New SSD! Questions...

[Deltalpha 3]

Hello all!

 

I just got a new Crucial M4 128GB SSD on sale from Newegg. It was such a good deal that I just couldn't pass it up!

 

My question (for now) is:

How can I transfer Win7 and a few of my games to the new SSD? Everything I have right now is stored on a Hitachi 1.5TB HDD. All the tutorials I look up tell me I have to put the entire contents of my main HDD onto the SSD, which is impossible since the HDD is roughly 12 times larger than the SSD.

 

If you have any questions about my hardware, click on my profile.

 

Any guidance into the right direction is welcomed!

 

Thanks.

[Illegitimi non carborundum 4]

Danny

128GB is quite small my FSX install is now nearing 100GB so that reaching the good working limit of my 120 GB SSD.

You have to ask yourself the question - Why do you want the OS to fire up quickly? If there is no burning reason for that leave it where it is (otherwise you are facing a clean install or a disk cloneimage with specialist software). You can then decide what games to transfer to the SSD, but many will need a reinstall, FSX included unless again you use specialist software and the registry fix provided on these forums. FSX will not run faster only load quicker (including textures during a flight).

Good luck

pH

[Deltalpha 3]

To be honest, I wasn't even thinking of putting FSX on the SSD. The only thing that I would put on it is Win7, BF3, and maybe some other small games.

 

Sadly, FSX is just too large to put on it, so I will have to leave it on my HDD.

 

Another question:

If I do a clean install Win7 on the SSD, what will happen to the programs on my HDD? Can I still use them?

 

Thanks!

[Manny 1,293]

Look at Acronis software...they do take an image of your OS directory...and you should be able to restore it on the SDD. Just dbl check with Acrionis. Acronis would also work as backing up your OS and FSX installs... It has saved my butt so many times.. I learned after a bad experience where I lost everything when I was hit by a virus so badly I had to reinstall everything from scratch. It was one of the reason I quit developing sceneries...I lost so much in that disaster I could not recover.

 

IF you have any questions...just call Acronis tech help and ask them this specific question and they should give you all the help. They have a good customer support. It costs no more than an addon aircraft or airport scenery.

 

BTW..a 128G SSD would give you around 100Gig of disk space.

 

And yes. I have a 128Gig Samsung SSD for Win 7 and I have another 250Gig Samsum SSD for FSX and 1 TB HD for photosceneries.

[drumsonly2002 3]

With Acronis, can the Win 7 OS on C drive be backed up on an external drive, also FSX on D drive be backed up on an external drive, in the event of hard drive failure and system crash? Thank you.

[Manny 1,293]

Yes to both.

 

You get one file for each and you can copy these files into 10 or 20 copies and verify each one of them is recoverable.

 

First thing you do after installing Acronis is create an acronis bootable CD and then say you back up your 1) c drive with your Os and the bootable partion etc into you z drive where you have your external USB drive.

 

Then you back up your D: drive with your FSX folder into the the same USB drive or on another drive.. it doesn't matter where...even on a USB thumb drive with sufficient space.

 

Then if something drastic happens to your C drive.

 

Set your BIOS to bootup with your CD instead of HD and put your Acronis bootable disk on your DVD drive. It would boot up into Acronis and you should be able to see all the HD connected including any USB drive ...with your your backed up c: drive backup as a file

 

Simply restore that file..in about 15 minutes it would boot up like it was on that day your took your backup.

 

In the case of what you are trying to do

 

1) Install Acronis

 

2) Create an Acronis bootable disk

 

3) Back up your C: drive including disk parition into your D drive or any other drive ..where you have sufficient space.

 

4) turn off the machine remove the C drive and replace it with a brand new SSD

 

5) keep your old drive away for safekeeps

 

6) put your Acronis bootable disk in your DVD drive ..change bios to boot from CD first.

 

7) boot from the CD...and you would see Acronis menu. Select Restore and search for your other drives with your backed up file containing your old C drive back up and select restore and the drive you want to restore to (in this case your SSD). It would restore that file into your primary ssd.

 

8., Remove the Acronis bootable drive and reset bios to boot from SSD.

 

9. Restart PC, it has now rebooted from your SSD.

 

10 now do whatever you want with your old HD that was in C. keep it as a back up or resue it.

 

If something has gone terribly wrong and doesn't work like I have stated, remove your SSD, replace it with your old HD and reboot. So if you substitue your HD with an SSD,.,don't do anything to that HD until your SSD is working fine.

 

Anyway...read the pdf for the Acronis.... for the latest and greates process change if any.

[drumsonly2002 3]

Wow! Very slick for recovery and fresh installs! With Acronis I will be able to keep FSX running top notch! Thank you for an excellent detailed reply. This is exactly what I am looking for. An ounce of prevention is worth more that 10 hours of a re install. Got a computer yesterday just for FSX and want to keep it working good.

[Santi871 0]

When I get my SSD I'll just format C drive (OS + all games), then do a fresh, clean install of W7 on the 240GB SSD, FSX and maybe some other game, rest of the games and programs will still be at C.

 

Then I'd have B: = 240GB SSD (W7 + FSX + a few other games), C: = 1TB HDD (Programs that don't need to be on the SSD) and D: = 2TB HDD (Anything that isn't a program or a game)

[Deltalpha 3]

Thanks for all your help guys!