120GB SSD £22.99 on 7dayshop

mightyreds

got mine this morning ordered late Sunday night

MisterAnarchy

Daniel S wrote: »

Amazing to think you can restart the PC and open Firefox in less than a third of the time!

Yip,once you switch to a SSD you will never want to go back to a physical drive .
Hopefully PC's and Laptops will have SSD's as the norm from now on.

ED E

Daniel S wrote: »

Amazing to think you can restart the PC and open Firefox in less than a third of the time!

And that's a slow SSD too, 450 MB/s, try 2200MB/s

ozmo

For max speed and less wear - I would recommend to reinstall on an SSD rather than clone - as windows will detect it on installation and make some adjustments...

eg. I believe some defrag and caching services are not enabled when installing fresh on an ssd - cloning will bring over the settings suitable for the old drive.

Also data installs at a slightly different start place on an SSD - if they data is misaligned windows will have to occasionally do an extra sector read to get that full data block.

"...a mechanical hard drive starts its first partition after 63 empty blocks, while a solid drive starts its first partition after 64 blocks. That is to say, cloning one to the other would certainly decrease SSD's performance because the partitions are not correctly aligned by rules." link

duridian

ozmo wrote: »

For max speed and less wear - I would recommend to reinstall on an SSD rather than clone - as windows will detect it on installation and make some adjustments...

eg. I believe some defrag and caching services are not enabled when installing fresh on an ssd - cloning will bring over the settings suitable for the old drive.

Also data installs at a slightly different start place on an SSD - if they data is misaligned windows will have to occasionally do an extra sector read to get that full data block.

"...a mechanical hard drive starts its first partition after 63 empty blocks, while a solid drive starts its first partition after 64 blocks. That is to say, cloning one to the other would certainly decrease SSD's performance because the partitions are not correctly aligned by rules." link

Trim is another thing which I think may be affected, as it would serve no purpose on a hard drive, and might not be active in a system cloned across from one.

ozmo

ozmo wrote: »

For max speed and less wear - I would recommend to reinstall on an SSD rather than clone - as windows will detect it on installation and make some adjustments...

eg. I believe some defrag and caching services are not enabled when installing fresh on an ssd - cloning will bring over the settings suitable for the old drive.

Also data installs at a slightly different start place on an SSD - if they data is misaligned windows will have to occasionally do an extra sector read to get that full data block.

"...a mechanical hard drive starts its first partition after 63 empty blocks, while a solid drive starts its first partition after 64 blocks. That is to say, cloning one to the other would certainly decrease SSD's performance because the partitions are not correctly aligned by rules." link

I followed the link ozmo and used the software provided thanks, but it said my ssd was already aligned?.

I used this from Macrium software https://www.macrium.com/reflectfree, to clone my hard drive maybe this software does it automatically?, or does windows 10?

editorsean

Deleted User wrote: »

I followed the link ozmo and used the software provided thanks, but it said my ssd was already aligned?.

Windows 7, 8.x and 10 all automatically create the OS partition aligned to a 4K boundary duration installation, regardless of installation to HDD or SSD. The exception is when upgrading from Windows XP or Vista, where the existing partition is kept. This means that a 1:1 clone of a Windows 7 or later OS to an SSD should already be 4K aligned, unless the OS partition was previously created with Windows XP or Vista. Hard disks manufactured from around 2011 use 4K native sectors also.

For example, on my workplace PC I did the clone with, the OS partition offset is 1048576, which 4096 divides evenly into, i.e. 4K aligned:



For comparison, the data storage hard disk in this PC which was originally partitioned many years ago on Windows XP has an offset of 32256, which 4096 does not divide evenly into. Dividing 512 into it gives 63, the sector which Windows XP aligns the primary partition to:



When Windows 7 onwards boots from an SSD after a clone, it will automatically reconfigure itself for the SSD the next time it reboots. For example, it displays the drive as a solid state drive in the defragger and will not let me analyse/defrag it unlike the hard disk listing:



Similarly for TRIM. The DisableDeleteNotify query should return 0 when TRIM is enabled (source):



Indeed, a clean Windows installation will give better performance, although this does not necessary mean it needs to be done the same time as upgrading the HDD, unless there is a problem with cloning the existing OS across. However, while the PC is open for the SSD upgrade, I do recommend cleaning the inside of the PC, especially dust build-up on the heatsinks, etc.

duridian

Good info there. Thanks Sean.

LeChienMefiant

Silly question possibly... my newish HP laptop has a 1TB HDD and I will be upgrading to this SSD. Is it possible to clone the 1TB to the 120GB?
Secondly there is a recovery partition on the HP laptop. Is cloning this an option? Thirdly, how would I go about getting install media to reinstall Windows 7/8 from scratch?

LeChienMefiant

LeChienMefiant wrote: »

Silly question possibly... my newish HP laptop has a 1TB HDD and I will be upgrading to this SSD. Is it possible to clone the 1TB to the 120GB?

Depends on how much space is used on your 1TB drive.

Secondly there is a recovery partition on the HP laptop. Is cloning this an option?

It's not a good idea. These recovery partitions are pretty dumb and expect certain size disk. Even if you cloned it, it probably wouldn't work in the event you needed it.

A clean install is what I would do in your case.

Fuzzy Logic

Anyone still waiting on delivery?

styron

Fuzzy Logic wrote: »

Anyone still waiting on delivery?

Yeah, ordered last Monday (Dublin).

