Acronis users

The Acronis disk is a bootable disk right? So you would install the SDD, boot up with Acronis and wait, what, 2, 4, 8. 16 hours to load the back-up disk to the new drive?

Which PDF manual are you referring to?

If swapping with just another "spinning drive" just use Acronis. Even with a SSD, Acronis should be fine. However, if you have been meaning to rebuild your system from scratch, this would a good time to do it.

The OCZ Tech is likely thinking that a new install is nice and fresh. You would not be carrying over any software or driver problems from the old build-up ... that might cause problems (and he's probably right). There might be more to that reasoning (maybe someone else can speak towards that).

You can run Acronis from Windows or a bootable CD/DVD that you can create. The PDF manual is available to take a look at.

Acronis will do a clone disk incredibly fast.  A regular backup takes quite a bit longer.  The reason you'd want to do a fresh install when doing an SSD is to properly align the drive partitions.  Windows 7 does this automatically as it formats the drive to do the install.  You can clone a platter drive and copy it to an SSD, but you won't get maximum performance from the SSD.....

The cloning process is quite simple, you start Acronis from Windows and tell it you want to clone a drive.  It then lets you select the drive to be cloned, and then the drive to clone it to.  Once you do that, it shuts down Windows and performs the task in a DOS environment.  The first time I did it, I was amazed in that it copied my boot platter drive (96 gb of 500) to a 128gb SSD in about 15 minutes.  I swapped out the drives and had everything back up and running in a total of 30 minutes.  While I was impressed with the SSD speed, I learned about the partition alignment and decided to do a fresh install.  It did make a difference.

Good luck.....

Acronis will do a clone disk incredibly fast.  A regular backup takes quite a bit longer.  The reason you'd want to do a fresh install when doing an SSD is to properly align the drive partitions.  Windows 7 does this automatically as it formats the drive to do the install.  You can clone a platter drive and copy it to an SSD, but you won't get maximum performance from the SSD.....   The cloning process is quite simple, you start Acronis from Windows and tell it you want to clone a drive.  It then lets you select the drive to be cloned, and then the drive to clone it to.  Once you do that, it shuts down Windows and performs the task in a DOS environment.  The first time I did it, I was amazed in that it copied my boot platter drive (96 gb of 500) to a 128gb SSD in about 15 minutes.  I swapped out the drives and had everything back up and running in a total of 30 minutes.  While I was impressed with the SSD speed, I learned about the partition alignment and decided to do a fresh install.  It did make a difference.   Good luck.....

So when you did a fresh install, did you manually reinstall all your programs etc.., or did you transfer from your Acronis back-up onto the new SSD? Did you transfer Windows settings to the new SSD using a transfer kit or manually reset everything?

Sounds like if you do a fresh install all you can transfer would be documents , pictures, etc.., and then be stuck with reinstalling all drives and updates.

When you say aligning the drive partitions, I think you are referring to the C: drive and the System Reserve? If so, why would it make a difference on a SSD? from what I've read the SSD doesn't care where the data is or where it places it since it is no longer a mechanical search. On a SSD it is suggested you disable two or three different prefetches and defrag because where the data is no longer makes a difference. But I guess you said you could tell the difference when you did a fresh install, so it must be noticeable.

Does anyone have any thoughts about using this software to transfer over to a SDD?

http://www.paragon-software.com/technologies/components/migrate-OS-to-SSD/

Thisn isn't spam or an endorsement.

I'd like to rephrase the OP's question a little differently. I assume Acronis does a backup image of the whole disk (including MBR) on a sector by sector basis. So, if I image an SSD which has been properly aligned, etc., can I assume that the restored image will also be properly aligned?

Thanks,

Harvey

You can run Acronis from Windows or a bootable CD/DVD that you can create. The PDF manual is available to take a look at.

I found in Control Panel where you can make a recovery disc. I looked at the manuals on Dell's site and the operating systems section doesn't include Windows Seven. It has Vista however.

I've used IOLO System Mechanic for years and it tells me two of my hard drives attributes are in the warning stage. The PBA in the bios says all is ok and I ran it with a tech individual a few weeks ago and it showed no problems. But with all the R3 issues and all the internal tests showing no issues with those systems I'm incline not to trust the Dell internal testing software.

So after reading up on SSD's I chose to go with the intel 510 250GB SSD. It isn't as fast as the OCZ Vortex 3, but a firmware update may fix that. My decision was based on the reliability factor. Intel is much more reliable than OCZ according to many googles. What I like most about the 510 SSD is that it comes with an adaptor and other hardware, plus it has a transfer-of-data software. It also has a tuning software that can optimize the SSD.

We'll see in a week or so.

Yes, if you clone an SSD that has been properly partioned, it will automatically copy each sector and partion to the new SSD.

