Dave’s Computers

Computer Repairs NJ | Support | Data Recovery | Dave's

Main navigation

Call / Text 908-428-9558
For Directions Click Here
Hours: M-F 8-6 Sat 9-3
You are here: Home / Archives for SSD

SSD

Computer support question of the week: How do I migrate Windows 10 to SSD?

Computer support question of the week How do I migrate Windows to SSD 300x188 - Computer support question of the week: How do I migrate Windows 10 to SSD?

With Solid State Drives (SSD) becoming cheaper than ever, it has never been a better time to upgrade from a hard drive (HDD) to a Solid State Drive. SSDs are many times faster than a HDD and are a worthwhile investment to make in terms of speed. Not only will your computer boot much faster but it will work faster too. The computer support team here at Dave’s Computers are asked to do many SSD upgrades but it is entirely possible to do it yourself.

We are of course more than happy to perform an SSD upgrade for you but you can also do it yourself. I’ll show you how.

You will need:

  1. An SSD drive large enough to take Windows 10 and your programs.
  2. Cloning software. I suggest EaseUS Todo Backup for home users. It is free and very good.
  3. Spare SATA cable and port on your motherboard.
  4. A recent Windows restore point and separate backup of your files

Getting things ready

Before migrating your hard drives, there is a little preparatory work we need to do first. We need to tidy up your current installation and remove the trash. Then we need to make sure the version of Windows you are migrating is the latest and greatest.

  1. Back up anything you don’t want to lose. Store it separately from the computer.
  2. Select Windows Settings and Update & security.
  3. Select Windows update and perform any updates.
  4. Open Windows Explorer and right click your C: drive.
  5. Select Properties and then Disk Cleanup.
  6. Remove any files within the next window by selecting them and confirming deletion.
  7. Go back into Disk Cleanup and select Clean up system files. Select all large files and delete those too.
  8. Select Windows Settings, Apps and Apps & features.
  9. Go through the list and delete any apps or programs you no longer use.
  10. Check your Documents, Downloads, Music, Pictures and Video files and delete anything you don’t need.
  11. Right click Recycle Bin and select Empty Recycle Bin.

Then turn off your computer and attach the SSD to a spare SATA port on your motherboard. To begin with we will run it alongside your current hard drive so we can make sure everything works and create a clone of the drive.

Boot your computer into Windows again and download and install EaseUS Todo Backup. There are other cloning tools out there but I know and use this one a lot at home and can recommend it. Here at Dave’s Computers, our computer support team uses enterprise-grade cloning tools but this costs a lot of money so a free option makes more sense for home users.

Creating a clone

Once booted into Windows, it is time to update the new SSD and create a copy of your operating system. Exactly how you update SSD firmware depends on the manufacturer of your disk. Some provide a CD with new drivers while other download and install firmware from within Windows. Now is a good time to check the manual and do whatever your manufacturer suggests. Then:

  1. Open EaseUS Todo Backup and select Clone.
  2. Set the source as your current C: drive and the destination as your new SSD drive.
  3. Double check that you have selected the entire C: drive with its multiple Windows partitions and the correct destination drive. The cloning process will overwrite everything on the destination drive so it pays to check again.
  4. Select Proceed once you have configured everything to your liking and confirm when prompted.

EaseUS Todo Backup will now lock both drives down and begin the cloning process. Depending on the speed of your computer and size of the drive, this could take as little as 15 minutes or as long as an hour. Do not interrupt the process!

Once complete, EaseUS Todo Backup will tell you so. Select Finish and the new cloned drive will show up in Windows Explorer. If it does, turn off your computer. Unplug your old hard drive and replace it with the SSD. Then boot into Windows.

Everything should run perfectly but much faster. Windows should load, the desktop should be identical to how it was and all the files and folders you elected to keep should still be there. Run a few programs, browse a few websites and open your email client to test everything.

Finishing off

Now the main work is done there are a couple of tasks still to do. First we need to make sure Windows picked up the SSD and utilized TRIM and then we need to make sure Windows 10 didn’t have any issues activating.

  1. Open a CMD window as an administrator.
  2. Type ‘fsutil behavior query DisableDeleteNotify’. If the result is 0, TRIM is enabled. If the result is 1, TRIM was not enabled.
  3. Type ‘fsutil behavior set DisableNotify 0’ to enable TRIM if you saw a 1.

TRIM is a system that allows SSD to be very space efficient and  retain its speed.

Our final task is to check that Windows 10 had no issues with activation. As you may know, Windows 10 uses digital entitlement instead of a product key to make sure it is legitimate. As part of that process it uses hardware signatures of your computer to create that entitlement. While you can of course upgrade your own hardware on your own computer, Windows sometimes has a problem with it.

  1. Select Windows Settings and Update & security.
  2. Select Activation and ensure that Windows is activated.

If Windows is activated there is nothing that needs doing. If Windows is not activated, select Activate and allow the system to do its work. If it doesn’t activate right away, give it a few hours to sort itself out.

