Best way to upgrade to SSD

[sthayashi]

So last night, I put in an order on shop.lenovo.com to get a decent T410. I cranked up most of the specs, but one that I left behind was the hard drive. The online store gave a nebulous option of 128GB SSD, which from my understanding is likely a Samsung drive with an infamous JMicron chip inside it. I'd rather use an Intel 160GB drive, and I have one on stand-by pending an answer to this question:

What's the best to "upgrade" to it? I've used various cloning tools in the past to larger hard drives, but I've never did anything to go to a smaller hard drive.

There two suggestions I've seen on this forum:
1. Reinstall windows 7 on the new SSD.
2. Run the recovery CD creation program on the T410, and "Recover" the hard drive onto the SSD.

Do I get a Windows 7 disc with the T410? That path seems more straight forward. The other question is: do I get the respective CDs for the other programs I ordered through Lenovo (I purchased Microsoft Office too). If I don't get those CDs, how do I get them over?

Sorry if this question has been answered before, but I did some searches on this forum and didn't come up with anything better than what I've listed above. Any suggestions on which to go through would be helpful. Thanks.

[mgo]

I have no experience with the Samsung drives, so I cannot comment on whether they have dumped the poor performing JMicron controller.

I do have Intel SSDs on three Thinkpads T60 machines, and combined with Windows 7 the results are excellent.

You're just going to have to do some experimenting to see what works. That means, hang on to the original drive as a fall back, that way you will at least have your factory machine intact.

Windows 7 has a good imaging backup program now, but I cannot tell you if it will allow the image to be laid down on a -different- drive. You can only try it and see. That image you would create should be put on an external USB drive.

Yes, do create the Lenovo CD recovery set. But again, I cannot state if those CDs will allow restore to a different drive. That Rescue and Recovery program is fussy and clunky.

I have used the Acronis version 11 imaging program successfully with a SSD. However, acronis will not account for the unique "alignment" features of a solid state drive. This means the drive will not be quite as efficient, but it will still work very nicely and will still be very fast.

The best way (and the most work) is to install Windows 7 fresh on the new SSD, and then go to the Lenovo site for drivers and features. If you have Office disks from Lenovo then that would be a plus.

To avoid a lot of work, why not just call Lenovo and ask if the Samsung drive is an updated one with a proper controller. (good luck finding somebody at Lenovo who can answer that question!)

Call a Microsoft store and ask what they have in stock. There are people there who are pretty smart, and should have answsers for you.

[sqldba]

I'm running an 80 GB Intel X25-M as my boot drive along with the 500 GB 7200 RPM HDD in the Ultrabay on my T410. The first thing I did when I got the laptop was make a set of recovery disks, then swapped the HDD & SSD and rebuilt to factory spec using the recovery disks. When installation was done I removed the DVD drive and put the HDD into the Ultrabay adapter. Not too difficult at all to do.

@SQLDBA

[ducky2802]

Easy fix.

Burn your recovery dvds, swap hdds, recover onto your new SSD. You can also do a custom factory recovery and not install certain features (like norton, etc)

After R&R failed on me a few times to recover onto raid, I stopped using it and instead rely on Windows complete pc backup do a base image copy.

[sthayashi]

Then experiment, I shall!

For reference, I'm already running a Win7 on an X80 for my desktop, so I know what a pleasure it is. The trouble is that I built the desktop myself, and there was no pre-installed software that I needed to port over.

The Thinkpad has already been ordered, so hopefully it'll arrive soon. We upgraded the hard drive in our last thinkpad, but we discovered that it wasn't a straightforward cloning process, as there was a separate partition with IBM specific stuff. We ultimately used a File System agnostic cloning tool to bring it over and then extend the primary partition.

However, since I don't have the T410 here yet, I have no idea whether I get a Win7 disc (or any other disc for that matter). It sounds as though it's pretty easy, and it sounds as though I don't really need a external exclosure either, which was another concern I had.

Thanks for all the help everyone!

[mpcook]

However, since I don't have the T410 here yet, I have no idea whether I get a Win7 disc (or any other disc for that matter). It sounds as though it's pretty easy, and it sounds as though I don't really need a external exclosure either, which was another concern I had.

Thanks for all the help everyone!

I do not believe you will receive any disks. However, you will be able to create a set of recovery disks, which you can then use to create a factory load onto a new blank drive.

Mike

[ljwobker]

You can use the unix "dd" utility to do a sector-by-sector copy of your existing HDD to the new SSD. This has worked quite well for me in the past and (nicely) avoids having to re-install, etc.

Of course, if it's a brand new machine without a lot of stuff installed, etc... then it's probably easier to just do a fresh install on the new drive.

Another option is "gparted" from a linux boot disk, and copy the partition from old drive to new drive. When I've done this route, I use "unetbootin" to make a bootable USB drive with the Ubuntu desktop .ISO on it, then boot that... and use gparted to copy the partition from the HDD to the SSD.

I don't know what your experience level is so these may be very simple for you, or may be a bit more complex than you were looking for.... sorry if either is the case.

Yet another alternative is one of the commercial disk imaging/cloning programs. I've used Acronis True Image with some success as well.

[sqldba]

However, since I don't have the T410 here yet, I have no idea whether I get a Win7 disc (or any other disc for that matter). It sounds as though it's pretty easy, and it sounds as though I don't really need a external exclosure either, which was another concern I had.

You will not get Win7 discs - you'll have to make your own with the Rescue and Recovery utility. Boot into Windows and run the utility by pressing the blue ThinkVantage button, then go to the System Health section, Enhanced Backup and Restore, and press the ThinkVantage Rescue and Recovery button. You'll need to create BOTH discs - boot and data - in order to restore the image to another drive.

[zhenya]

I just did this for the new T410s' we received. Purchased with standard drives, and installing our own 1.8" Intel 160GB drives. I made the recovery disks as a precautionary measure, then used Acronis True Image Home 2010 to image the factory install, restored that to the SSD and it's working great. From power button to working desktop is 40 seconds. I also deleted the recovery partition as I now have sufficient means to be able to restore to factory state and the 8GB it uses is at a premium on the SSD.

I would advise against a 'clean' install that requires manually installing drivers as I have never been able to get all functions of the machine 100% when doing so, and you'll also lose out on the 'Lenovo Enhanced Experience' which is likely part of the reason for the fast boot time.

[Wiz]

I would advise against a 'clean' install that requires manually installing drivers as I have never been able to get all functions of the machine 100% when doing so, and you'll also lose out on the 'Lenovo Enhanced Experience' which is likely part of the reason for the fast boot time.

I always do a clean install and never had issues where some functions does not work. All the required software/drivers from Lenovo are available for download even if system update usually leave some out. Some 3part software like windvd, norton and stuff like that might not be available for download from Lenovo, but i would never install and use those anyway. 40 seconds isn't especially fast for a modern computer when using a SSD and more like the normal. My W500 with the Intel X25 SSD managed to boot in about 20 seconds after a clean install of Win7 before i installed any drivers or other software except what's included with Windows. After installing drivers, antivirus and a lot of software the boot time increased some as expected. It's easier and faster to get up and running by using the factory install compared to a clean install though. A clean install is a bit time consuiming and doesn't necessarily give a better result. I just prefer to start with a clean Windows and install what i need/want instead of starting with the factory install and have to remove all the stuff i don't need/want. Also i never experienced issues where some functions doesn't work after doing a clean install.

[zhenya]

I always do a clean install and never had issues where some functions does not work. All the required software/drivers from Lenovo are available for download even if system update usually leave some out. Some 3part software like windvd, norton and stuff like that might not be available for download from Lenovo, but i would never install and use those anyway. 40 seconds isn't especially fast for a modern computer when using a SSD and more like the normal. My W500 with the Intel X25 SSD managed to boot in about 20 seconds after a clean install of Win7 before i installed any drivers or other software except what's included with Windows. After installing drivers, antivirus and a lot of software the boot time increased some as expected. It's easier and faster to get up and running by using the factory install compared to a clean install though. A clean install is a bit time consuiming and doesn't necessarily give a better result. I just prefer to start with a clean Windows and install what i need/want instead of starting with the factory install and have to remove all the stuff i don't need/want. Also i never experienced issues where some functions doesn't work after doing a clean install.

We have nearly 30 Thinkpads in our office here, and I've configured every single one of them. I've probably attempted to do a clean install from scratch on probably 1/2 dozen of them over the last couple of years. Nothing goes 'wrong' per se, but there are some small details that are difficult to get figured out, specifically getting the Power Management software to work 100%. I have never seen a machine with a 'clean' install with Power Management working entirely as it should, and I have spent dozens of hours on this forum and many others discussing the issue and attempting a fix to no avail. Given that the factory image is rather clean and works quite well, I stand by my recommendation that most users should not bother with a 'clean' install.

I also have nearly a dozen computers running on Intel SSD's here, and anything under a minute to a fully working desktop is very fast in the real world of a fully configured, work computer, joined to the domain, and booting fully through the bios. (ie. not a 'warm' boot). There are too many variables in measuring the 'boot' time to have a meaningful conversation unless some standards are defined. I'm just interested in knowing what an average user will have to deal with on a day-to-day basis in the real world. In that light, these new machines using the factory image are faster than most.

[Wiz]

We have nearly 30 Thinkpads in our office here, and I've configured every single one of them. I've probably attempted to do a clean install from scratch on probably 1/2 dozen of them over the last couple of years. Nothing goes 'wrong' per se, but there are some small details that are difficult to get figured out, specifically getting the Power Management software to work 100%. I have never seen a machine with a 'clean' install with Power Management working entirely as it should, and I have spent dozens of hours on this forum and many others discussing the issue and attempting a fix to no avail. Given that the factory image is rather clean and works quite well, I stand by my recommendation that most users should not bother with a 'clean' install.

I also have nearly a dozen computers running on Intel SSD's here, and anything under a minute to a fully working desktop is very fast in the real world of a fully configured, work computer, joined to the domain, and booting fully through the bios. (ie. not a 'warm' boot). There are too many variables in measuring the 'boot' time to have a meaningful conversation unless some standards are defined. I'm just interested in knowing what an average user will have to deal with on a day-to-day basis in the real world. In that light, these new machines using the factory image are faster than most.

Well don't get me wrong. I'm not saying your advice is a bad one. I'm just saying i prefer the clean install and found that to work great without any issues like the power management as you refer to. The company i work for got about 200 Thinkpads and we created some images for the models we use so we don't have to manually install each one of them. I cannot remember the exact boot time for the older models, but the newer models (T400, T500, W500 and newer) with SSD boot within a minute without any problems. So my experience is that it's more like normal for SSD's and these kind of Thinkpads and not faster than normal. Now we mainly buy T410s, T410 and T510.

I'm not trying to make you change your recommendation, but rather give mine as well which is a bit different than yours and just had to add that i haven't experienced the same issues as you where something might not work 100% after a clean install.