I need some hand-holding for migrating to new SSD drive.

[ipanema]

Hello Headlands,

The safest and fastest way I know is to use a software called Acronis True Image. What it does is make an exact copy of your old drive (including the OS) and puts it on your new SSD. If you were completely happy with your old drive, that is. Had you asked before installing Windows, you could have saved time.

It’s very fast and reliable. Google it for more info. Sorry I can’t recommend any safe, tried and true way to transfer only the apps and settings.

Good Luck.

[StudioRay]

Hi Headlands,

I don’t believe that there is any way to do what you’ve asked except for loading in all of the programs one at a time form scratch - always a major PITA when upgrading computers. However, I give a +1 the Acronis method - that’s what I use. It’s the way to go when switching out hard drives AND a great image backup software too - well worth the price of admission. The built in Win7 imaging back up can be glitchy - I once tried a recovery with it and got a BSOD which took hours of research to discover a known glitch and to recover from. Never had a problem with Acronis for years and years. In fact, if you are nervous about ipanema’s suggestion, you can back up your clean install of WIn7 as well with Acronis and then if you don’t like how it goes migrating your old system drive image (I can’t see why not - unless your old system drive doesn’t have your Win7 Pro on it), then you can always get your clean Win7 install back.

Good luck!

[ipanema]

@Headlands

The issue is that I wanted a clean install of W7 because of issues that are popping up that could be affecting ASIO spikes, etc. Many have said that a clean install often helps with this, so I wanted to give it a shot. Is there a way to “re-install” Windows on an earlier installation? That way I could clone the drive using Acronis, as you recommend, and get a re-install of W7 over that.

Don’t even think about re-installing Win7 on itself. Even if it is possible, you will have more problems than less. I don’t think anybody will recommend this path.

I think your only option is to install all your programs from scratch. I know it takes time, but better safe than sorry.

Having said that, if you really want to try the re-installing method you brought up yourself, use Acronis to make an image of your old drive before hand. I truly believe your method will render your old drive useless, so having an image to restore it to the way it was is very important.

Cheers