Peeps,

Following on from the Digital Audio Workstation / laptop question
previously, we have since found a s/h i5 HP Notebook that seems to run
Reason 11 ok. It came with a 750GB hdd that I'd like to swap out for a
SSD (a new 500GB Samsung 860 EVO is sitting here ready).

Now, I think I read somewhere that if you clone a std HDD onto a SSD
you may not get the optimum configuration, compared with allowing W10
to partition the drive from scratch itself. This is down to partition
/ block boundaries or some such? [1]

So, whilst this is a pretty fresh re-install of W10, she's taken it to
school the last couple of days and has to get the school IT dept to
put it online.

Now, if a fresh install (that is potentially going to be running for a
while, especially if she goes onto UNI etc) could give better results
than cloning, I might as well do that, even if she has to 'bother'
school IT again.

Thoughts please?

Cheers, T i m

[1] Or can you re-configure such things post cloning, with Gparted or
the like?

On Wednesday, 27 November 2019 10:56:26 UTC, T i m wrote:
Peeps,

Following on from the Digital Audio Workstation / laptop question
previously, we have since found a s/h i5 HP Notebook that seems to run
Reason 11 ok. It came with a 750GB hdd that I'd like to swap out for a
SSD (a new 500GB Samsung 860 EVO is sitting here ready).

Now, I think I read somewhere that if you clone a std HDD onto a SSD
you may not get the optimum configuration, compared with allowing W10
to partition the drive from scratch itself. This is down to partition
/ block boundaries or some such? [1]

So, whilst this is a pretty fresh re-install of W10, she's taken it to
school the last couple of days and has to get the school IT dept to
put it online.

Now, if a fresh install (that is potentially going to be running for a
while, especially if she goes onto UNI etc) could give better results
than cloning, I might as well do that, even if she has to 'bother'
school IT again.

Thoughts please?

Cheers, T i m

[1] Or can you re-configure such things post cloning, with Gparted or
the like?

The main issue is that your SSD is smaller than the HD, so you will
need to shrink the last partition before you clone it.
I have successfully cloned a couple of Windows 7 systems to Samsung 860 Pro
drives using DD running on a USB bootable linux. It may not be the optimal
method, but the results are good.
Getting the computer "online" at the school often means installing the
school spyware and a certificate for their proxy server so that they
can inspect all the encrypted traffic. Some monitoring may take place
even when the computer is out of the school. Any removable media attached
to the computer are also likely to get scanned and "anomalies" reported.
Schools have draconian legal powers for doing such things.

John

I would imagine the school would be on a loser if you removed all but
security software from it, as after all its not their machine, is it?

Brian

--
----- --
This newsgroup posting comes to you directly from...
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Note this Signature is meaningless.!
wrote in message
...
On Wednesday, 27 November 2019 10:56:26 UTC, T i m wrote:
Peeps,

Following on from the Digital Audio Workstation / laptop question
previously, we have since found a s/h i5 HP Notebook that seems to run
Reason 11 ok. It came with a 750GB hdd that I'd like to swap out for a
SSD (a new 500GB Samsung 860 EVO is sitting here ready).

Now, I think I read somewhere that if you clone a std HDD onto a SSD
you may not get the optimum configuration, compared with allowing W10
to partition the drive from scratch itself. This is down to partition
/ block boundaries or some such? [1]

So, whilst this is a pretty fresh re-install of W10, she's taken it to
school the last couple of days and has to get the school IT dept to
put it online.

Now, if a fresh install (that is potentially going to be running for a
while, especially if she goes onto UNI etc) could give better results
than cloning, I might as well do that, even if she has to 'bother'
school IT again.

Thoughts please?

Cheers, T i m

[1] Or can you re-configure such things post cloning, with Gparted or
the like?

The main issue is that your SSD is smaller than the HD, so you will
need to shrink the last partition before you clone it.
I have successfully cloned a couple of Windows 7 systems to Samsung 860
Pro
drives using DD running on a USB bootable linux. It may not be the
optimal
method, but the results are good.
Getting the computer "online" at the school often means installing the
school spyware and a certificate for their proxy server so that they
can inspect all the encrypted traffic. Some monitoring may take place
even when the computer is out of the school. Any removable media attached
to the computer are also likely to get scanned and "anomalies" reported.
Schools have draconian legal powers for doing such things.

