Replacing hard disk with SSD

Hi,
One last question before I make a decision on which laptop to buy.

I found a Toshiba system that looks absolutely perfect. 17", 16GB, 4720HQ processor.

However, the hard disk isn't user-replaceable, which means I'd have a hard time putting an SSD in there.

Does anyone have any experience opening up an S70 Toshiba Satellite? I'm pretty technical, and have stripped down laptops and put them back together in the past. I'm just concerned about voiding the warranty, etc.

I would also then be looking at replacing it with a Samsung 512GB SSD. Any thoughts on compatibility issues with the reinstall disc?

 

According to this you can replace the hard drive.

My guess is you'll have to make the recovery discs, which you can then use to reinstall the OS on whatever drive you get. If you've got Windows 7 you can download a disc to a clean install. If you've got Windows 8/8.1, you're probably stuck with the recovery discs as I don't believe Windows 8/8.1 dics are very plentiful.

 

Awesome, sure hope so. They told me on live chat it would void the warranty, so I thought someone might have had experience with this and knew whether there was one of those warranty stickers over a screw or something similar preventing access.

It's win8.1, and there's apparently a procedure to generate your own recovery DVD/USB.

 

According to this you can install an mSATA drive so you would have two drives (the factory one+ SSD). That's the setup I'm using in my Dell M3800. It's nice to have a large secondary drive and SSD speed.
http://www.tomsguide.com/faq/id-1780630/install-msata-drive-toshiba-satellite-p70.html

 

That's awesome. Then I can get a small enough SSD for just the OS and a 1TB for storage.

 

I wouldn't get a small mSATA SSD... performance will be terrible.. I would get one which is 240GB/256GB in size.. Won't be too expensive anyways (someting like $100 ish)...

 

Yes, that's the exact size I was thinking as being small

I'm considering the Samsung 256GB 850 EVO, although, is there any benefit to the 850 Pro instead? Looks to be a bit faster and possibly a better warranty?

 

Is there an 850 Pro mSATA? If there was, that would be better than the Evo... But 512GB would be even better performance wise than 256GB.

 

It's this one, right?

http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-256GB-2-5-Inch-Internal-MZ-7KE256BW/dp/B00LMXBOP4/

 

That's a 2.5" SATA SSD not an mSATA. Different form factor. That would go in your HDD bay. So, no 1TB harddrive if you get a 2.5" SSD in your link.

here's an mSATA: http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-850-m...=1428705065&sr=1-1&keywords=samsung+msata+850

 

Or,

See:
http://www.amazon.com/Crucial-MX200-500GB-mSATA-Internal/dp/B00RQA6GF0

 

Definitely, better pics. Especially, the one going in a laptop.

 

+1000 vote for this

 

Awesome, thanks so much guys. I actually didn't realize there were two "slots" with two separate form factors available.
I'll probably get a 256GB mSATA disk and not the 500GB if I can also have a 1TB SATA disk for storage. How do I control which is the boot disk?

 

You should be able to control the boot order in the BIOS.

Also highly recommend you get the 500GB drive in either case. After allowing for ~30% OP'ing (if you want the fastest possible speeds with the least WA and highest consistency (almost) no matter how you use the drive..), that 500GB drive becomes a mere ~325GB of Windows addressable capacity.

While I am currently allocating 150GB for the C:\Drive partition for the O/S and Programs, in just a few short months I will be upping that to at least 200GB and possibly 250GB on the latest platforms (Skylake). Why so much? Because my current O/S and Programs folders take ~80GB to ~120GB depending on what the workstation is setup for. With Windows needing at least 25GB+ (currently) for smooth operation, you can see why 200GB+ will be needed very shortly. With every increasing sizes for updates (O/S and Programs and SP's) and platforms soon taking advantage of DDR4 with 64GB+ RAM configurations possible (and the pagefile and hibernation file space that entails), it makes no sense to save a few dollars today and need to spend more than double to get a bigger O/S drive, sooner, rather than later.

Highly recommended:

• Remove all drives except the one you want to install Windows to
• OP the drive right from the start - using Windows Advanced Setup options (simply take the MB's indicated when you try to create a new partition and multiply by 0.70).
• Only after you have installed Windows, Drivers your Programs and all updates (to all) would I introduce another drive. Note that I would not have used the system yet for any real work...
• At this point, install the Storage Drive and format it (even if it was empty... to ensure it is formatted using the latest NTFS version). I would also ensure that it was D:\Drive (use Disk Management to change if needed) and name it DATA
  • Create a 'u' Folder on the D:\Drive
  • Right click and select Properties, Security, Edit
  • Select the Users account in the group or user names box
  • In the Permissions for Users click the full control check box
  • Click Okay, Okay, Okay until all dialogue boxes close
  • Inside the 'u' folder you created, create a user folder 'z' (z is just an example folder name)
  • Now, go to C:\Users and click on your user folder
  • Select all the 'special' folders inside here and MOVE them to the 'z' folder on D:u

With the above complete, you should be automatically saving your new data to the 1TB drive, by default.

Hope this helps.

Good luck.