Crucial M4 Questions

So after spending hours and hours reading into SSD options for x220, I think M4 is best overall in terms of real life price, performance, power consumption, and reliability (after firmware update). However, I just have a few questions before I buy it.

1. Is 64gb enough? How much room is there going to be left once load: Window 7 Pro/Word/Excel/Powerpoint/Onenote/Photoshop/Adobe Reader Pro. I dont have music or movies on my computer.

2. From my understanding "spacer" need to be removed on M4. It void the warranty, but they cant tell since there is no sticker correct?

3. What exactly is the "spacer"? From pictures it is basically the top half of the SSD case. To properly install the drive I have to remove that and put electrical tape on the memory? (I am kinda iffy about the second part since electrical tape often leave black residue). Also why do we needs screws for the SSD? x220 service video show that all you do is slide the drive back in the bay?

4. What is the best way to install everything onto the new SSD? I have never installed anything from the recovery partition before. Do I need to buy extra cables and stuff?

 

"1. Is 64gb enough?"

No.

"4. What is the best way to install everything onto the new SSD? I have never installed anything from the recovery partition before. Do I need to buy extra cables and stuff? "

Usually these days, the software is on the ssd to do that.

Renee

 

If you don't need WWAN, the Intel mSATA drive might be worth a look.

You'll need the recovery discs and an optical drive if you want the factory install. If you want a clean install of Windows you can download a disc in the Windows forum and I think there's a way to do via USB, but I don't have any specifics.

 

1. I would say NO, according to anandtech: 64GB drive = 59.6GB (after windows formatting) = 47.68GB actual usable space (after 20% free space rule)

2. True, there does not seem to be a warranty sticker. Two things about the Crucial M4: One, I did ask Crucial if 'modding' the drive would void warranty, they said yes, it will. Even if there is no sticker to show you did remove the spacer, it will be visible(tiny scratchmarks) Second, Crucial M4 still shows up on their website as 'Guaranteed-compatible with the Lenovo Thinkpad X220 Tablet', but not with the regular X220.

3. The Crucial M4 basically consists of 3 parts: The SSD part, a spacer and a bottom(or top) cover. So 4 screws are removed, you remove the spacer and screw the bottom(or top) back on the SSD part with shorter screws. According to some people on this forum, with the bottom directly connected to the SSD part, the drive will short-circuit and will not be recognized by the X220, separating the 2 parts with electrical tape solves this problem.

4. Use recovery disks or fresh install, depending on personal preference.

Seems that the ADATA S511 is a good option as well, not sure if it has a removable spacer though.

 

I thought the M4 was listed as not having a spacer in the thread about drives that fit the x220 and similar 7mm laptops.

The C300 has a spacer though.

 

So does the M4, see: Crucial M4 modded to 7mm



The spacer is the black part of the drive.

 

That is actually what I am getting

So for installation is it possible to stick the M4 into one of these drive enclosure

Newegg.com - Vantec NexStar TX 2.5" SATA to USB 2.0 External Hard Drive/SSD Enclosure - Model NST-210S2-BK

Get a program to duplicate the HDD then swap the HDD and SSD? Do I have to do anything else so that the computer recognize that this is a different kind of drive and use it accordingly?

 

i can confirm that removing the spacer with the m4 results in hit or miss. i have one drive that's killed 2 x220's (thanks, onsite warranty!) and a bunch which have worked just fine. putting electrical tape on the chips doesn't help, i'm guessing that THINKPAX40 is saying you should put tape between the metal top and bottom, which may make it harder to screw the parts together???

 

Yes.

Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit, plus Office apps and Adobe CS5 apps, occupy 29GB of my 64GB Crucial SSD.

All user files are on a second, larger drive.

 

How's the freeze up look alike? Mine lock up after a certain program I closed, this time was access connection. But when I press CTRL + ALT + DEL it respons and I can choose to restart. Is this so called "Freeze"? Do I still need to apply the LPM?

 

Removed 10char

 

Guys need help here, my x220 is still freezing sometimes when I exit an application to fast .. I have put the LPM patch, disable the active protection but still freezes. Today already 3 freezes ...

 

Are you using the latest Intel driver? Meaning not the one from the Lenovo site, but the one from the Intel site.

 

dont know which one to install, I just installed all what Lenovo System Update installed and Windows Update. Any advise which one to install? How to check which version? thanks

 

Just use the latest one on the Intel site.

 

Yeah I did install it this morning, then my fingerprint stop working, reinstall the software, resulting in BSOD, follow the instruction from: Re: T420s Fingerprint Reader After Clean Install - Lenovo Community

 

I just installed an M4 in my x220. It did seem to pause. A firmware upgrade to v0002 fixed the pauses.

I had to upgrade the firmware in my desktop as the crucial software requires a CD drive to boot on. There are ways around this but my desktop was handy.

This thing screams! 7.9 on the windows disk performance metric.

I removed the spacer, cut the screws short and installed it without a hitch!

 

Did you add electrical tape to it?

 

I am just making sure that we answered the OPs main question.

64 GB is clearly not enough. Personally I would put at least a 120 GB in as the OS drive although I can see that a 80+GB mSata with a platter HDD as the storage drive could work very well in the X220.

I have the OS on the 160 GB main drive and am using the mSata for storage but I got my SSD from Lenovo and have only recently added the mSata.

BTW, I am pleasantly surprised at its speed.

 

Will this 7mm mod void the warranty ?

 

Huh? I am not the only one in the world who has been using a 64GB SSD boot drive coupled with a larger HDD for user files.

"Clearly not enough" based on which criteria? Windows 7 64-bit, plus Office and Adobe applications and a bunch of utilities:



Roughly half of the 60GB (after NTFS formatted) is still unused.

 

64GB is perfectly fine. I ran W7 Pro + Office 2010, PS CS5 and Elements 9, and many other programs off a 32 GB mSATA SSD. With 64GB, you'll definitely have plenty of headroom to install all your programs.

I would recommend a clean install of Windows 7.