John

On Wed, 27 Nov 2019 03:43:40 -0800 (PST), wrote:

snip

The main issue is that your SSD is smaller than the HD, so you will
need to shrink the last partition before you clone it.

Understood. Luckily the drive is fairly empty so it won't be a
capacity issue and most of the partitioning tools seem to be able to
allow for a resize on the fly (Acronis / Ghost etc).

I've seen some good words on the Samsung migration tool so I might
give that a look as well.

I have successfully cloned a couple of Windows 7 systems to Samsung 860 Pro
drives using DD running on a USB bootable linux. It may not be the optimal
method, but the results are good.

I'm not confident enough with the CLI to be able to do such.

Getting the computer "online" at the school often means installing the
school spyware and a certificate for their proxy server so that they
can inspect all the encrypted traffic.

Ah.

Some monitoring may take place
even when the computer is out of the school.

Crafty.

Any removable media attached
to the computer are also likely to get scanned and "anomalies" reported.

Oooerr!

Schools have draconian legal powers for doing such things.

Are there any things we could look for to check? Proxy server settings
in network properties or wouldn't it be that obvious?

Cheers, T i m

On 27/11/2019 10:56, T i m wrote:
Peeps,

Following on from the Digital Audio Workstation / laptop question
previously, we have since found a s/h i5 HP Notebook that seems to run
Reason 11 ok. It came with a 750GB hdd that I'd like to swap out for a
SSD (a new 500GB Samsung 860 EVO is sitting here ready).

Now, I think I read somewhere that if you clone a std HDD onto a SSD
you may not get the optimum configuration, compared with allowing W10
to partition the drive from scratch itself. This is down to partition
/ block boundaries or some such? [1]

You won't notice the performance hit for block boundaries but you should
reconfigure the cloned disk to know that it is an SSD so that windows
won't do silly things to speed up spinning rust that slow down an SSD. I
think Win10 gets it right by default but earlier Windoze didn't.

https://www.tenforums.com/installati...4-pro-ssd.html

Be prepared for eventual failure - SSDs when they go wrong leave you
with no access at all to any data. Rare but not completely unknown.
Backups of work in progress is a very good idea...

So, whilst this is a pretty fresh re-install of W10, she's taken it to
school the last couple of days and has to get the school IT dept to
put it online.

Now, if a fresh install (that is potentially going to be running for a
while, especially if she goes onto UNI etc) could give better results
than cloning, I might as well do that, even if she has to 'bother'
school IT again.

Thoughts please?

You can clone it across provided that the content of the old disk will
fit on the new one and then run one of the tools to check and optimise
the configuration. Samsung's disk magician is pretty good.

EVOs can just about saturate a SATA 6G link so if you have an interface
capable of that speed or better it is worth putting the SSD on it.

--
Regards,
Martin Brown

On Wed, 27 Nov 2019 14:28:45 +0000, Martin Brown
wrote:

snip

Now, I think I read somewhere that if you clone a std HDD onto a SSD
you may not get the optimum configuration, compared with allowing W10
to partition the drive from scratch itself. This is down to partition
/ block boundaries or some such? [1]

You won't notice the performance hit for block boundaries

Ok, thanks.

but you should
reconfigure the cloned disk to know that it is an SSD so that windows
won't do silly things to speed up spinning rust that slow down an SSD. I
think Win10 gets it right by default but earlier Windoze didn't.


https://www.tenforums.com/installati...4-pro-ssd.html

Noted. I think I've been though most of that before but a handy recap.

Be prepared for eventual failure - SSDs when they go wrong leave you
with no access at all to any data.

Quite.

Rare but not completely unknown.

Sure. I'm going to put the 750GB drive I take out in a USB3 caddy and
see if my ClickFree dongle backs up everything she would consider
important.

Backups of work in progress is a very good idea...

I've set up another PC on that network to backup automatically to the
OMV NAS and that in turn backs itself up when you plug in a USB drive.
I might look into some cloud storage for them as well.

snip

You can clone it across provided that the content of the old disk will
fit on the new one and then run one of the tools to check and optimise
the configuration.

Check. Brand new W10 install with just the Reason 11 DAW so pretty
empty.

Samsung's disk magician is pretty good.

Interesting, thanks.

If I were doing it for myself, I'd be tempted to do a fresh install to
the new SSD with it in it's proper place, not in a caddy and then
swapping over.

EVOs can just about saturate a SATA 6G link so if you have an interface
capable of that speed or better it is worth putting the SSD on it.

