How do I know if an SSD is compatible with my laptop?

bobkn said:

That's a good point. Amazon "marketplace" sellers aren't Amazon.

There are basically three levels: sold by Amazon, shipped by Amazon, or completely third-party. I've seen third party listings that are much higher than the MSRP, even when the item is in stock by Amazon at the MSRP or lower. I've never been able to figure out why anyone would buy from such a vendor, except by mistake. (Or is it some financial scheme that I don't understand?)

Looks like I'll be safe with the one I'll be getting:

Secure transaction

[COLOR=#565959 !important]Ships from

Amazon.com

[COLOR=#565959 !important]Sold by[/COLOR]

Amazon.com

Nice return policy extension for the holidays - ~2 months to test it out

steve108 said:

Nice return policy extension for the holidays - ~2 months to test it out

Yes! It's usually 1 month, and sometimes things fail just after that. It's nice to have that extra time.

I've lost track ....... do you have a plan for how you will image or clone the new SSD?

steve108 said:

I've lost track ....... do you have a plan for how you will image or clone the new SSD?

I used Macrium Reflect to create a backup image on an external HDD about a week ago, so it's current. What I would do is wait for my current HDD to die, then replace it with the new SSD, then use a flash drive that I put the boot drive on to boot to the external drive, and activate the image to load onto the new internal SSD. It's something I've never done before, so I'm just using the terminology I've read here before. I do have another laptop (a Lenovo) that I could look up information with if I run into problems.

Does my description about what to do sound about right?

Delly10 said:

I used Macrium Reflect to create a backup image on an external HDD about a week ago, so it's current. What I would do is wait for my current HDD to die, then replace it with the new SSD, then use a flash drive that I put the boot drive on to boot to the external drive, and activate the image to load onto the new internal SSD. It's something I've never done before, so I'm just using the terminology I've read here before. I do have another laptop (a Lenovo) that I could look up information with if I run into problems.

Does my description about what to do sound about right?

I would not wait for the HDD to die as you will lose time testing the new SSD. I would start using the SSD immediately - you'll be amazed at how much faster your PC boots and loads apps, windows updates, etc - then you won't even want to go back to the slowness of using the HDD as a boot drive

By USB flash drive do you mean you made a bootable Macrium Reflect Rescue USB, because that is what you would boot from to restore the image from your external HDD to the SSD or HDD installed in the laptop.

I've you've never tried booting from the MR Rescue USB, you should try that when you have time - just to become familiar with the process.

steve108 said:

I would not wait for the HDD to die as you will lose time testing the new SSD. I would start using the SSD immediately - you'll be amazed at how much faster your PC boots and loads apps, windows updates, etc - then you won't even want to go back to the slowness of using the HDD as a boot drive

By USB flash drive do you mean you made a bootable Macrium Reflect Rescue USB, because that is what you would boot from to restore the image from your external HDD to the SSD or HDD installed in the laptop.

I've you've never tried booting from the MR Rescue USB, you should try that when you have time - just to become familiar with the process.

Here's a pic of what's on the flash drive I was referring to. It has the Rescue USB files, along with some others since I use it for other things too.

Have you ever booted from it like I asked?

Delly10 said:

No. I figured it was only for booting to a backup drive to restore a backup file. I didn't want to mess around with doing that until it became necessary. The old "If it ain't broke, don't try to fix it" thing. Sometimes when I fiddle around with something, I mess it up and then wish I hadn't.

However, I have looked up and saved instructions on how to do it. It sounds easy enough, and it seems like people here do it all the time when viruses or other glitches come up. I've never had to yet.

Nope. It's a bootable drive. It may launch the recovery version of Macrium when it loads.

I suggest testing it. It'll do no harm.

My preferred method would be the one-time boot device setting, which is invoked by a hotkey during startup. The hotkey may be the F12 key.