HP envy: HDD to SSD

[Amitojc]

Hi,
I have a HP Envy. I recently bought a 256 gb SSD. My laptop has 2 HD bays so I was able to install the SSD easily. It has stock windows 7 on it, and I like to keep the HP software, instead of doing a clean install on the SSD.

Second, I would like to transfer the operating system from the laptop's HD to the new SSD. I found this procedure and followed it completely:

http://lifehacker.com/5837543/how-to-migrate-to-a-solid+state-drive-without-reinstalling-windows

http://www.todo-backup.com/products/home/download.htm

This procedure copies the contents from the HD to the ssd. I was able to successfully do this. On the SSD were the copy contents of the HD.

The problem was that the laptop would boot off the stock HD. I then removed the stock HD, so now just the cloned SSD was in the laptop and it said "No bootable drive was found."

I am unsure what the issue is, and how do I get the computer to boot from the ssd?

Thank you for your help. Please ask any questions if you feel I was vague with any part in particular. I look forward to your solutions.

 

[Albatross]

Make sure the SSD drive is installed into the primary hard drive slot and see BIOS settings for boot order.

 

[Amitojc]

Make sure the SSD drive is installed into the primary hard drive slot and see BIOS settings for boot order.

Hi Albatross,
I have done that. I said in my situation, that I took out the original HD and tried to boot from the SSD. To be clearer, I moved the SSD to the position where the original HD was from. I hope this is clear.

Second, HP bios does not give the option of booting form a distinct drive. Only to boot from a HD. Hope that clears it up. Thanks.

 

[Bubbaleone]

You made the beginner mistake of leaving the original HDD and the cloned SSD both connected when you attempted to boot the SSD. The BCD (Boot Configuration Data) is now corrupt and it won't boot even if the other drive is now disconnected. Load the Windows installation disk and select the repair option when you get to the Install Windows screen.

 

[Amitojc]

Thanks guy! It works fine now. Okay so I copied the HP HDD to my SSD. Now it boots off the SSD. I was reading about using an alignment tool. The thing is I only copied over the HP C drive at the time, nothing else. Do I still need to use an alignment tool? People said that this alignment tool will help you run the SSD a lot faster.

This is the tool:
Paragon Alignment Tool

 

[Bubbaleone]

Download and run AS SSD Benchmark for a quick way to check partition alignment. The arrowed figure below represents the Partition Starting Offset which determines alignment. Note that the starting offset of 103424K is OK because 103424/512=202. 512 is the number of bytes per sector and as long as you can evenly divide 512 into that starting offset number, the partition is correctly aligned. AS SSD will mark the partition starting offset as BAD if it's not evenly divisible by 512 bytes (partition is misaligned).

.

 

[Berryracer]

Very good idea Bubbaleone

I once run AS SSD Benchmark and got a score of 525 only

After alignment using Paragon Alignment Tool, the score jumped up to 825

PS: your SSD score is smoking man! is that because it's a Samsung 840 Pro or is it the combined effect of RAID?

My LAT-LCM256M3S 256 GB SSD scores:

Crystal Disk Mark of the LCM-256M3S SSD:

AS SSD Disk Benchmark of the LCM-256M3S SSD: