The Notebook Review forums were hosted by TechTarget, who shut down them down on January 31, 2022. This static read-only archive was pulled by NBR forum users between January 20 and January 31, 2022, in an effort to make sure that the valuable technical information that had been posted on the forums is preserved. For current discussions, many NBR forum users moved over to NotebookTalk.net after the shutdown.
Problems? See this thread at archive.org.

    SSD with a HDD

    Discussion in 'Sager and Clevo' started by Tilt, Sep 9, 2011.

  1. Tilt

    Tilt Notebook Consultant

    Reputations:
    19
    Messages:
    121
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    30
    Running a small SSD with a much larger HDD for data.
    What's the best way to avoid filling the SSD with a bunch of useless items that are, by default, saved on to the SSD? I.E User data? Downloads? Other misc. data? Any way to set the HDD up as the default place for data to be written to?
     
    Tilt, Sep 9, 2011
    #1
  2. rtrainer

    rtrainer Notebook Consultant

    Reputations:
    5
    Messages:
    100
    Likes Received:
    14
    Trophy Points:
    31
    rtrainer, Sep 9, 2011
    #2
  3. Mr.M.A

    Mr.M.A Notebook Enthusiast

    Reputations:
    4
    Messages:
    45
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    15
    Like you said, all your personal files. pictures, videos, downloads and anything big like that. on the HDD

    you may need to install some games in the HDD if you have many, I have around 40GB of game files :D that's 4 games only
    That's what I would do if i had an 80GB SSD
    I too would like to hear what others do
     
    Mr.M.A, Sep 9, 2011
    #3
  4. Anthony@MALIBAL

    Anthony@MALIBAL Company Representative

    Reputations:
    616
    Messages:
    2,771
    Likes Received:
    3
    Trophy Points:
    56
    I personally find it easiest to install most my standard apps plus OS to my SSD (I have a few machines with SSD's, but they're all 120GB or less). Selectively install your larger games and apps to either the SSD or HDD based on space.

    The biggest help is to create a symbolic link on the C:/Users directory OR to change your default music/movies/pictures/downloads/documents directories to D:/ locations.

    Move the Users Directory in Windows 7

    The way you do it entirely depends on how much data you have. By sym linking the Users directory and choosing where to install apps, it basically becomes simple after that. You'll never overload your SSD with the folders that vary in size regularly (those are almost always in C:/Users).

    Also, if you have a smaller SSD- turning off or limiting the size of System Restore will have a big impact, as will limiting the size of your paging file.
     
    Anthony@MALIBAL, Sep 9, 2011
    #4
  5. ReDuNZL

    ReDuNZL Notebook Evangelist

    Reputations:
    33
    Messages:
    458
    Likes Received:
    14
    Trophy Points:
    31
    ... and de-activating hibernation. A mostly useless function anyway, imho. You still have the sleep mode.
     
    ReDuNZL, Sep 10, 2011
    #5
  6. jclausius

    jclausius Notebook Virtuoso

    Reputations:
    6,160
    Messages:
    3,265
    Likes Received:
    2,573
    Trophy Points:
    231
    FWIW, I "junctioned" my Users, %windir%\installer, %windir%\logs and %windir%\temp to my Momentus XTs, and made sure %TEMP% and %TMP% both pointed to the XTs as well.

    Left the virtual memory mgr's pagefile.sys on the SSD per recommended by Microsoft, reduced System Restore to just over 4GB, and ran the "powercfg -h off" to reclaim some SSD space.

    HTH
     
    jclausius, Sep 12, 2011
    #6
  7. rtrainer

    rtrainer Notebook Consultant

    Reputations:
    5
    Messages:
    100
    Likes Received:
    14
    Trophy Points:
    31
    With 12GB of memory, you should think about turning off paging. I have done it with no ill effects. I also have turned off System Restore.
     
    rtrainer, Sep 12, 2011
    #7
  8. al....

    al.... Company Representative

    Reputations:
    35
    Messages:
    50
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    15
    Did you check out this site? I have done most of those tweaks manually (without the program) and it has given me some speed and quite a bit of space.
     
    al...., Sep 14, 2011
    #8