Adding SSD to T420 with ultrabay HDD, any tips?

So the WD Scorpio Black I bought off Amazon is going back, this thing is driving me bonkers.
It is so loud! It isn't the read/write cycle that is loud, it is a constant whirring that is louder than the T420 fan. I've had Samsung and Seagate 7200rpm drives in my prior Macbook Pro and XPS 15, and they were silent. This thing is far from silent. So bad that in a dead silent room where you could hear a pin drop, when I'm studying I have to use noise cancelling headphones so I don't lose focus.

So, it is going back to Amazon and I splurged on a 64gb primary SSD for OS and a couple of my most frequently used programs. I'm going to put a 500gb 5400rpm WD Blue into the ultrabay.

Any tips on how to optimize the system in this config? I've heard there are some settings in Windows to make it run better and to stop Windows from writing to the SSD too frequently, but I've never had an SSD before so any tips would be appreciated.

 

Are you going to do a fresh install?

 

Unless you have one of the cheap JMicron-based SSDs from c. 2008 all of the tips that you've read about are garbage with the sole exception of disabling defragging (as it's not necessary.)

 

Yup.

Sandforce.

 

In your bios you should change the drive to ACHI.

 

Cool, thanks for the tips guys.
I'm assuming I need to enable TRIM in the fresh install it isn't turned on automatically?
And target the locations for all the stuff in the documents/photos/music to the 500gb second drive.

I'll use the SSD for programs I use frequently like Win7, Office, iTunes, Lightroom, Photoshop, and League of Legends.
All other programs I plan on installing to the second hard drive.

 

TRIM is done at the firmware level. If you did a fresh install the partition will be aligned properly and you don't have to do anything. Make sure to use the latest Intel RST drivers.

This is the best ssd optimization guide I've come across so far. Written by NBR user Les who has contributed a lot to the ssd knowledge base here. You should drop in the NBR ssd subforum, you'll get much more detailed advice there.
The SSD Optimization Guide | The SSD Review

 

Thanks man, that is a good guide.
Saved a PDF of it for when the drive comes in.

 

Everything is NOT done at the firmware level. The OS interacts with the store drivers and hardware for notifications to the controller. Hence the reason to check the OS data management settings.

I also don't agree with all of the mods in the guide. You certainly don't need to do everything in that list.

 

I said TRIM is done purely at the firmware level.

You don't need to do everything on that list. Anyone who can think critically will be able to determine which ones are not necessary for their usage. The author doesn't recommend those changes absolutely either and says so himself.

 

Which is incorrect. TRIM is actually accomplished in conjunction with the OS. This may be semantics to you but the point is, without the right OS, you don't get TRIM.

As for the list, I also respectfully disagree. Many people don't have enough experience to know what should be done (core), and which ones are really optional. Some of the advice on the list reminds me of advice from the Vista era.

 

Yeah, I'm gonna pick and choose which ones I want, when reading the article several stood out as something I don't need to bother with.

 

I installed an SSD (intel x25-m) in a Thinkpad x61s. I did a clean win7 install, didn't adjust any settings. I'm no expert though, I just read the odd article, but I see no reason to try and fiddle with win7 settings for an ssd.

You might want to give this article a read.
Support and Q&A for Solid-State Drives
Support and Q&A for Solid-State Drives - Engineering Windows 7 - Site Home - MSDN Blogs

 

That's a nice article from the developers of Windows 7. There's another articles at Windows, TRIM and other SSD Mysteries - Keith Combs' Blahg - Site Home - TechNet Blogs that is more of a "How-To" on how to confirm TRIM is actually working.

This would be important to go through if you are restoring to SSD from a backup that used a source HDD.

 

Thanks for the articles, pretty good, liked that one from Microsoft.
I'll read it a little more in depth after my exam tomorrow.

 

do you need to have an adapter to put the hard disk in the ultrabay?

 

Yes, you do. I believe it's still http://shop.lenovo.com/SEUILibrary/...35BAB3C417CA9D77F5867D31462&model-number=4177

 

Thanks... with the adapter, I think this option is out of my budget...