I chose to manually reinstall all of my programs because I didn't want to add all of the optional program accessories on a couple of them.  You can, however, do a Windows install and then recover a backup to an SSD and it will maintain the partition alignment.  Note:  this is with recovery and not clone......Hope this helps.  I noticed in one of your later posts that you went with Intel instead of OCZ, I have two gSkill drives and a Kingston myself, and they all serve me exceptionally well. 

I chose to manually reinstall all of my programs because I didn't want to add all of the optional program accessories on a couple of them.  You can, however, do a Windows install and then recover a backup to an SSD and it will maintain the partition alignment.  Note:  this is with recovery and not clone......Hope this helps.  I noticed in one of your later posts that you went with Intel instead of OCZ, I have two gSkill drives and a Kingston myself, and they all serve me exceptionally well.

Thanks for the info.

If I do the clean windows install and then do the recovery off of Acronis, will all of the updates to windows also be copied over to the new drive?

jb122 wrote:

"Acronis will do a clone disk incredibly fast.  A regular backup takes quite a bit longer.  The reason you'd want to do a fresh install when doing an SSD is to properly align the drive partitions.  Windows 7 does this automatically as it formats the drive to do the install.  You can clone a platter drive and copy it to an SSD, but you won't get maximum performance from the SSD....."

Could the alingment issue be the reason for the following:being reported by the Windows Experience Index? (both PC same Hardware as shown below) (both reading done when PC was only a day or two old)

Original  PC (factory Overclocked)                    Replacement  PC (not Overclocked)

Processor            7.8                                                                 7.8

Memory                 7.8                                                                 7.8

Graphics               7.7                                                                 7.2

Gaming graphics  (3835MB ???)    7.7                                        (4851MB ???/)   7.2       (<- see (2))

Primary hard disk              5.9                                                   7.2     (<----- see (1))

(1) As to the identical harddrives could it be that Dell used an image created from a spinning hard drive for the original PC and then on the replacement PC an image from an SDD??   There certainly is quite a difference in the reported Score.     

(2) As to the graphics, I don't understand the MB recording). Elsewere the further details on the report read: - (perhaps a driver or overclocked issue ???) As to the score, I believe Dell also overclocked the Graphics cards so I can see the reported higher score for the original PC unless that is related to the xfire issue outlined below, which may have been set-up on the original PC.  Have not checked this score with xfireX enabled.

Total available graphics memory  3835 MB                                   4851 MB 

Dedicated graphics memory          1024 MB                                   2048 MB

Dedicated system memory                 0 MB                                          0MB

Shared system memory                    2811 MB                                   2803 MB

Display adapter driver version           8,663.0.0.                                8.762.0.0.

Primary montor resoluion                 2560x1600                                2560x1600 

DirectX version                                      DirectX 10                                Direct  X 10

As outlined in my below listed other post (with more info), particularly the issue on xfireX being not "ticked" and one GPU reported as disabled on the replacement PC which shows a higher memory than the original. (never checked into that on the original one). 

The Device manager in both PC showed all 4 GPU's as "this device is working properly" and Sys Info showed for both PCs 1,024 Mb of memory for each of the 4 GPUs.  I never went into  the Catalyst Control Centre on the original PC so I don't know how it was set up - It's the only software which shows one GPU as disabled when xfire not implemented.. So who is correct, Device Manager or Catalyst Control Centre?   Perhaps the different reporting is related to the different DELL installed drivers. "i'm lost".

http://en.community.dell.com/owners-club/alienware/f/3746/t/19376851.aspx

Before you run the Windows Experience Index (WEI) do the following.

Right click on desktop / personalize, then disable AERO by selecting a basic windows theme. Make sure you save your current theme so you can go back to it when done. Now you can close the personalize screen.

Next go to CCC and in the gaming section / 3D application settings, turn everything off and/or reduce the setting to performance.

Next check under Gaming again in the sub section AMD crossfire Confi. Here you can enable or disable cfx. Restart your computer. Test the WEI with cfx on and then off to see what your WEI records.

Once done, restore your theme and gaming 3D settings if you llike.

Thanks AAA737FLYER for your reply.

I had so many problems with my original Aria 51 ALX and then even on the Replacement PC the MIO board needed to be replaced, that I have not been able to do any gaming (totally new at that). Too far behind in my :"free" work I do for various community groups due to the PC problems. So, while not totally computer illiterate, these high-end graphic cards and associated software is still "greek" to me. Trying your suggestion I looked into CCC only to get into an error, breaking it and I don't know how to fix it.  See my following posts for details.  So once I have been able to fix CCC I will try your suggestion, and hopefully will eventually get into gaming after also studying my AW keyboard to find out how to set it up for gaming.

http://en.community.dell.com/owners-club/alienware/f/3746/t/19376851.aspx

http://en.community.dell.com/owners-club/alienware/f/3746/p/19378087/19874355.aspx#19874355

Not my day,

The first link in my

http://en.community.dell.com/owners-club/alienware/f/3746/p/19378500/19874374.aspx#19874374

post should have read: