and losing the programs and data,
or whether it can convert a non-functioning W7 to a functioning W7.
Sorry about the naive question.

I take it the AHCI mode is optional and can be set after the new disc
is installed and tested (in case anything goes wrong)?

Thanks for the constructive response.

 

[sothwalker]

Just curious, how exactly did you Ghost the new drive ?
Where was it physically connected,
and how did Ghost perform the clone operation.
Was the entire drive copied - including all the MBR boot sectors ?

Is this a SATA or an older IDE type drive ?

I got in this with some threads missing so this might be a waste of
mine and everyone else time but, I had a lot of trouble obtaining a
bootable clone from Ghost using Win 7.

No idea why and in the interest of time went to Acronis which has
always worked.

 

[Scott]

I got in this with some threads missing so this might be a waste of
mine and everyone else time but, I had a lot of trouble obtaining a
bootable clone from Ghost using Win 7.

No idea why and in the interest of time went to Acronis which has
always worked.

Thanks for that. It has been an interesting thread with a diversity
of approaches to discussion from different posters.

One thing that seems clear is that Ghost does not seem to produce the
'right kind of clone'. Is it Acronis True Image or Acronis Migrate
Easy that you used?

Have you tried cloning to a smaller disk?

 

[BillW50]

No idea why and in the interest of time went to Acronis which has
always worked.

Lucky you! I have purchased four different versions of Acronis and they
all have the same problem with some USB controllers. At first they used
to admit this and made it sound like it would be soon fixed or at least
the next version it would be fixed. And then all admittance of this
problem totally disappeared on their web site.

What happens is that it will backup to any USB drive all day long and
even for years and not one single problem. Although when it comes to
restoring, it can't even acknowledge that same drive even exists. I've
been through this nonsense version after version of Acronis.

I also started to use other backup software too and no other backup
programs has this problem. It is just Acronis and nobody else. Then I
started to investigate Acronis and I compiled about 12 pages of other
things it does wrong as stated by others.

Oh and if you ask them to refund your money, they won't honor it in my
experience. Nor have I ever found anybody on the net that they did so
either.

Personally when Acronis works, it works well. When it fails, it fails
well. I also have programmed for many years. And with the source code,
it should be easy to fix. Although my gut says the one guy they had
either quit or got fired or something. Now somebody else is just
rehashing the same code over and over again. Because they don't know
enough to fix it.

 

[Robin Bignall]

Thanks for this. What I am not sure about is whether this would
involve reformatting the entire disc and losing the programs and data,
or whether it can convert a non-functioning W7 to a functioning W7.
Sorry about the naive question.

I take it the AHCI mode is optional and can be set after the new disc
is installed and tested (in case anything goes wrong)?

Yes, but if you installed in IDE mode a registry fix is necessary to
enable AHCI. This page shows how to do that and also how to enable TRIM
for the SSD.
http://forum.corsair.com/forums/showthread.php?t=86403

 

[sothwalker]

Thanks for that. It has been an interesting thread with a diversity
of approaches to discussion from different posters.

One thing that seems clear is that Ghost does not seem to produce the
'right kind of clone'. Is it Acronis True Image or Acronis Migrate
Easy that you used?

Have you tried cloning to a smaller disk?

I am using Acronis True Image Home 2012.

I have cloned a large drive successfully to a smaller drive but am not
100% sure it was a boot drive, but I think it was. I remember that I
forgot the destination drive was smaller until it was about 50%
completed and I let it run just to see what would happen.

I will know in a few days as I need to clone my new SSD from a 600GB
drive.

 

[sothwalker]

Lucky you! I have purchased four different versions of Acronis and they
all have the same problem with some USB controllers. At first they used
to admit this and made it sound like it would be soon fixed or at least
the next version it would be fixed. And then all admittance of this
problem totally disappeared on their web site.

What happens is that it will backup to any USB drive all day long and
even for years and not one single problem. Although when it comes to
restoring, it can't even acknowledge that same drive even exists. I've
been through this nonsense version after version of Acronis.

I also started to use other backup software too and no other backup
programs has this problem. It is just Acronis and nobody else. Then I
started to investigate Acronis and I compiled about 12 pages of other
things it does wrong as stated by others.

Oh and if you ask them to refund your money, they won't honor it in my
experience. Nor have I ever found anybody on the net that they did so
either.

Personally when Acronis works, it works well. When it fails, it fails
well. I also have programmed for many years. And with the source code,
it should be easy to fix. Although my gut says the one guy they had
either quit or got fired or something. Now somebody else is just
rehashing the same code over and over again. Because they don't know
enough to fix it.

This a little scary. I hope my luck doesn't run out.

 

[BillW50]

This a little scary. I hope my luck doesn't run out.

Well the version you have is 2012. The last one I tried was 2011. And at
least 2011 won't get the drive alignment right on SSDs. Hopefully 2012 does.

 

[Ken1943]

I am using Acronis True Image Home 2012.

I have cloned a large drive successfully to a smaller drive but am not
100% sure it was a boot drive, but I think it was. I remember that I
forgot the destination drive was smaller until it was about 50%
completed and I let it run just to see what would happen.

I will know in a few days as I need to clone my new SSD from a 600GB
drive.

I used EaseUS Partition Manager Free to clone a 100 gig partition to a
128 ssd. Then used the same program to expand the partition to the full
128 gig. Both were sata drives with acpi turned on in bios.. Worked like
a charm without a single problem.
Windows 7 turned on TRIM

I could of used Paragon, but read all good things about EaseUS free.


KenW

 

[Jan Alter]

--
Jan Alter
(e-mail address removed)

Well the version you have is 2012. The last one I tried was 2011. And at
least 2011 won't get the drive alignment right on SSDs. Hopefully 2012
does.

I've cloned a Win7 installation from an IDE drive to an SSD using True Image
2011 with no problems.

This is what Acronis says about alignment support. I copied it directly from
their Knowledge base page
"All current Acronis products have full support of Solid State Drives (SSD)

Description
The following Acronis products have full support of Solid State Drives
(SSD):

a.. Acronis Backup & Recovery 11.5
b.. Acronis Backup & Recovery 11
c.. Acronis True Image Home 2011
d.. Acronis True Image Home 2012
e.. True Image 2013 by Acronis
f.. Acronis Disk Director 11
g.. Acronis Snap Deploy 4
This means that Acronis products detect whether the drive is a solid state
or a mechanical one and will treat it as such.

Typical examples:

a.. If you restore or clone a disk image to an SSD disk, the
recovered/cloned primary partitions will be aligned to the default starting
offset 1024kb (2048 sectors)."

Jan Alter
(e-mail address removed)

 

[charlie]

After a lot of time consuming screwing around, in part due to getting
firmware updates into the new SSDs- (Maybe that's why they were on sale?)

I ended up using a program called Paragon Migrate OS "special edition".
There is a later version available, but I didn't need to get or use it.
The real secret was to forget about using a USB interface, and instead
used one of the SATA channels. At the conclusion, shut down, pull the
old boot drive, and plug in the SSD drive in it's place.
This program was able to use a large drive, and as long as the contents
would fit, put them into the smaller SSD.

The SATA interface in AHCI mode using Microsoft drivers was the only way
that I could get the firmware update software to work. Then, (sigh),
change back to the AMD chipset specific drivers.

The USB interface worked fine for initializing the SSDs, etc, so windows
saw them.

 

[BillW50]

In Jan Alter typed:

I've cloned a Win7 installation from an IDE drive to an SSD using
True Image 2011 with no problems.

This is what Acronis says about alignment support. I copied it
directly from their Knowledge base page
"All current Acronis products have full support of Solid State Drives
(SSD)
Description
The following Acronis products have full support of Solid State Drives
(SSD):

a.. Acronis Backup & Recovery 11.5
b.. Acronis Backup & Recovery 11
c.. Acronis True Image Home 2011
d.. Acronis True Image Home 2012
e.. True Image 2013 by Acronis
f.. Acronis Disk Director 11
g.. Acronis Snap Deploy 4
This means that Acronis products detect whether the drive is a solid
state or a mechanical one and will treat it as such.

Typical examples:

a.. If you restore or clone a disk image to an SSD disk, the
recovered/cloned primary partitions will be aligned to the default
starting offset 1024kb (2048 sectors)."

Jan Alter
(e-mail address removed)

Odd, my Acronis True Image Home 2011 always starts the first partition
at sector 63. Maybe you need a newer build than the one I have or
something. I always use the boot CD and run ATI that way.

 

[Scott]

I am using Acronis True Image Home 2012.

I have cloned a large drive successfully to a smaller drive but am not
100% sure it was a boot drive, but I think it was. I remember that I
forgot the destination drive was smaller until it was about 50%
completed and I let it run just to see what would happen.

I will know in a few days as I need to clone my new SSD from a 600GB
drive.

Could you report back once mission is complete, as this is the same
task as I am trying to accomplish? Thanks in anticipation.

 

[Scott]

I decided to replace my primary hard drive with a solid state drive. I
don't have a Windows installation disc, so instead I used Norton Ghost
to clone the existing drive to the new drive (which I called X). The
clone was successful. So far, so good.

I then installed the SSD into the slot previously occupied by the C
drive. When I turn on the computer, I get a message saying, 'Reboot
and select proper boot device'. I have gone into the set-up menu and
checked that the new drive appears there. I have made it the second
boot option (after the DVD which has always been in position 1) but
still the computer gives the same message.

Any ideas where I am going wrong?

Thanks to all those who contributed ideas and advice to this project.
In the end I was unable to clone the disc successfully so rather than
spend any more time I admitted defeat and took the computer to the
computer shop. The technician there said he had never encountered so
much difficulty cloning a disc, but it is successfully completed now.
I am very pleased with the result.

To anyone wanting to insult my project management skills, bring it on
but be aware that I will simply delete your posting.

 

[Char Jackson]

Thanks to all those who contributed ideas and advice to this project.
In the end I was unable to clone the disc successfully so rather than
spend any more time I admitted defeat and took the computer to the
computer shop. The technician there said he had never encountered so
much difficulty cloning a disc, but it is successfully completed now.
I am very pleased with the result.

To anyone wanting to insult my project management skills,

It's no sin to run into issues, even on tasks that others have completed
successfully. I'd also say it's a virtue to know your own limitations, to
know when to admit defeat and turn it over to someone else.

bring it on
but be aware that I will simply delete your posting.

Yeah, but this being Usenet, you can only delete your local copy. Everyone
else is still free to do as they please.