Y510p: How to clone/migrate/install Windows 8 onto mydigitalSSD 128 GB on NGFF - Instructions needed

Hello

Thanks to all your kind replies I was able to buy this fine laptop which is equipped with a working NGFF slot. As i found a retailer for the 128 Gb MydigitalSSD NGFF 42mm SSDs in Germany I am planning of migrating my OS onto the SSD in order to increase performance. I also have bought Acronis True image 2014, however that program is supposedly not able to clone my 1 TB HD, why i don`t know (the way i read it it has something to to with UEFI (sadly i didn`t know about that issue prior to ordering Acronis)

I skimmed through several threads however I have not yet understood how to migrate /clone or do a fresh install onto the NGFF SSD and use my 1TB HD as storage: someone mentions using the onkey recovery function, some thread mentioned a UEFI method (??), another one mentioned using paragon recovery suite, so i am really confused.

I found a something on an amazon review using an externals SATA USB adapter, which i ordered, hovewer I cannot locate that thread and the instructions anymore..

So, as I am a total newbie in this migration/cloning/SSD procedures: Can anyone give me a clear and easily understandable instruction of how to achieve the following: Installing the new 128 GB SSD as the system for Windows 8 while using the original 1 TB as a storage Hard drive ?

Thanks in advance,
T.

 

Well, first you want to take an image of your current hard drive. You will then install the SSD as a slave drive and clone the image to it. Then take it out and install it in the main drive slot.

Through disk manager, you can set up this drive to be the MBR drive and then the other hard drive to be the data drive. Just takes a bit of planning.

 

First of all thank you for your reply...... however i think you misunderstood, i want to ADD the NGFF SSD 128 GB, however i want t o move the OS to that SSD drive......

T.

 

Same thing, just add it and mount the SSD drive. Then move the data from the primary drive to the SSD drive and make it the master. Not rocket science.

 

Sorry for bringing back an old post, just wanted to ask OP: Did you manage to do it without installing?
Because it's turning out to be quite a PITA to get it done. It IS a bit more rocket science than just copying and running. Because it seems some data must be associated to the old drive by UUID. So even I copied the whole disk partition by partition to the other NGFF drive (Acronis Disk Director), and told BIOS to boot from the NGFF, the EFI still points back to the old HDD and loads from there.

I rebuilt the EFI bootloader on the NGFF, and still, half way booting (super quick, so I reckon it's now taking the NGFF) it asks me whether to boot from partition 5 or partition 10. Which is the most useless dialog I've seen in a while, since it doesn't let you check anything of each partition and won't provide a single detail of them (not even the size, so it's really hard to see which one is which).

Booting from partition 10 seems to boot, albeit slowly. I think it loads some system files from the NGFF then the rest of the OS from the old HDD.
Booting from partition 5 gets me to a login screen with a default blue background, no wallpaper. When I input the password the spindle stays spinning for some good 5 minutes, then arrives to a blank screen where only the mouse pointer is visible. Control+alt+del also brings the menu, but that's about it, not even the task manager will load. It will also ignore if I click to shut down.

What should I do? I would like to keep the installation without having to go through the whole thing again. But bear in mind, it's a different drive slot altogether, without removing the previous system HDD.

 

If ever you lose or need to reinstall your Windows 8 for the Y series, i suggest downloading this:

Windows 8 NON-PRO OEM 64 Bit For System Builders - Judas (download torrent) - TPB

This is the OEM copy of windows 8 (not 8.1) non-pro for 64 bit systems.

Note to the moderators and readers: This is not piracy because it does not come with a serial! However if you install this it will auto detect your serial found in your UEFI and activate itself free of charge, as a genuine windows copy. No keygens/piracy needed. And youll save yourself 40$ ordering a replacement CD from Lenovo, which will probably come with bloatware anyways.

With the above in mind just do a clean install. It will take longer but its worth it in the long run.

 

If you check my post in the 42mm ssd thread, instead of using Acronis, I used Macrium Reflect (which is free). I installed the ssd into the m.2 slot, formatted it into GPT, and then used Macrium to clone the original hard drive onto the 256gb m.2 ssd. I adjusted the size of the main OS partition so that all of the partition can fit onto the 256gb m.2 ssd. I changed the boot order in BIOS and everything is just working fine.