That’s how to migrate Windows 10 to an SSD. It is quite an involved process but one that is achievable by someone with decent computer knowledge. If you want to upgrade to solid state but don’t want the hassle of doing it yourself, bring your device to Dave’s Computers. Our computer support team will be happy to do it for you.

How to migrate Windows 10 to a Solid State Drive

How to migrate Windows 10 to a Solid State Drive - How to migrate Windows 10 to a Solid State Drive

A Solid State Drive (SSD) is one of the most cost-effective and just plain effective upgrades you can buy right now. Especially when prices are dropping steadily and the price per gigabyte is at the lowest I have seen in a long time. If you have bought one and want to know how to migrate Windows 10 to a Solid State Drive, read on.

Cost aside, the performance upgrade you get with an SSD has to be seen to be believed. A new Windows 10 installation boots quickly on a standard hard drive, but can literally boot in seconds from an SSD. As long as the rest of your hardware is up to the task, it really is an upgrade worth doing.

To make this work you will need a legit copy of Windows 10 and a new SSD large enough to handle everything you want to copy across.

Migrate or clean install?

In an ideal world, we would all have the luxury of time and patience to perform a clean install of Windows 10 onto your new drive. Everything works better with a clean install. However, if you have gigabytes of data or spent months tuning Windows 10 to work just how you want it to work, you may not want to go through all the hassle of a fresh install.

In that case, we need a cloning tool. This is a piece of software that takes a snapshot of your entire hard drive and implants it onto the SSD. It isn’t enough to simply copy and paste files because Windows cannot copy or move protected files, Active Directory, the registry, Dynamic Link Libraries and all those other essentials that make up a functional Windows installation. A clone tool will lift all that information and make a direct copy of everything.

I tend to use a pro level tool here at Dave’s Computers as we perform drive copies all the time. However, for home use I would use aseUS Todo Backup Free. It is fast, reliable and easy to use. Best of all, for the occasional user it is free.

Getting things ready to migrate Windows 10 to a Solid State Drive

Once you have your SSD, have installed aseUS Todo Backup Free and have a spare hour. Let’s get to work. Our first task is to clean up the current Windows installation so we only copy the good stuff.

Perform these steps:

  1. Empty your Recycle Bin.
  2. Delete any folders and files you no longer need.
  3. Uninstall any programs you no longer use.
  4. Download and install CCleaner. Use the Cleaner, the Uninstaller and the Registry checker tool.
  5. Defragment your main hard drive. Right click the drive in Explorer, select Properties, Tools, Optimize.
  6. Back up everything you cannot afford to lose to cloud storage, USB storage or something else.

Backing up

The cloning process is pretty reliable but whenever we make any big changes or undergo anything that could cause issues later, we take a backup. You can use Windows Backup to take a copy of the entire operating system or just copy your favorite files and folders onto a different drive. While up to you, I would definitely suggest saving your files and folders onto a different drive at the very least. That way, should the worst happen, you can just reinstall Windows and copy your files across. While still a bit of a pain, it isn’t as bad as losing everything.

Cloning a Windows 10 drive

Now your hard drive should only contain the things you really need and will be in a fit condition to clone.

  1. Shut down your computer.
  2. Attach your new SSD to your computer as a secondary drive.
  3. Reboot your computer.
  4. Start aseUS Todo Backup Free and select Clone from the left.
  5. Select ‘Optimize for SSD’ and let the cloning process complete.

Depending on the size of your hard drive, the process could be done in minutes or take a while longer. Don’t worry if it seems to take a while. The software is good at what it does and seemingly pauses at times. There is still stuff going on in the background though so be patient!

Once the process complete, close everything down and shut down your PC. Replace the boot drive with the SSD using a SATA cable. Place the old boot drive into another slot on the motherboard and boot into your system BIOS or UEFI.

You may need to tell the motherboard to detect an SSD before is recognizes it. Select the drive section of the BIOS and select Solid State Drive and AHCI mode if there is the option to. Set the system to boot from the SSD drive and not the older hard drive. Once done, save the changes and reboot.

Using your new SSD

Now you have set your computer to boot from the SSD, it should load in a few seconds. The actual time depends on your computer specs but it should be several times faster than a normal hard drive.

Once loaded into Windows, you can copy across all the files you saved elsewhere so they are accessible once more. You can then format the hard drive to use as storage or keep as a spare. It is entirely up to you.

That is all there is to migrating Windows 10 to a Solid State Drive. Windows 10 should automatically pick up that it is an SSD and enable Trim. This is a newer version of file management which spreads the read/write loads across the disk to prolong its life.

Once you begin using SSD, you have to remember to never defragment it. If you were in the habit of regularly defragging your hard drive, you need to stop it for the SSD right now. Nothing wears an SSD out like the defrag tool. Plus, with trim enabled, there should be no need to defrag it anyway. If you need to check whether trim is enabled or not, check out this useful tutorial.

If you need further help with the process or any computer issue, contact Dave’s Computers today. We are here to help!