help with HDD to SSD

My new W500 has just arrived and it is beautiful. It came with a SATA hard drive, but I want to swap it for a SATA 2.5" SSD. I have created the restore disks to put on the new "drive", and followed the Lenovo manual to remove existing HDD. But no mention is made in the manual of what looks like an adaptor for the HDD or the need to remove screws to access it and remove it, so I can fit the SSD. How do I go about this procedure? Am I on the right track? Any help would be much appreciated!

 

The hard drive should just go in. I don't have a w500. My t61 had rubber rails that you just slide off.

 

Take off the rails from the hard drive you pulled. You should then see four Philips screws. Remove those screws and take the old HDD out of the tray. Place the new SSD in the tray, screw it in, and attach the rails. That's all there is to it.

 

wow! that sound easy! I will try it and report back. i can't believe how quick and the advice is (if it works) thank you!! i will report back after a strong coffee and the deed...

 

I may have cheered too soon, but I bet you have the answer... the SSD appears to be the same size as the existing tray with the HDD within. so i can't imagine the SSD will fit inside the tray. (it is a standard OCZ Summit). ??

 

Really??? The SSD should be identical in size to the HDD (2.5" wide and 9.5mm high). The tray itself is very thin (each wall is only about 2mm wide), so unless you have removed the HDD and tried to fit it in there don't say it can't be done.

Can you attach pictures with a ruler for scale.

 

it's this one:
http://www.ocztechnology.com/products/flash_drives/ocz_summit_series_sata_ii_2_5-ssd.
http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=666

 

I will give it a try, thank you! straight after my strong coffee!

 

it is an extremely tight fit. did i read somewhere that you can put the SSD in without the tray? or should 1 persist?

 

tried without the caddy, but no HDD dedected on startup. now i don't know how to remove the SSD from the slot without the pull cord! any help please? it is saturday so there is no tech support...

 

Some photos would help... never heard of a standard 2.5" ssd not fitting into a caddy.

 

Well, that's why you're supposed to use the caddy. I suppose you could try shaking your computer with the SSD facing the ground. Alternatively, tweezers and/or a nail file may provide adequate leverage.

 

got it out finally through top of machine and a bit of massaging. maybe will ring tech support monday...

 

If anything, you should take this up with the manufacturer of your SSD (OCZ?). Your 2.5" SSD should be identical in size to the 2.5" HDD you removed and fit in the caddy/rails just fine.

Again, pictures would help.

 

is just installable with rubber tracks but can only be removed by opening up the case, but though it works fine as an external drive, the thinkpad doesn't detect the drive. i can install it easily without the rubber surrounds, but no detection either. will phone tech support on monday...

 

managed to successfully place drive in space provided, but got the dreaded ERROR 2100: "HDD initialization error". browsed around and found a suggestion to the issue of a bios update for error 2100 on the lenovo web site at http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/document.do?sitestyle=lenovo&lndocid=MIGR-63685. tried it, but though i changed boot sequence to read the cd first with the update it still reported the 2100 error. Then phoned Lenovo Thinkpad technical support but they said they would not discuss an issue with any hardware installed that was not purchase through Lenovo. They referred me to the Lenovo web site for support, and I mentioned that the Lenovo web site did indeed discuss the issue, but the techie said "we are IBM, not Lenovo", and do not support the issue, though the Lenovo web site might! I thought this very strange. So I am on my own with my very expensive very standard SSD and the internet...a learning experience for me about the Lenovo/IBM subculture, after 15 years with Dell...the W500 is very fine, but it is a bit like having a mac (don't add off-the-shelf hardware!)...not what i expected...(smile)

 

Please clarify the exact issue.

If you go into the BIOS (F1 before boot) do you see the SSD listed?

If so, have you tried setting the SATA controller to both AHCI and compatibility mode?

Have you tried updating the BIOS from the CD with the SSD REMOVED (it's not required for the BIOS update)?

