SSD Newb - How to Install Windows?

[cheez]

I am about to pull the trigger on a SSD drive for my HTPC for the first time. Never installed SSD's before. How do I install it? Just pop in a CD and setup install from boot like you normally do with regular hard drives? I have Windows Server 2003.


Anyone?


()

 

[Bubbaleone]

Yes, with the exception that if your mobo has a UEFI BIOS; be sure you boot the optical drive in AHCI mode so that the Windows installer can create a MBR partitioning scheme.

 

[cheez]

Yes, with the exception that if your mobo has a UEFI BIOS; be sure you boot the optical drive in AHCI mode so that the Windows installer can create a MBR partitioning scheme.

Thanks. I have Asus P5B Deluxe motherboard with BIOS year 2006.


cheez

 

[ThatsABigOne]

Thanks. I have Asus P5B Deluxe motherboard with BIOS year 2006.


cheez

Your BIOS should have AHCI mode, and if not, try to update your BIOS. It should have AHCI mode regardless.

 

[SimMike2]

Virtually all BIOS, even newer ones, defaults to IDE emulation for hard drive controllers. This really hurts performance of SSD drives. Windows 7 isn't too bad with driver support, especially for something 2006, so you might be able to enable AHCI after the install and it will still work. Or you can go on the Internet and find out how to manually install the AHCI drivers in Windows, even XP, and on the next boot it can work.

 

[Bubbaleone]

The Asus P5B Deluxe BIOS fully supports selecting AHCI mode prior to installing the OS, which I'm quite sure the OP is fully aware of.

 

[ViRGE]

Server 2003? Yikes. Not only are you going to have to install drivers for AHCI, but it's going to have the wrong partition alignment. You're going to have to get the partitioned aligned, which isn't the easiest thing to do these days.

 

[cheez]

With traditional hard drives in AHCI mode it requires a storage controller driver in the starting point of the install process. I have the driver in diskette for that. Will this work on SSD??

As for partitioning, the only partition I need with hard drives is only one partition - NTFS. I don't need to do anything fancy for it to work. What's this partition alignment fuss all about?? Do I need to do something different with the SSD? This is the sort of things I was asking about.


cheez

 

[ViRGE]

As long as you have the driver disk (and a 3.5" FDD) you're fine. It's just a pain in the butt compared to how easy it is with Win6.x.

As for alignment, SSDs operate on pages of 8K/16K these days. However Win5.x will write its first partition at LBA 63, which won't be at the start of a SSD page. As a result, NTFS file clusters will span multiple pages, which is bad for the performance and for the SSD. The guys in the storage forum can tell you more, but if you're going to use Server 2003 you're going to want to take care of your alignment.

And why Server 2003 for an HTPC? Realize that if you intend to keep that box around for any length of time, support ends in 2 years. Server 2003 is not a good choice for an HTPC these days.

 

[Bubbaleone]

ViRGE makes very valid points regarding Server 2003 on an SSD, and I'll add that Server 2003 doesn't natively support the TRIM command so you'll need to install a utility to enable that very important feature as well. But if you want to give it a shot here's the procedure:

To manually align the beginning of the system partition on the 4 KB page boundary of the SSD; the SSD will need to be partitioned with an initial offset of 1024 KB, set active, and then NTFS formatted with a file allocation unit size of 4 KB prior to installing the operating system. The diskpart commandline tool is well suited for this task. It would be easiest to temporarily mount the SSD on a Windows 7 machine (or any version that already has AHCI drivers installed and will immediately recognizes the SSD), and then run diskpart from an elevated command prompt on the desktop:

diskpart
(starts diskpart)

list disk
(lists all disks by #)

select disk #
(replace # with the number of your SSD)

attributes disk clear readonly
(this prevents errors during clean operation)

clean
(makes the disk unallocated)

create partition primary offset=1024
(creates a primary partition with the correct offset of 1024 KB)

select partition 1
(puts focus on the partition you just created)

active
(marks the new primary partition as a system partition)

format fs=ntfs quick
(performs a quick NTFS format with the correct file allocation unit size of 4 KB)


.

