How is drive-letter assignment determined with an Asus P9X79 WS motherboard, or isn't it? I currently have a Samsung 830 Series MZ-7PC512B/WW SSD as my C (boot) drive and my DVD as the D drive. Tomorrow I am expecting delivery of a Samsung 840 Pro Series MZ-7PD512BW SSD that I would like to use as the C (boot) drive instead, allocating the current SSD as the D drive (and the DVD as E). I am using 64-bit Windows 7. My first step might be to reassign the DVD to E using Disk Management. Then, my plan is to install the new SSD as the C drive and move the older SSD to D. (How do I do this?) Then, using the BIOS, boot from the old SSD, which would then be the D drive. But what hardware configuration determines drive letter assignment? Then I'll use the already installed Samsung Magician software to "overprovision" the C drive. (The D drive to-be is already overprovisioned.) Then I'll use the already installed Casper to clone the D to the C. And henceforth be automatically booting from that C drive. Are the steps outlined above proper, and what is the best way to install the new SSD as the C drive and the old as D in this situation? (I think I remember that in the old days drive-letter assignment would be determined by each drive's position on one cable, but I don't think that holds true anymore with SATA.)
If you want to make C become D and then move all data from D to C, what is the point of all this? What's wrong with setting the D drive (your current disk) as the boot, and move all data except the OS to C drive and use it as such? I really don't see the purpose of the whole exercise. Is the drive letter important to you because of some in-built application is hard-coded to scan the C drive for some data? Or is there a different reason why the drive letter is important to you? To answer your question, you set which HD to boot from in your BIOS. It doesn't look at "drive letters" as they don't exist in the BIOS. In Windows however you can assign drive letters to any of your HDs (if i remember correctly) via Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Computer Management > Disk Management. So the drive letter is just a Windows naming convention, it doesn't really care where your data is or what you do with the disks, but you seem to be confusing this concept so I asked the question above.
Once the Casper cloning is done, just swap the data cables between the drives. Then check the boot order in Setup. (Merely swapping data cables may or may not have the desired effect... some mobos select a specific drive to boot rather than which SATA port it's mounted to on the mobo. If afterwards the drive letter assignments aren't to your liking, use Disk Management to set manually.)
I would use Macrium Reflect to clone your current SSD to the new one, then remove the old one & boot on the new one. Once this is working, plug back the old one, use the bios to boot on the new one (if it doesn't automatically), then wipe out the old one.
I must admit you're right. I have no compelling reason to boot from the C drive. It's just that I have a lifetime of using the C drive this way and most programs usually default to the C drive for installation and maintenance. But all that, of course, can be changed. Regardless, you went ahead and gave a good answer to my question; you explained it well and that's what I was looking for. Thanks, braincell, and best regards, JP
Well, I've been using Casper for many years; it has worked flawlessly and I'm used to it. But if for some reason it doesn't work this time I will try Macrium. Thanks for that suggestion.
"Booting from the C drive" is a misnomer I think. When you boot from a hard disk, you boot. The hardware (your motherboard) has no concept whether this is a "C" drive or not a C drive. You tell the motherboard where to boot using the control in CMOS/BIOS. It can be from SATA disk, it can be from the built-in DVD drive, it can be from the USB external device (CD/DVD or hard disk), it can be from the network. It is the operating system - Windows - that customarily (legacy thing from CP/M and DOS) assigns "C" to the drive where it boots from. Otherwise a drive is a drive. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drive_letter_assignment According to this Microsoft article you can change the drive letter assignment, even the "C" drive. I just tried it in Windows 7 to change the C drive assignment and only got error "invalid parameter". http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows-vista/Change-add-or-remove-a-drive-letter At any rate I would leave the drive letter C assignment stick and not to mess with it to avoid headache.
I just re-read the thread in its entirety. Some of my comments were already said, sorry. As for what to do with the old SSD: I would suggest only un-install the apps and transfer data to save disk space, but keep the bootable Windows on it, and maybe the trading apps. It has already been configured and proven working. You never know. One of these days if you get hit by a computer virus (I got hit 4 times in 2012 - different story, different thread)... that your computer crashes in the middle of the day, your main SSD is hosed and cannot be booted (like booting, blue screen, booting again, blue screen)... it feels good to have a second disk where you can boot Windows, deal with the trading thing until the market closes, get some breathing room before you proceed with recovering your system and data.
The MB does not determine the drive letter - the OS does. In Windows Computer/Manage/Disk Management right click on the drive letters in the chart and you will see an option to change the drive letter