Help with cloning HD

Hi, I recently received a dv6tqe and a Sandisk Extreme 480gb ssd.

I looked online and found a method that uses the Macrium Reflect software to clone the windows partition in the HD to the SSD. During this transfer, the HD needs to be the main drive but the SSD also has to be accessed.

The dvtqe only holds on drive at a time, so I can't put both into my laptop. However, I bought a hard drive docking station ( Amazon.com: Plugable USB 3.0/2.0 SATA Hard Drive Docking Station (LucidPort chipset): Computers & Accessories. My main question is, does the dock hold the SSD so I can clone it?

I know installing windows 7 to the SSD is another option, but cloning seems much easier.
Thanks!

 

I am not familiar with that docking station. But I did notice that its for a 3.5" drive and your SSD is a 2.5" drive.

First of, returning the dock will save you some money.

You can make do with this little $7.99 product from Amazon: Amazon.com: Vantec NexStar TX 2.5-Inch SATA to USB 2.0 External Hard Drive Enclosure: Electronics



To clone:

Put the SSD drive in the USB case, connect it to your computer and then follow the instructions for Macrium. After it is cloned, power off the computer, take out the original drive, put the SSD in and boot the machine. If it all works, you are on your way.

As a precaution I would recommend that you hang on to the original drive as is for a few days/weeks till you are sure that SSD is running well. And, of course, make sure to keep fully system backups on a third drive in case you need to revert to the old drive.

 

The Plugable dock actually supports both 3.5 and 2.5 :

Also, I don't have another drive. Could I just put the backup on the original hard drive itself? I won't be using the HD if the SSD works.

 

In that case, the same principle would apply. Put the SSD in the docking station, connect, clone and swap drives. I would recommend keeping the old drive and leaving it as is for a few days simply because the SSD that you have purchased comes with a Sandforce controller. If you search this board then you will notice that significant numbers of users have had trouble with drives that use Sandforce controllers. This does not mean that you will have the same problem. Once you are sure there are no issues with the SSD, you can wipe the original drive and use it as a backup device or do as you please.

 

What bad stuff happens with Sandforce controllers? I bought the Sandisk based on price and reviews. On Amazon it had a 5-star rating, was cheaper than the 830, and had similar speeds.

Also, say I put my SSD into the internal drive and my HD into the docking station. I don't wipe the HD and use it as backup/extra storage, is that fine? Will the laptop know to boot from the SSD and not the external HD?

 

First the easy answer:

The computer's BIOS settings determine which device it will boot from. Most likely, it is not configured to treat USB drive as a default/first boot device. So, once you successfully clone and install the SSD in the primary drive bay the computer will boot from it and will do so even if the other drive is connected via USB as long as the BIOS settings are correct. To learn more about BIOS settings check the support documentation from the comp manufacturer.

Now the hard part:
I have never owned a Sandforce based drive, partly because of the research I did on this forum and others like it. After reading up a lot of user reports, I brought two SSD drives; one uses an Intel controller and the other a Marvel. My own choice was informed by the fact that I came across more queries and requests for help and also reports of trouble with Sandforce based drives than with the others. In addition, more ppl endorsed the Samsung 830 and Crucial m4 drives on this and other forums. Of course, none of this means that you are likely to experience the same problems that others have. After all, large numbers of manufacturers are using Sandforce controllers on their drives and millions have been sold. My guess would be that most likely you never will encounter any problem with the drive.


You can us the other drive for storage if you wish.

 

The answer about SandForce was and still is the infamous F4 BSOD problems. I say was because the horrors people were experience (still small percentages, but way too high by industry standards) have been fixed. F4 BSOD issues still remain though, i have been unfortunate to have the only SF drive i owned start throwing F4 BSODs after a few months.

Crucial M4 64, 128 and 256GB have all been running happily so far
160GB Intel 320 has been running well so far
240GB Mushkin Chronos Deluxe started throwing F4 BSODs related to the SF-2281 controller. I haven't even bothered to try the replacement drive i received from Mushkin yet.

YMMV

SandForce still throws F4 BSODs in a very small minority of people, the fact that OCZ was using SF controllers as well didn't help. In all the stats i've seen return rates for OCZ drives were sky high compared to the lower return rates of other manufacturers.

I've seen stats from 2011 and 2012 and return rates for Intel drives have increased from below 1% to close to 2%. What changed is that Intel released new SSDs and those are using the SF-2281 controller. That doesn't mean that the controller is responsible for everything (8MB bug on the 320 anyone), but there's a good chance the increase in return rates is due to sandforce.

Too bad not every manufacturers are in this though, i'd like to see overall stats for most of the SF based drives.
http://www.behardware.com/articles/843-7/components-returns-rates-5.html
http://www.behardware.com/articles/862-7/components-returns-rates-6.html

 

The Samsung 830 was my first choice. However, I wanted a 512gb ssd, since I'm starting college this fall and don't want to bring the external HD along. The 512gb Samsung cost $661, a huge price jump from its 256gbs, which are $245. That's the only reason I didn't buy the Samsung. I was looking at the Crucial m4s but read about breakdown reports from people and its sequential write speeds are in the 200s, strangely lower than the other SSDs. So that's why I settled on the Sandisk, since it offered good price and reviews. I'll probably post something in a few days about how my transition went.

As for the cloning, Macrium Reflect gives me the option to clone four different drives:

1. SYSTEM (None). NTFS Active. 199.0 MB - not sure what this is
2. (C). NTFS Primary. 909 GB - my hard drive
3. Recovery (D). NTFS Primary. 21.87 GB - windows recovery partition
4. HP_TOOLS (F). FAT32 (LBA) Primary. 102.0 MB - driver upgrades

So should I just clone all four drives to the SSD? I'm unsure about #1, don't know what that is.

Thanks so much!

 

Yep. Clone all four partitions. The 199 MB is created by Win 7 and required for repair and recovery operations. The one labelled D (21.87 GB) contains images of the factory installed software, and the FAT 32 has the drivers. I would burn (if HP provides the means) the factory install to DVD disks as a back up. So if ever you need to recover from a catastrophic failure, you have a copy of the factory installed software and can reinstall it on a replacement drive.

BTW, check this thread out: http://forum.notebookreview.com/hp-...-sata-caddy-external-dvd-drive-enclosure.html

It is possible to have both disks in the dv6t with a drive caddy. The caddy they are discussing is here: http://www.newmodeus.com/shop/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=289

 

Do we have to partition/format the SSD before we clone the HD to it?

 

No. Macrium will take care of it. Its best if you don't and let the cloning software do it.

 

I finished the whole installation, I'm pretty happy with the final outcome! My WEI hard drove score shot from 5.9 to 7.9. Only thing thats weird is that the CrystalDiskMark seq writing score is in the 200s, half of my seq reading score. I've done most of the optimization stuff. SSDs are amazing.

Big thanks to tijo and especially yrc for helping me out through this! You guys are awesome.

 

Getting slower writes than reads is normal, it also depends on which drive you have and which type of benchmark you're using.

 

Glad to hear it worked out.

 

Clean install is the best way to go but if not the best free cloning tool is windows PE with ImageX.