 

[cheez]

As for alignment, SSDs operate on pages of 8K/16K these days. However Win5.x will write its first partition at LBA 63, which won't be at the start of a SSD page. As a result, NTFS file clusters will span multiple pages, which is bad for the performance and for the SSD. The guys in the storage forum can tell you more, but if you're going to use Server 2003 you're going to want to take care of your alignment.

Well then I suppose I need to find out more about this "alignment" thing.

And why Server 2003 for an HTPC? Realize that if you intend to keep that box around for any length of time, support ends in 2 years.

Because the certain programs I run require either Server 2003 or XP.

Server 2003 is not a good choice for an HTPC these days.

Not in my case. It does well exactly what I want done on this PC. The only question is how well I can get SSD to co-operate with my OS.


cheez

 

[cheez]

Thank you for the info, Bubbaleone. I'll keep that in mind if I need to set one up..



GUYS, UPDATE! UPDATE!

Things turned out exactly opposite of what I thought was going to happen. Installing Server 2003 on a OCZ Vertex2 SSD was SUPER EASY. Pop the Floppy in. Start OS setup. F6. Install storage controller driver. Install OS. BAMM done in 10 min.

But in order to do that I had to tinker with the BIOS settings. It was more complex because I have other hard drives (two raptor drives running in raid0 while other 3 sata hard drives running in either IDE or AHCI) running in the system.

THE BIG MESS / PROBLEM is the fact AFTER installing windows on SSD I couldn't get my OTHER hard drives to recognize... Finally got them to show up in disk management, but could not access any of them!! HOLLY CRAP.

What a mess...

I noticed one of the drives shows as "Basic" (GPT Protective Partition) and I could not make any changes through disk mgmt.. I have no control over it. The other hard drive is showing as "Dynamic" with something (don't remember what it said, I'm not at home as we speak..). I have very critical data in all these drives and afraid to initalize or convert disks in any way as I can't afford to lose data if anything happens.

Man this is retarded.


I am finding a Windows 7 machine to see if I can get these drives to recognize and access... Cross my fingers. :\


Stay tuned for updates.

 

[cheez]

I noticed one of the drives shows as "Basic" (GPT Protective Partition) and I could not make any changes through disk mgmt.. I have no control over it.

Hooked up this drive in Windows 7 machine just now. In this machine, the disk mgmt shows this drive as "Basic" NTFS volume. WTH... In Server 2003 it shows as GPT Protective Partition and I could not make any changes to the drive. But in Win7 I can access this drive fine. I can go into the folders and do whatever I want.


This doesn't make much sense to me, as this drive has been running on Server 2003 machine before I got the SSD.... Installed the same OS on SSD and why can't I access these drives? Is this because I changed from IDE to AHCI in BIOS?


cheez

 

[ViRGE]

Not all versions of Server 2003 support GPT.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GUID_Partition_Table

 

[cheez]

^ This is still weird cause that drive was accessible on Server 2003 SP2 before I got the SSD. It's an exact same OS and Service Pack 2, when installed on SSD I cannot access these storage drives...

Anyways, thanks for the link.


Welp, I am currently copying files from this drive to an external USB hard drive. Gonna do the same thing with the other drive that was not accessible. Then get these drives fixed up so Win 2003 Server on SSD can access them. Put back all files.


cheez

 

[cheez]

Does Windows Server 2003 on SSD need a defrag? Or will it never need it?

Update: Well, looks like defragging is not needed. It can actually decrease life span of the SSD. http://www.computerhope.com/issues/ch001064.htm


And do I use the Windows default swap file (page file) on SSD? Does it behave the same way as the hard drive? Or can I disable the swap file?