Not sure I've got a choice on this Notebook Martin. ;-)

Cheers, T i m

On 27/11/2019 10:56, T i m wrote:
Peeps,

Following on from the Digital Audio Workstation / laptop question
previously, we have since found a s/h i5 HP Notebook that seems to run
Reason 11 ok. It came with a 750GB hdd that I'd like to swap out for a
SSD (a new 500GB Samsung 860 EVO is sitting here ready).

Now, I think I read somewhere that if you clone a std HDD onto a SSD
you may not get the optimum configuration, compared with allowing W10
to partition the drive from scratch itself. This is down to partition
/ block boundaries or some such? [1]

That only really applies to partitions created under WinXP or earlier.
Vista onward has always aligned things on boundaries that match Advanced
Format drives.

So, whilst this is a pretty fresh re-install of W10, she's taken it to
school the last couple of days and has to get the school IT dept to
put it online.

Now, if a fresh install (that is potentially going to be running for a
while, especially if she goes onto UNI etc) could give better results
than cloning, I might as well do that, even if she has to 'bother'
school IT again.

Thoughts please?

Clone it, it should be fine.


--
Cheers,

John.

/================================================== ===============\
| Internode Ltd - http://www.internode.co.uk |
|-----------------------------------------------------------------|
| John Rumm - john(at)internode(dot)co(dot)uk |
\================================================= ================/

On 27/11/2019 14:15, T i m wrote:
On Wed, 27 Nov 2019 03:43:40 -0800 (PST), wrote:

snip

The main issue is that your SSD is smaller than the HD, so you will
need to shrink the last partition before you clone it.

Understood. Luckily the drive is fairly empty so it won't be a
capacity issue and most of the partitioning tools seem to be able to
allow for a resize on the fly (Acronis / Ghost etc).

I've seen some good words on the Samsung migration tool so I might
give that a look as well.

Acronis will shrink on the fly (and most of the drive specific tools are
rebadged versions of Acronis IME)

I'm not confident enough with the CLI to be able to do such.

Getting the computer "online" at the school often means installing the
school spyware and a certificate for their proxy server so that they
can inspect all the encrypted traffic.

That should ring alarm bells on any modern web browser - the site
certificates would no longer match.


--
Cheers,

John.

/================================================== ===============\
| Internode Ltd - http://www.internode.co.uk |
|-----------------------------------------------------------------|
| John Rumm - john(at)internode(dot)co(dot)uk |
\================================================= ================/

John Rumm wrote:

T i m wrote:

Getting the computer "online" at the school often means installing the
school spyware and a certificate for their proxy server so that they
can inspect all the encrypted traffic.

That should ring alarm bells on any modern web browser - the site
certificates would no longer match.

Get the domain controller to push out the root CA certificate that the
proxy fakes the website certificates from ... I hate doing it, but
nobody seems to like my suggestion not to MITM their users online
banking any more :-(

On Wed, 27 Nov 2019 10:56:26 +0000, T i m wrote:

Peeps,

Following on from the Digital Audio Workstation / laptop question
previously, we have since found a s/h i5 HP Notebook that seems to run
Reason 11 ok. It came with a 750GB hdd that I'd like to swap out for a
SSD (a new 500GB Samsung 860 EVO is sitting here ready).

Now, I think I read somewhere that if you clone a std HDD onto a SSD
you may not get the optimum configuration, compared with allowing W10
to partition the drive from scratch itself. This is down to partition
/ block boundaries or some such? [1]

So, whilst this is a pretty fresh re-install of W10, she's taken it to
school the last couple of days and has to get the school IT dept to
put it online.

Now, if a fresh install (that is potentially going to be running for a
while, especially if she goes onto UNI etc) could give better results
than cloning, I might as well do that, even if she has to 'bother'
school IT again.

Thoughts please?

Cheers, T i m

[1] Or can you re-configure such things post cloning, with Gparted or
the like?

With mine (Samsung 950 Pro, SATA) I cloned it with Macrium Reflect,
disconnected the HDD and it booted straight away. ISTR having to do a couple
of things (BIOS?) first. This was a couple of years or so ago and the MoBo
was just OK with last BIOS issued.
I also got a driver so that I could try a NVMe one, but it boots to useable
in 35s even with all the things that run at start.
--
Peter.
The gods will stay away
whilst religions hold sway

On Wednesday, 27 November 2019 17:09:35 UTC, PeterC wrote:
I also got a driver so that I could try a NVMe one, but it boots to useable
in 35s even with all the things that run at start.

NVMe really is nice and much faster than SATA. I tried one
(Samsung 970 PRO 512GB M.2) in an HP ML110 Gen7 server with a
4-lane PCIe adapter card recently.
I couldn't boot from NVMe, even with a BIOS update from this year,
so the boot partition had to go on a spinning disk and everything else on
the NVMe. I could have used a SATA SSD to boot from of course, but didn't
have a spare to hand. Read and write speeds were limited by the PCIe v2
on the motherboard.

John

On Wed, 27 Nov 2019 14:36:56 +0000, Chris Hogg wrote:

snip

[1] Or can you re-configure such things post cloning, with Gparted or
the like?

I've recently done something similar. I had a 240GB SSD available in a
little USB caddy, that I plugged into this computer, cloned the 150GB
HDD to it using Acronis, took it out and replaced it with the SSD, and
it powered up pretty much as before

It's good when that happens eh. ;-)

(rather to my surprise, I must
say. IME if anything can go wrong when messing with the insides of a
computer, it will!).

In many cases I'm the opposite. In my years of IT support I would go
to a users machine that was reported as 'playing up', have them
demonstrate the problem to me, only to it work perfectly (of course).
;-)

Then I re-formatted the HDD to remove everything
on it and put it back, to give me an additional 150GB for whatever I
choose.

Yeah, I think I'll do the same with the 750G that's in there atm.

Had to tell the BIOS that I was using two discs, but apart
from that, all is now working perfectly AFAICT.

Unless someone had turned off automatic support for any unused ports,
it should have picked them up automatically. Could it have just been
the boot sequence, the PC trying to boot from the original drive?

But replacing a 150GB
HDD by a 240GB SSD may have made the swap easier than if it were the
other way round - I don't know.

If the migration / cloning tool can't support that, or if you had more
data on the drive than the new destination could take, then no, it may
not have made much difference.


But I'm delighted the way it all zings along now; much faster than
before!

It was the same with daughters i3 Tosh laptop. I have done several
others that haven't been so 'obvious' in the improvement but they were
usually either crappy SSD's or not a bottleneck in the first place.

Cheers, T i m

On Wed, 27 Nov 2019 15:07:16 +0000, John Rumm
wrote:

On 27/11/2019 10:56, T i m wrote:
Peeps,

Following on from the Digital Audio Workstation / laptop question
previously, we have since found a s/h i5 HP Notebook that seems to run
Reason 11 ok. It came with a 750GB hdd that I'd like to swap out for a
SSD (a new 500GB Samsung 860 EVO is sitting here ready).

Now, I think I read somewhere that if you clone a std HDD onto a SSD
you may not get the optimum configuration, compared with allowing W10
to partition the drive from scratch itself. This is down to partition
/ block boundaries or some such? [1]

That only really applies to partitions created under WinXP or earlier.

Ah. I've got a 120GB SSD hanging off this XP / Mac Mini that I know it
can't deal with 'nicely' (no TRIM etc).

Vista onward has always aligned things on boundaries that match Advanced
Format drives.

So was that under the control of the OS, even when using a bootable
partition tool (like Acronis)?

So, whilst this is a pretty fresh re-install of W10, she's taken it to
school the last couple of days and has to get the school IT dept to
put it online.

Now, if a fresh install (that is potentially going to be running for a
while, especially if she goes onto UNI etc) could give better results
than cloning, I might as well do that, even if she has to 'bother'
school IT again.

Thoughts please?

Clone it, it should be fine.

Yeah, I'm happy it will work (and faster than the old HDD), it was
just the question of if it would be optimised (if I had a free choice
of cloning or installing from scratch). I'll take your reassurance
that it will and clone. ;-)

Cheers, T i m

On Wed, 27 Nov 2019 17:09:32 +0000, PeterC
wrote:

snip

[1] Or can you re-configure such things post cloning, with Gparted or
the like?

With mine (Samsung 950 Pro, SATA) I cloned it with Macrium Reflect,
disconnected the HDD and it booted straight away.

If it were here I could back it up to my WHS, swap drives and image it
back from the server. That way I still have the original drive
(intact), a backup on the server and am writing the new drive when
it's in it's final position. ;-)

ISTR having to do a couple
of things (BIOS?) first.

