What SSD to buy for a thinkpad x60?

[EOMtp]

The 4-5GB partition you found is likely the Lenovo Recovery partition -- what "runs" when you press the blue button on the keyboard at bootup. Until True Image is "fixed", you will need a sector-by-sector backup if you want to preserve upon restore the functionality of what was on the source drive.

Note (tangential to your situation):
Acronis True Image (any version) appears to have the following "issue" with restoring to an SSD, unless the backup type was "sector-by sector". Example: Backup from an SSD drive a 30GB partition which has 20GB used/10 free, then restore to the same SSD drive, and you have 29GB used/1GB free! Only a "sector-by-sector" backup cures the problem.

[dmdsoftware]

Still on this topic, what do people here use for cloning their old HD to an SSD?

I normally use Trueimage, to image the HD to a file on a network drive. For the SATA HD used on the X60S, this needs to be v9 or later to support the SATA controller. However, TI throws up an error message / warning when one tries to image the whole HD. It sees a second partition, about 4GB, and it reports there are errors on it. I have no idea what this partition is; it may be some kind of hidden factory recovery feature. It says it cannot image this unless one uses "sector by sector" backup, and this results in a far bigger image; 70GB instead of 25GB for just drive c: in my case.

Anyway, I have done two images; one just drive c: and one with the whole lot using sector by sector, and will try restoring the 2nd one initially.

My Intel SSD drive came with it's own backup and transfer software, but it too ran up against that restore partition on the HD that was preventing it from happening. Also my HD was larger (320GB HD vs 80GB SSD) but it still would have worked as I only had about 50GB of data but again that pesky restore partition.

I figured it's good practice to start with a clean windows 7 install anyways, since you ought to reformat yearly anyways.

[peter-h]

Acronis True Image (any version) appears to have the following "issue" with restoring to an SSD, unless the backup type was "sector-by sector". Example: Backup from an SSD drive a 30GB partition which has 20GB used/10 free, then restore to the same SSD drive, and you have 29GB used/1GB free! Only a "sector-by-sector" backup cures the problem.

I think this must be system dependent, because I used TI v8 (quite an old version) to install a 32GB SSD (as per the URL I posted earlier) in a Motion LS800 tablet, doing the standard backup, and that is working fine.

Why would TI have such an issue? An IDE SSD "should" look like any other IDE hard drive.

But thank you for the info anyway; I will restore the sector by sector backup.

It will be interesting if this makes the Thinkpad faster. The Corsair 128GB SSD I have in my desktop is much faster than the fastest available HD, but that cost $500... and most SSDs used in the EEE type netbooks are horribly slow (I have an EEE 901 whose 4GB SSD is about 10x slower than any HD, and the 32GB SSD I installed in it as drive d: is only comparable to a HD).

I figured it's good practice to start with a clean windows 7 install anyways

Generally I would agree but this laptop has a vast amount of installed software, used for aviation route planning etc. I am on XP - win7 is too much hassle. Also, it has extremely flakey (but currently working) bluetooth drivers

[underclocker]

Results have been very good with my X60s. I went from a second generation Hitachi 7K200 7200 rpm 100GB SATA drive to an Intel G1 80GB X25-M SSD.

The machine is quieter, runs cooler and is much faster. I know there are even faster SSDs available, but these results are very good. I used CrystalDiskMark to test both drives, the results are linked below. I'm running XP Pro w/SP3. You can see and feel the difference.

With the SSD, it's 25 seconds from power off to Windows booted waiting for a fingerprint swipe. It's about 1 min. 15 sec. to fully booted and IE open with all services running, including Anti-Virus, etc. It's about 15 seconds to hibernate (w/2GB RAM) and under 20 seconds to return from hibernation, power off to wifi connected.

Hitachi 100GB 7K200 7200 rpm drive


Intel 80GB X25-M G1 SSD

[peter-h]

What do you do about that x60s feature which senses laptop movement and parks the HD if it sees any? Presumably the SSD will just ignore that, but if the O/S is blocked from accessing it, it may be irritating.

[underclocker]

All you have to do is uninstall the Lenovo Active Protection program, as I did. The same is true for all modern ThinkPads, just uninstall the program when you have an SSD.

However, I believe the program has no effect on an SSD.

[peter-h]

I have put in the SSD and am restoring the 55GB sector-by-sector image now. I quickly found out that one must UNcheck the sector-by-sector option on the restore operation to make it work, unless (presumably) the new HD is exactly the same size (or perhaps larger) as the old one. The Intel SSD is "80GB" but it is probably just a little smaller than the original HD, and Trueimage (2009 Home version) doesn't allow the restore.

