How to upgrade your notebook to a SATA 2.5" SSD

[gospelmidi]

"Success."  Sorry that I didn't say that explicitly. Like other cloning s/w,

probably, Acronis Backup 2014 => TOOLS => CLONE DISK => AUTOMATIC

automatically sets as active the partition on the newly cloned SSD

corresponding to the active partition on the original HDD.  REALLY EASY.

The SSD is then ready to move to the HP 15-f039wm HDD bay and boot.

I still don't have the 1024KB offset set correctly yet, but that's just details. 

Acronis documents how to create a 1024KB offset before cloning the HDD.

I hope you had a great Thanksgiving, Erico, a day off from community service.

I probably couldn't have done this without all the help from you and others.

[dlleno]

Hi and thank you for the good info here.  is the process the same for replacing an existing SSD?  I'm not sure if I even have my origional recovery DVDs.... but if so I assume that would be a natural way to re-install factory conditions to the new SSD.  best to use cloning software, me thinks. 

My DV7t-6100 CTO shipped with the Intel 160G SSD and I am looking at alternatives for replacing it with a larger one, in the 480GB region.   Are there any compatibiltiy issues I need to be aware of?  specifically,  my "maintenance and service guide" lists the SSD interface as "SATA" while it lists "SATA 3Gb/sec" for the rotating HDD.  Does this mean the SSD I/F is the older 3Gb/sec SATA? Accordingly, as today's SSDs are nearly all 6GB/sec SATA, I assume they will work in the DV7t but the I/F will throttle the performance downward, is that correct?

[erico]

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@dlleno wrote:

Hi and thank you for the good info here.  is the process the same for replacing an existing SSD?  I'm not sure if I even have my origional recovery DVDs.... but if so I assume that would be a natural way to re-install factory conditions to the new SSD.  best to use cloning software, me thinks. 

My DV7t-6100 CTO shipped with the Intel 160G SSD and I am looking at alternatives for replacing it with a larger one, in the 480GB region.   Are there any compatibiltiy issues I need to be aware of?  specifically,  my "maintenance and service guide" lists the SSD interface as "SATA" while it lists "SATA 3Gb/sec" for the rotating HDD.  Does this mean the SSD I/F is the older 3Gb/sec SATA? Accordingly, as today's SSDs are nearly all 6GB/sec SATA, I assume they will work in the DV7t but the I/F will throttle the performance downward, is that correct?

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The use of cloning software is usually the most reliable method. I prefer to use a usb to sata cable and the SSD manufacturer's cloning software.

SATA is a downwardly compatible specification. Since the Maintenence & Service guide lists SATA in the specification, then  a SATA3  hard disk or SSD will run at SATA bandwidth. HP does not specify whether SATA means SATA150 or SATA300. Judging from the generation (2011) your notebook comes from, I would expect SATA300. SATA300 is 3.0 GB/s.

[dlleno]

thanks.  any reviews/opinions/experiences on cloning software choices?

[erico]

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@dlleno wrote:

thanks.  any reviews/opinions/experiences on cloning software choices?

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Sure. 🙂

Go to Page 4 of this thread. I already described my preferences and some experiences with a few types of cloning software. 

http://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Hardware-Upgrades-Replacements/How-to-upgrade-your-notebook-to-a-SATA-2...

[JoeJacob]

Hi I use the HP DV5-1106AX laptop how do i know which SATA can i upgrade to. Is it SATA 2 or SATA 3 .... How can i verfy which SSD suits my Laptop.

[erico]

You can use a rather wide assortment of SSD  SATA drives. You can not use the mSATA SSD drives. The one you choose must be SATA.

SATA is a downwardly compatible protocol. That is to say that a SATA600 (SATA3) or SATA300 (SATA2) SSD will work in a notebook that has SATA150.  The numbers are mega bits per second. 

I would recommend an SSD of 256 GB storage capacity. 

Maintenence & service guide See page 3

[chasedown]

Hi, I'm a bit new to the laptop upgrade scene. I purchased a HP Probook 450 G1 and wanted to upgrade the 750GB HDD to the Crucial MX100 512GB SSD. What I'm wondering is that is there a difference between cloning and fresh install in terms of performance? Is it better to do a fresh install? Thanks a lot.

[erico]

A fresh install is always the preferred way to go.  🙂

Before you get started, do yourself the big favor of looking in the device manager.

 See the following example from my current HP product loan Spectre 13t Ultrabook.

Expand the sections as I did. Those are all of the critical drivers. There will probably still be a couple more that you will need depending on the CPU and chipset in your notebook. Print out the images or use the snipping tool to save the images to a usb stick for viewing on a desktop or another notebook. This will save you having to go on an extended  aventure to find the correct drivers. 🙂

[chasedown]

Great! Thanks for the tip! One more thing, what do I do about my OS though? I was going through the things that came with the laptop but there is no product key located with them or on the laptop itself. Thanks.