Best way to install Win7 on SSD

AHCI generally, though you may need to go to IDE for flashing firmware temporarily.

BTW, if you do decide to use an image based install, ensure your SSD is set to the same mode as the mechanical HD to ensure the OS loads the correct drivers during boot. If it doesn't then you'll likely get a BSOD, especially if you try to boot from AHCI when the image was taken from a drive in IDE mode :)
 
Ok thanks. Would it be O.k to put the backup image on my USB hard drive to restore to the SSD? Or should I put it on an internal drive first ?

Think I should be ok doing the one install from DVD.. But once installed I'll make a backup image of it and store it.
 
Either will work fine. I'd recommend the USB drive as it keeps it separate from your PC.

An internal SATA mechanical drive will be faster than USB if you didn't want to use the machine during backup, though you'd still need to copy it to USB, so increasing the overall time. Likewise it will be faster to restore from an internal drive in the future should you need to.
 
Will I be able to add the SSD to my current system as a slave? Asus A7N8X Deluxe and check what version firmware the drive has first ?
 
BoroRob_UK said:
Will I be able to add the SSD to my current system as a slave? Asus A7N8X Deluxe and check what version firmware the drive has first ?
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Yes you should be able to. Just boot from the current drive with the SSD attached to one of your SATA ports. In the BIOS make sure your old drive is the first in the boot priority, or if your motherboard allows you to select a boot menu then hit the key for that (sometimes F8 or F11 or ESC during the POST).

Do you want the bad news though? I hope I am wrong but I believe your board only supports SATA150, this is seriously going to bottleneck the performance of any of the current mainstream SSDs.
 
Flanno said:
I'm not expert but I did a quick search on a few forums and the only one I could find which does not contain alignment was acronis which is what people have said here too. I'd say you have a better chance of it being retained anyway by using the built in win7 backup/restore which is a very handy program.
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Just a note on Acronis. If you image a parition it will not keep the source offset but create a new incorrect offset. However if you image the entire drive rather than just a partition on it it WILL keep the source offset on the restored image.
 
ChileanLlama said:
Yes you should be able to. Just boot from the current drive with the SSD attached to one of your SATA ports. In the BIOS make sure your old drive is the first in the boot priority, or if your motherboard allows you to select a boot menu then hit the key for that (sometimes F8 or F11 or ESC during the POST).

Do you want the bad news though? I hope I am wrong but I believe your board only supports SATA150, this is seriously going to bottleneck the performance of any of the current mainstream SSDs.
Click to expand...

Its only to check the firmware version. It will be coming straight back out then going into my new one.. Asus p6td

So, to clarify..

1. Make sure SSD has latest firmware.
2. Install Windows 7 on old SATA drive
3. Make an image and save it to external USB drive
4. Plug SSD in install Win 7 from image?
 
BoroRob_UK said:
Its only to check the firmware version. It will be coming straight back out then going into my new one.. Asus p6td

So, to clarify..

1. Make sure SSD has latest firmware.
2. Install Windows 7 on old SATA drive
3. Make an image and save it to external USB drive
4. Plug SSD in install Win 7 from image?
Click to expand...

Ahh good news :)

I would simplify your process as you don't have an existing image to;

1. Make sure SSD has latest firmware.
2. Install Windows 7 to SSD on new machine.
3. Create an image/backup for future restores.

The performance difference by installing from an image over from DVD is not worth the effort - not when you'll have TRIM to clean up any used cells.
 
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