Update: After some searching on web looks like I've better leave pagefile alone... Shoot, I was hoping for having it completely disabled...





thanks,

cheez

 

[cheez]

ViRGE makes very valid points regarding Server 2003 on an SSD, and I'll add that Server 2003 doesn't natively support the TRIM command so you'll need to install a utility to enable that very important feature as well. But if you want to give it a shot here's the procedure:

To manually align the beginning of the system partition on the 4 KB page boundary of the SSD; the SSD will need to be partitioned with an initial offset of 1024 KB, set active, and then NTFS formatted with a file allocation unit size of 4 KB prior to installing the operating system. The diskpart commandline tool is well suited for this task. It would be easiest to temporarily mount the SSD on a Windows 7 machine (or any version that already has AHCI drivers installed and will immediately recognizes the SSD), and then run diskpart from an elevated command prompt on the desktop:

diskpart
(starts diskpart)

list disk
(lists all disks by #)

select disk #
(replace # with the number of your SSD)

attributes disk clear readonly
(this prevents errors during clean operation)

clean
(makes the disk unallocated)

create partition primary offset=1024
(creates a primary partition with the correct offset of 1024 KB)

select partition 1
(puts focus on the partition you just created)

active
(marks the new primary partition as a system partition)

format fs=ntfs quick
(performs a quick NTFS format with the correct file allocation unit size of 4 KB)


.

Ok I went back and booted off Windows 7 disc and ran DiskPart and followed the instruction you listed for my SSD.

I then installed Server 2003 OS on the NTFS partition (1MB (1024k) partition left untouched).

Reboot.

Can't get past the boot startup screen. It gets stuck when detecting the SSD... It says Auto detecting AHCI on Port 0......... It was working fine till last night. So hmmm.... maybe the port has gone haywire? I moved over to other ports, 1 through 5. No go! It gets stuck on whatever port the SSD is connected to. I tried this over and over and over and over and over and also tried other power connectors from PSU. Reseat cables. Reset BIOS and reconfigure, etc etc etc etc no go.

Pulled out the SDD. Put my hard drives back on. Boots right up and gets past the boot screen and boots to windows desktop just fine.

Looks like I have a failed SSD. This is a refurb from OCZ Vertex II model I got it for $55 from Newegg. Now I can see why the price is low, to sell defective / un-repaired / failed products! $55 is too much for this. This should have been free at $0.

What a B.S.... I wasted all my time and money to get nowhere... I went to bed at 3AM this morning because of this mess and woke up at 9:30 AM. Didn't get enough sleep.

My raptor 10k drives are almost 9 years old! and still works like a tank!

This is a huge fail. I'm so pissed I don't know if I want to take the hassle returning the damn SSD... Do they offer shipping label for returning stuff? I know Amazon does.






cheez

 

[cheez]

Hmmmmm... oops. Looks like the SSD is not broken. I tried it on a PC at work and was able to load Windows on SSD like piece of cake.

Hummmmmmmmm.... so why did all the sudden my Asus P5B Deluxe motherboard decid to hang when the SSD is plugged? It was working fine prior to that.


I will try this again on my Asus board when I get home today.

If it goes hairy again (hang) I will try updating the BIOS to the latest version. Currently I'm using the BIOS that originally came with the manufacturer, year 2006.


^_^

 

[Bubbaleone]

If I was you; I'd update the BIOS before doing anything else. The initial release is version 0302 dated 2006.07.26, the last non-beta update is version 1101 dated 2007.04.04, and beta updates continue until version 1238 dated 2009.02.11. There are a lot of error fixes, compatibility improvements, and device support enhancements between 2006 and 2009.

 

[cheez]

If I was you; I'd update the BIOS before doing anything else. The initial release is version 0302 dated 2006.07.26, the last non-beta update is version 1101 dated 2007.04.04, and beta updates continue until version 1238 dated 2009.02.11. There are a lot of error fixes, compatibility improvements, and device support enhancements between 2006 and 2009.

Thanks. I will do that the first thing when I get home...

These computer components have their own mind... and act differently depending on their mood. I thought only the humans do this. This isn't the first time I faced this kind of behavior from PC hardware..


Will let ya know how it turns out.


cheez

 

[shortylickens]

Oh shit, I wish you'd asked before the purchase. OCZ is crap. They have a bad track record with SSD's.

 

[ViRGE]

Cheez, you'd be better off at this point asking the guys in the storage forum. It's really no longer an OS issue, but a hardware issue.