Yeah. I might on one of my home built desktops as I may have disabled
any unused / wanted onboard devices to help KISS. ;-)

This was a couple of years or so ago and the MoBo
was just OK with last BIOS issued.

I find it a bit of a disappointment when I check for BIOS updates and
there aren't any (rare). More confusing when you find you are running
a later BIOS version than they have on their support sire (even when
it's a few years old)?

I also got a driver so that I could try a NVMe one, but it boots to useable
in 35s even with all the things that run at start.

That's what daughters i3 W7 laptop went to ... from about 3 mins and
made a big difference to how (often especially) she used it.

Cheers, T i m

On 27/11/2019 21:36, T i m wrote:
On Wed, 27 Nov 2019 15:07:16 +0000, John Rumm
wrote:

On 27/11/2019 10:56, T i m wrote:
Peeps,

Following on from the Digital Audio Workstation / laptop question
previously, we have since found a s/h i5 HP Notebook that seems to run
Reason 11 ok. It came with a 750GB hdd that I'd like to swap out for a
SSD (a new 500GB Samsung 860 EVO is sitting here ready).

Now, I think I read somewhere that if you clone a std HDD onto a SSD
you may not get the optimum configuration, compared with allowing W10
to partition the drive from scratch itself. This is down to partition
/ block boundaries or some such? [1]

That only really applies to partitions created under WinXP or earlier.

Ah. I've got a 120GB SSD hanging off this XP / Mac Mini that I know it
can't deal with 'nicely' (no TRIM etc).

Vista onward has always aligned things on boundaries that match Advanced
Format drives.

So was that under the control of the OS, even when using a bootable
partition tool (like Acronis)?

Normally just a problem on the built in partition / install tools.

Clone it, it should be fine.

Yeah, I'm happy it will work (and faster than the old HDD), it was
just the question of if it would be optimised (if I had a free choice
of cloning or installing from scratch). I'll take your reassurance
that it will and clone. ;-)


If you run msinfo32, then look under Components, Storage, & Disks it
should show you the Partition Starting Offset for each logical volume.
Divide that by 4096 and check you get an integer result.


--
Cheers,

John.

/================================================== ===============\
| Internode Ltd - http://www.internode.co.uk |
|-----------------------------------------------------------------|
| John Rumm - john(at)internode(dot)co(dot)uk |
\================================================= ================/

On Thu, 28 Nov 2019 11:05:14 +0000, John Rumm
wrote:

snip

If you run msinfo32, then look under Components, Storage, & Disks it
should show you the Partition Starting Offset for each logical volume.
Divide that by 4096 and check you get an integer result.

Good tip, will do, thanks.

Cheers, T i m

On 28/11/2019 14:41, T i m wrote:
On Thu, 28 Nov 2019 11:05:14 +0000, John Rumm
wrote:

snip

If you run msinfo32, then look under Components, Storage, & Disks it
should show you the Partition Starting Offset for each logical volume.
Divide that by 4096 and check you get an integer result.

Good tip, will do, thanks.

or do it from the command line:

Do:

diskpart

Then get a list of disks:

list disk

Select the one you are interested in:

select disk n

Now get a list of partitions on the selected disk:

list partition

Now select the partition of interest:

select partition n

finally:

detail partition

That will show among other things the "offset in bytes"



--
Cheers,

John.

/================================================== ===============\
| Internode Ltd - http://www.internode.co.uk |
|-----------------------------------------------------------------|
| John Rumm - john(at)internode(dot)co(dot)uk |
\================================================= ================/

On Thu, 28 Nov 2019 18:06:59 +0000, John Rumm
wrote:

On 28/11/2019 14:41, T i m wrote:
On Thu, 28 Nov 2019 11:05:14 +0000, John Rumm
wrote:

snip

If you run msinfo32, then look under Components, Storage, & Disks it
should show you the Partition Starting Offset for each logical volume.
Divide that by 4096 and check you get an integer result.

Good tip, will do, thanks.

or do it from the command line:

Do:

diskpart

Then get a list of disks:

list disk

Select the one you are interested in:

select disk n

Now get a list of partitions on the selected disk:

list partition

Now select the partition of interest:

select partition n

finally:

detail partition

I have used diskpart in the past but feel uncomfortable doing so (when
making changes) because there is no visual representation of what you
are doing, unlike many of the GUI tools these days.

That will show among other things the "offset in bytes"

I'll transfer this to my phone so have it with me when I do the
upgrade (for the S&G's). ;-)

Cheers, T i m