Edit: the restore "failed", at the very end, after several hours of obviously doing it. However, windoze boots OK and all seems to work, checkdisk shows no errors. As far as I can tell, TI basically failed to restore the 4.3GB "mystery partition". I tried to restore it separately afterwards (selecting just the 4GB piece from the 55GB TI backup file) but it still won't do it; it puts out a useless error message immediately. Now, pressing the Thinkvantage button at startup, and selecting the F11 (diagnostics) option, results in a 'cannot load operating system' message and a hang, so that partition evidently held the diagnostics. I can still get into the BIOS OK.

I removed the Active Protection software.

The resulting performance is better than the old HD, generally, by perhaps 2x, but very large app loading times (involving a lot of database ops during loading) have not improved (maybe they are VM limited). The latter is not quite what I expected, having seen a massive speedup with the Corsair 128GB drive on my desktop. No doubt it will make the laptop last longer, and will make it more rugged, but I am suprised the speedup is not more universal. Any way to fit another 1GB RAM in this X60S, and which brand?

Is there any way to restore the diagnostic code?

[aabram]

Just chiming in on SSD in X60s. I replaced my old 7200 rpm HDD with fairly mediocre Kingston 64GB SSDNow. I don't have Win7, just XPsp3 but this drive does not support TRIM anyway. After 8 months of daily use I'm yet to see slowdowns. I do try to minimize writes though, suspend rather than hibernate, have disabled last access timestamps and done other usual tweaks. I use it for light development and Photoshop and most of the time I can see that now the bottleneck has moved from HDD to CPU.

For anyone considering this relatively cheap drive the speeds are as follows

.

[codek]

Just chiming in on SSD in X60s. I replaced my old 7200 rpm HDD with fairly mediocre Kingston 64GB SSDNow. I don't have Win7, just XPsp3 but this drive does not support TRIM anyway. After 8 months of daily use I'm yet to see slowdowns. I do try to minimize writes though, suspend rather than hibernate, have disabled last access timestamps and done other usual tweaks. I use it for light development and Photoshop and most of the time I can see that now the bottleneck has moved from HDD to CPU.

For anyone considering this relatively cheap drive the speeds are as follows

.

very interesting. those drives are vary easy on the wallet too.

I don't know how to read those charts but how does it compare to a 7200 on random reads vs writes?

[ThinkRob]

I don't know how to read those charts but how does it compare to a 7200 on random reads vs writes?

Every single current generation SSD will absolutely blow away any spinning platter drive on random reads/writes.

[peter-h]

Back to this topic...

I found that the Intel X25-M drive I put in my last x60s is no longer stocked, but apparently very similar versions of it are.

Could anybody comment on whether any of the 80GB ones here

http://uk.insight.com/apps/nbs/results. ... gb&4905v=4

are suitable? There are several X25-M models, 80GB, which have very tiny P/N differences.

Incidentally, for the sector by sector restore using True Image (and assuming TI works at all for restoring the 0x12 Compaq 4GB recovery partition), doesn't the new HD need to be the same size as the original? Let's say you replace a 60GB HD with a 80GB SSD, isn't that simply going to waste 20GB of the SSD? I realise one could resize the c: partition afterwards using other tools, but that will move the 0x12 partition further up the drive and if IBM hard-coded the logical block numbers....

[frankiepankie]

Maybe X60 can use this mod: http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=84953 ?

I used it on my T61 wit Intel 40GB SSD and it works great!! Screenshots of my benchmarks are in that thread.

[ThinkRob]

http://uk.insight.com/apps/nbs/results. ... gb&4905v=4

are suitable? There are several X25-M models, 80GB, which have very tiny P/N differences.

I've had excellent experiences with both generations of the X25-M. Any of the X25 series will work just fine in the X60(s)/X61(s).

[Tasurinchi]

I've had excellent experiences with both generations of the X25-M

+1

I have one in my desktop and it works great! Just ordered another one for my T61, I will pick it up today and post my feedback here.

[peter-h]

I wonder why Insight is carrying the slightly different versions? I can't even see a difference in the specs.

If they really are all the same, I might order this one:

http://uk.insight.com/apps/productprese ... 64905v%3D4

[ThinkRob]

I wonder why Insight is carrying the slightly different versions? I can't even see a difference in the specs.

Different form factors (the 2.5" drives are either 9.5mm or 7.0mm high).

Electrically they're all the same. In this case, the SSDSA2MJ080G2C1 is listed as a 9.5mm drive -- which should work just fine in the X6x series.

[peter-h]

OK; I recall the HD in the x60s about 9mm thick.

Many thanks.

[Tasurinchi]

OK; I recall the HD in the x60s about 9mm thick.

The X25-M should work great in the X60, I've just installed it in my T61 and so far I'm really happy. Boot time is incredible and each application starts immediately. Once you get used to an SSD you won't dare to use and HDD again