When exactly do you see this error message (right after turning the machine on, 10-15 seconds after power on (i.e. POST screen disappears), later)?

 

thank you for the suggestions to look into! i will sometime soon and report back. the lenovo instructions on the bios update is that it needs the problematic hdd/sdd to be in place as it will only install if it is needed - but it didn't work...

 

I am jumping into this thread kind of late...but I don't think that's the firmware upgrade you want. That's to upgrade the firmware of the hard drive itself, not the laptop. You don't want to upgrade the firmware on the ssd drive other than with firmware from OCZ, which you may want to check into. I have a W500 and the first thing I did was to buy an OCZ 128gb SSD and plug it in. I used the rubber rails from the existing hard drive and basically "taped them on" to the SSD. I then used more tape to create a "pull tab" to be able to pull the drive out when needed. I didn't use that slim caddy tray, I always thought that was a heat shield and I don't need a heat sheild for my SSD drive so I left it out.

The only thing I really had to do was look into the hard drive bay to make sure I was inserting the SSD drive with the connector oriented correctly and it took me a couple of tries to make sure it was seated correct. But once that was done I didn't have a problem recognizing the drive. My OCZ SSD also had a newer firmware out so I did that upgrade as well.

I used Acronis TrueImage to backup by old drive so I just booted off the Acronis Boot CD and restored the image the the SSD. Everything pretty much worked without a hitch.

I do believe the Bios Setting for AHCI/Compatible comes into play but not until Windows starts to boot and load the hard driver driver. If you get an error there then you need to change that bios setting.

The things I'd recommend to do...

1. Check if OCZ has a firmware update
2. Check to make sure drive is seated properly
3. If you can, boot from original drive and plug SSD into USB with adapter cable to verify drive actually works and isn't faulty. I have one of the external hard drive enclosures that I can pop a drive into and plug it into a usb port, its great for troubleshooting stuff and being able to access those drives externally.

Good luck...

 

kevroc, thank you very much for adding your comments! as Lenovo tech support won't discuss anything about the issue, you are invaluable! I have tested the ssd on an external case - it is formatted and works fine.
how do i know the firmware? i thought the samsung-driven OCZ summit does not have any firmware updates yet? is yours a Vertex or a Summit? i get the error message directly on boot, no delay. some good suggestions. what sort of tape did you use? as you have found, the drive is too tight with both the caddie and the rubber rails. i thought, if one was to go, the caddie was more important than the rubber rails? you obviously don't think so. maybe it is just a seating problem?....I hope so.

 

I have the OCZ Vertex I believe...

I used packing tape, the stuff that's about 2" wide, electrical tape would work well also.

The rubber rails are more important than the caddy to keep the drive from shifting around.

It sounds like a seating problem, if the drive is recognizable externally but not internally upon boot it's either not connected properly or the Thinkpad BIOS does not recognize the drive, the latter is hard to imagine being the case. Have you checked to see if other Thinkpadders have used that drive in a Thinkpad before? That would answer quickly enough if bios supports the drive.

Good luck...

 

kevroc, thank you!!!!
I did what you said, exactly, and I now have the OCZ Summit up and running. it is just amazing! a dead quiet machine! quick too. like something quite different. the future of computers. just amazing... thank you!!!

 

Glad you got it working.

 

I felt the same way when I made the switch to SSD, the future of computing. I got the W500 with the P9500 chip so mine is low power and low noise...a very nice laptop indeed, couldn't be happier, especially now with the Windows 7 Beta drivers from Lenovo that Jon had pointed us to.

Glad it worked out.

 

thank you, jon, also, for your help! the W500/SSD is now as I dreamed it, and better.
now to look around to figure out how to have my power setting, etc. i can't imagine that i need "turn HDD off", for example...I am a this moment typing in complete silence but for clacking (!) of the keyboard, inbuilt light shining down on keyboard. utter silence from the machine. delight.