Alanstrainor

LeChienMefiant wrote: »

Silly question possibly... my newish HP laptop has a 1TB HDD and I will be upgrading to this SSD. Is it possible to clone the 1TB to the 120GB?
Secondly there is a recovery partition on the HP laptop. Is cloning this an option? Thirdly, how would I go about getting install media to reinstall Windows 7/8 from scratch?

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows8ISO

Download directly from Microsoft themselves.

I would not clone your drive. I would install from scratch in this case, seeing that it is a relatively new machine. You can keep your old hard disk as a backup at least for a short while, and then perhaps repurpose it as an external USB drive.

rebeve

Fuzzy Logic wrote: »

Anyone still waiting on delivery?

Still waiting ,Ordered mine on Monday .

editorsean

LeChienMefiant wrote: »

Silly question possibly... my newish HP laptop has a 1TB HDD and I will be upgrading to this SSD. Is it possible to clone the 1TB to the 120GB?
Secondly there is a recovery partition on the HP laptop. Is cloning this an option? Thirdly, how would I go about getting install media to reinstall Windows 7/8 from scratch?

You may be able to exclude it with the cloning software or alternatively delete the partition after the clone and expand the OS partition to fill the space in EaseUS. Windows 10 will work fine without the recovery partition and later recreate a smaller Windows 10 recovery partition during the next feature update. However, I've only done this with 240GB and larger SSDs.

As a few others already mentioned, I also recommend doing a clean Windows installation in this case due to the limited 120GB capacity. Besides the recovery partition, there tends to be a lot of preloaded content (and bloatware) on OEM installations that's difficult to fully remove. Based on the last few times I installed Windows 8 or 10 64-bit with drivers and updates, a clean ready to use Windows installation is typically around 10GB, compared to up to 40GB I've seen with some brand new laptops.

Before starting, download the network or Wi-Fi drivers from the HP website. Open up device manager (right-click start -> Device Manager) and check what network adapters you currently have, e.g. Realtek, Intel, etc. to identify which to download if it gives a choice. In device manager, click the very top item and press * on the numeric keyboard to expand the lot. Take screenshots page by page and put the images on a USB key. Once you get online with the clean Windows installation, Windows will automatically download and install most drivers from Windows update. If there are any remaining unknown devices, you can use the screenshots to help identify what drivers are left to install. In some cases, I've seen Windows 8 and 10 install every driver after completing Windows updates without depending on the manufacturer's website. If there's just one unknown device that needs a driver, it's usually the SD card slot.

If you would like to try Windows 10, I have also successfully installed Windows 10 on a friend's laptop late last year that only ever had Windows 8, well after the free upgrade period ended. I don't recall it asking for the Windows key during installation and activated fine. However, as that was about a year ago it's possible Microsoft may no longer allow this, in which case you can still install Windows 8.

As for my 7dayshop delivery - I ordered the SSD and a set of Ink cartridges last Sunday 22nd. The SSD arrived last Wednesday 25th and the ink cartridges on Friday 27th.

mrtom

rebeve wrote: »

Still waiting ,Ordered mine on Monday .

7 Day shop response:
We are sorry to hear your order has not yet arrived. I can confirm it was shipped on 24/7/18 and should be with you shortly. Unfortunately, I am unable to give you an exact arrival date, the package is not tracked. Delivery usually takes 3-5 working days, but this is not guaranteed.
Please allow a few more days for delivery. We are unable to re-send or refund until after 28 days from shipping as the Post Office will not accept an order as missing until after this time.
If your order has not arrived by this time, please get back to us.
Regards

davemie

Mine has also not arrived yet.

styron

Not today either - only realised despite using before that 7dayshop are Guernsey not UK/EU based (well hid on the site). My order's around £50 ... possible customs ??

djmarkus

styron wrote: »

Not today either - only realised despite using before that 7dayshop are Guernsey not UK/EU based (well hid on the site). My order's around £50 ... possible customs ??

"Guernsey is not a member of the EU and not part of the UK. Under its Protocol 3 relationship with the EU Guernsey is part of the customs territory which allows for the free movement of goods."

Alanstrainor

I order bits and bobs from them all the time, sometimes delivery takes a week or maybe a bit longer. Generally they are quick, but it happens. I wouldn't worry too much lads.

Daniel S

rebeve wrote: »

Fuzzy Logic wrote: »

Anyone still waiting on delivery?

Still waiting ,Ordered mine on Monday .

+1

sapphade

Daniel S wrote: »

+1

also still waiting

Daniel S

sapphade wrote: »

also still waiting

I'm starting to wonder if there's stock left.

rebeve

Daniel S wrote: »

I'm starting to wonder if there's stock left.

I changed my mind and bought the Kingston instead , and it hasn`t arrived , I`ll give them till

the end of the week ,and then contact paypal .

Daniel S

Anyone get theirs today? Haven't been home to check.

Fuzzy Logic

Nothing here.

rebeve

Nothing here today either , can`t believe so many are stuck in the post .

duridian

I ordered one from Amazon rather than 7DayShop, the night after the bargain alert appeared here on Sunday, July 22nd, and it was only today I got a message that it has been dispatched. (Amazon said it's being sent via Asendia, which means it is either coming by post from France or Switzerland.)

So maybe it is just a bit of an all round stock shortage, caused by a rush/attention from various bargain alert forums like this and HUKD?

sapphade

I ordered two of the Kingston ones instead of the adata. No sign in the post today either . I’m really hoping the arrive tomorrow. It’s my first time ordering from them and I’d be reluctant to order from them again given the delivery delays

GBX

Delays happen with many vendors. Not only that, when posted on the likes of HKUD and then here, orders increase. So they could be under pressure to get all the orders out. Have ordered from 7day before. No issues.