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Planning to upgrade HDD in my G75VW. Can I reuse the original?

Pikapichu
Level 9
I'm planning to install an SSD in my G75VW and would like to use the factory drive to store stuff. I don't want to delete the restore partition however or screw any of that stuff up. Is there a way to do that without messing up boot tables and such? Or should I purchase a new mechanical HDD and use that one instead?
G75VW || 660m / 24GB RAM / Sandisk Extreme 240GB SSD
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6 REPLIES 6

Quasimodem
Level 10
Pikapichu wrote:
I'm planning to install an SSD in my G75VW and would like to use the factory drive to store stuff. I don't want to delete the restore partition however or screw any of that stuff up. Is there a way to do that without messing up boot tables and such? Or should I purchase a new mechanical HDD and use that one instead?


Install your SSD, and have the OG drive removed. Clean install Windows, install the drivers, get it all going. Put the OG drive back in. Open up Windows Disk Management. Your OG drive will have 2 partitons. The OG Windows and the recovery. Format ONLY the WIndows partition.
G75VW-DS73-3D | 670m 3GB | 32GB RAM | 1TB RAID-0 2 x 830 512GB SSD DualBoot | Killer-N 1103 WiFi

Pikapichu
Level 9
Thanks for the response! I had a SATA-to-USB adapter and connected the OG HDD using that once everything was up and running on the SSD. Formatted the OS partition using the Windows Partition Manager. (there were 4 partitions for some reason) Everything works great now. 😄
G75VW || 660m / 24GB RAM / Sandisk Extreme 240GB SSD

tkolarik
Level 9
I am going to revert to Windows 7 because some games just don't do right and I intend to do is reinstall my original drive back to factory state. Then the first thing I will do is shrink the drive and add a data partition. When I am done, i will replace my SSD with Windows 8 back in and run as a dual boot. Both Windows 7 and 8 will use the data partition for librarys and data storage.

Pikapichu
Level 9
Is there a reason for having both Windows OS on the same system? It seems a little redundant.
G75VW || 660m / 24GB RAM / Sandisk Extreme 240GB SSD

whathedo69
Level 8
Yeah i agree you really dnt need 2 of the same os on the same drive because you have the disk that comes with the laptop and that has everything you need so you could wipe everything and do a fresh install on the new drive use the disk and it will be like you just got your laptop that way you know brand new plus it will give you that much more space on your new drive so if you are getting a ssd it will be good anyways beause we all want as much space as possible on our ssds well depending how much money you got and want to spend but its all personal preference plus you wo t be able to wipe the factory partition on the original drive anyways unless you run a tbird party software or run a command prompt thats the only way to delete it
Asus G75VW-DS71
i7-3740qm
Nvidia GTX 660m
16gb ddr3 1866mhz Corsair Vengeance
x2 128gb SSD Vertex 4 Raid 0
Windows 7 Ultimate

Nah man, make it your storage drive, but leave it's recovery partition intact... Why have fast Win8 on an SSD, then slow Win7 Home Premium on a Spinner? Sure you could merge the user folders, but that's a complete waste of a HD IMO...
G75VW-DS73-3D | 670m 3GB | 32GB RAM | 1TB RAID-0 2 x 830 512GB SSD DualBoot | Killer-N 1103 WiFi