Need help setting up Secondary hard drive to store & run everything except Windows 7

I would much appreciate some tips on how to set up my secondary hard drive with my system. Right now I'm running an HP4530s Probook, CPU = i5 2.6ghz,60gb Kingston SSHD #1 Boot drive for Windows 7 Professional 64 bit, 320gb 7200rpm Western digital HDD #2, and my laptop has integrated graphics with the OEM optical drive in an external caddy because I rarely use it. What I haven't seemed to be able to figure out yet is how to put only Windows 7 Pro 64 bit and the drivers it needs on the solid state hard drive only and then use my larger 320gb 7200 rpm normal HDD to run all my programs, store things, etc. Money at the time of purchasing my solid state hard drive was an issue so I could only afford a 60 GB one. Now I wish I would have waited and just gotten a 120 GB or 240 GB but I have the 60 and need to use it. Besides once it has Windows 7 Pro 64 bit loaded on it with service pack 1, my security, and a few programs there is only 4 GB of space left. Between the loss I get when I format it (I didn't know about format loss at the time) and the 5 GB of space HP Tools takes I don't have much space left for future updates or whatever I might need some room for. So what I would like to do obviously is make my 60 GB SSHD my boot drive and the other 320 GB my slave hard drive for programs and storage. I have no idea how to set this up so programs, music, and whatever else is downloaded and installed on the 320 GB HDD automatically. If someone could help me with this I would be very greatfull. If there is something I have to do when installing Windows please be specific on how to do it if you can please.

Thanks in advance.

 

Install Windows on the SSD, format the HDD and then just tell the programs you use to install on the HDD (custom install option most of the time). That is when you're going through the process of installing your programs of course.

 

Sorry but that doesn't help me. I can't take a program of say my SD card, click on it to open, install and run and it not be on my solid state. I want to be able to click on a program and have it install and run off the hard drive. I'm trying to set it up so after I install Windows on my SSHD, everything else I ever download and install goes directly to the regular hard drive. I don't even want it to be an option to go to the solid state. I guess I don't know how to just install and run all my programs off the regular hard drive without any of the program size going to my SSHD after its installed.

 

well your running 7 so that helps, you can redirect all your "Libraries" as windows 7 has them labeled to your hdd. i have more the most part done what you are saying with the exception that Local, LocalLow and Roaming (program settings) still reside on the SSD but, the that doesn't take much space at all. It still give me the option to install programs to my C rive but, that's the fault of the installers. Other than that all my down loads and programs and what not go to my hdd.

EDIT: you can't have programs automatically go to the salve drive, the program installers aren't smart enough and assume you want C by default.

 

Oh ok, see I thought there was a way to set up the SSHD so that the installers would ignore it's existence, almost as if the installers thought automatically that the regular HDD was the C: just labeled a different letter.

 

Well i have seen some cases due to the presence of a SUB card reader where windows XP installs itself, or rather designates the OS drive as letter other than C. That does cause some rather notable problems though. One of my bosses machines runs this way it's kind of funny and also bothersome.

 

You can change the default install path with a registry edit, by changing the global variable "ProgramFilesDir". See here: Change Default Installation Directory In Windows 7 & Vista

Although some programs are hard coded to the path, so you still will have to pay attention when installing

You can easily change your libraries to go to any path you want just by right clicking each library (i.e. Documents, Music, Videos, etc) and setting a path. Don't forget about your "Downloads" folder. If you're like me, mine grows quickly, just make sure that's on the HDD.

I did do a write up for it defaulting the entire Users directory to another drive, but it requires a full reformat and some configuration of variables that you need to get right the first time. I can hunt it down if you really want to go that route.

But with all that being said, what's the point of having an SSD if you don't put your programs on the SSD, at least your most commonly used ones?

There's also other measures you can take to free up lots of space:

- change your virtual memory to have a minimum size of 256MB (usually reserves same amount of RAM you have)
- turn off hibernation (usually reserves same amount of RAM you have). You can still sleep your computer just fine, just not hibernate where it writes all contents to the disk, unlike sleep that just charges the RAM.
- reduce system restore size to minimum or turn it off completely

That right there will likely recover 8-10GB on a system with 4GB RAM, and much more if you have 8GB or more.

 

Well I stand corrected, i'll definitely have to look in to that.

 

I personally don't like to mess with the registry too much. What i did is create a Program Files and Program Files (x86) folder on my D:\ drive so that i only have to change C to D in the install path when I install something. It literally takes only a few more seconds when I install a program and it's not like i'm installing new programs every day.

You can set some folders to go straight to the HDD when installing windows like the user folders. There is a post on NBR on how to do it, but it does come with some disadvantages if you decide to do that. Just telling the libraries to use the HDD as a default is enough for me as far as user files are concerned.

Gotta agree with this, My programs and Windows with the tweaks HT mentioned take about 25GB. Well, they did when i was using a 64GB SSD, not that i'm running 160GB or higher capacity SSDs in all my rigs, I simply install everything on the SSD and use the HDD to hold my libraries and games.

 

"I did do a write up for it defaulting the entire Users directory to another drive, but it requires a full reformat and some configuration of variables that you need to get right the first time. I can hunt it down if you really want to go that route."

Yes I would very much appreciate that. I would like to reformat and re-install Windows 7 Pro one last time and do everything the correct way so it does like you say. When I click on a program to install from like say my SD card or F: drive it doesn't give me any option on which HDD to install that program on or where I would like it to be from permanently. It always just puts all the on the SSHD and this is what I don't want. I only want Windows 7 and its drivers, window updates, and anything that has to do with Windows 7 operating system on the SSHD. I thought if you turned you virtual memory down it made the laptop slower or is that only with a regular hard drive? I have the virtual memory jacked up to match the ram at 8gb. If I turn it down to 256mb that won't slow anything down? I'll give that a try. Whenever I install an OS with a SSHD I go through a series of checks like turning the defrag off totally, turning off hibnernation, and making sure the trim is on and a few other things I have on a list. Plus when I have everything where I want it I can delete all the restore points and than make a back up image finally...

PS. I deleted my HP TOOLS / E: partition and it gave me another 5gb of space. I don't want to have to do that but my 60gb SSHD only had 2gb of empyu space left and I only had Windows 7 Pro 64 bit OS, IE 9, FIREFOX, Chrome, CCLeaner, SPECCY, Windows live & photogallery, and my security installed on the entire laptop!!! I only had those few things installed and it had my C: in the red with almost no space....

 

That's what I thought I would be using to but once I have Windows 7 Pro 64 bit installed with all the updates and drivers all ready to go it takes up 44GB of space from my 60GB kingston solid state which only really has 55gb of space after format loss... I had no idea about format loss until I got a SSHD and it really sucks how my Windows seems to be so much larger than yours. If it only took up 25gb I'd be fine with enough room to put all my programs on it to.

 

How much RAM does your system have? The Hibernation file, the Page file and the System Restore/Protection option can all be turned off to reduce how much Windows uses for itself (with the pagefile; make sure you test your usage scenarios/programs first before turning off for good).

 

Indeed, i had ~25GB after disabling hibernation as well as moving the page file to another drive.

 

Currently I have 8gb of DDR3 1800mhz low voltage lat 8-8-8-12
It was very expensive supposedly the best ram I could buy for my notebook.

 

That means you have ~16GB of your SSD's capacity used for hibernation and pagefile duties.

Do you run any high power productivity software (like the Adobe CS6 suite, for example)? If not: you may be able to save at least most of that 8GB the pagefile is using.

If you're not using the hibernation feature (I don't see the point with SSD's... - they boot up faster than they can de-hibernate ), you can also save that space too.

If you're using this with Win8 - I wouldn't disable the hibernation feature - it will also disable the super fast boot times.

 

But I had the hibernation feature disabled right after I installed Windows and there wasn't even close to 16gb of space unused after I changed that and turned off the paging file.

 

You not only have to turn off the paging and hibernation files - sometimes, you have to delete them too.

 

Jason, have you considered making symlinks pointing to the hard disk drive? This would not affect any of your programs behavior. They will still install to "C:\Program Files", etc, but the physical location is not on Ssd but rather the HDD.

You can do the same for music, documents, downloads, etc.

In *nix, there is the ever handy ln program. In Windows, I believe there is a mklink. You'd have to google for mklink usage, but if you need ln help I will be happy to give you needed commands.

I also believe there are several freeware options that can make this symlink action pretty easy.

Sent from my EVO using Tapatalk 2

 

How did you mange 44Gigs O/S install on my laptop and desktop all HDD no SSD it only takes up around 20Gigs? Are you sure your formatting correctly? And to the point of second hard drive did you make sure your BIOS was point to the SSD as the main boot drive so that when the O/S was installing it looked for the SSD first? Also a better way to prevent the O/S trying to install on the HDD which should install on the SSD remove or keep out the HDD til you install and update the SSD then place the 2nd HDD in the 2nd bay and then format that and it will be recognized as D:/ drive. That would save you alot of headache. I have a gateway F-6860FX and that is how I did it. Format the HDD first install O/S and then place the second HDD format and that should do it. But as always check your BIOS or update it and make sure it knows which drive is main boot drive.

FYI my lappy and desky all run Windows 7x64 Sp1 with current update as well..with all their drivers updated...

 

I had and have mine set up the same exact way you said your Gateway is set up. Yes, I installed the SSD with Windows Ultimate 64 bit Sp1 with all the updates and drivers using the recovery CD's that came with this new laptop I just got. I have installed a ton of Windows 7 on many laptops and computers and just realized the issue was I have been using the recovery cd because this is a brand new laptop and I wanted all the HP softeware and BS to be on the laptop ya know. I just installed a fresh version of Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit SP1 on a compaq I'm refurbing and with all the updates and drivers it only used up 15 - 18 gb of space. I think what I need to do is just go ahead and use my WIndows 7 disc instead of using the recovery Windows install disc that I got with the laptop because it's obviously installing a crapload more of stuff and I don't even really use much of that stuff anyways. I just never really paid much attention on how much space and install took up until after I realized how much more space that recovery Windows install disk used compared to my Windows 7 dealers copy disc. Thanks for helping me realize I'm pretty much just a dumba$$ for not realizing this. LOL!!

 

@OP if you are running low on space, try deleting some old versions of google chrome. Chrome unfortunately does not delete old versions off the hard drive when updating. I was able to recover nearly 4 GB space just by deleting the old versions