some Questions for Clean WIndows 7 Install on Series 9 900X3D

Hi Guys,

I get my new Laptop, a Samsung 900X3D tomorrow, but unfortunately with Win 8 on it, which i dont like at all. So i did some research and found this forum which seems to be full of people who know, what they are talking about. I saw in other threads that som ppl. had similar problems e.g. with the fast boot option in the bios.
So basically, i want to wipe the SSD, including the recovery partition and then install Win 7 on it via USB. I downloaded the drivers from Samsungs page, but have some questions left:

1. Which programs do I need apart from the drivers?
2. I read in a blogpost that you would need a specific Installation of Windows 7, otherwise the System wouldn't wake up from sleep just from opening the laptop. Is this true, or is there just a program i need to install?
3. How important is the recovery partition? I dont need WIndows 8 and have acces to a serial, if i would need one. Is there something on the partition which I cannot get otherwise?
4. If the Recovery partition is important, how can I make a backup? Most of the solutions i read about included cloning the SSD, but i dont have the cable for that. Is it possible to make a copy to an external Harddrive or USB-stick?

Thats all for the moment, I hope you can help me.

Best regards, Jan

 

Welcome to the forum. And congrats on your new laptop

I would recommend you leave that Recovery Partition alone -- at least until your Win7 re-install is running smoothly. Many people have gotten stuck after re-installing on the new Win8 models, and that Recovery could be a life saver. Also, in case you want to sell the laptop some day, the Recovery will allow you to restore it to factory state. Recovery Partitions are not easily re-created once they've been deleted.

If and when you decide to delete the Recovery Partition later, you can always extend the adjacent partition to use its space.

But even if you DON'T delete it (and certainly if you DO) there are some backup steps you should take, as described in the post linked here. In particular should you make a USB Admin Tool and a System Software backup.

Warning: That post recommends using a LiveCD for copying the contents of your Recovery Partition. Do NOT do this with UEFI enabled in the BIOS as it can semi-brick your PC. See the sticky thread linked here.

Instead, use XCOPY from Windows Setup to copy the contents of the Recovery Partition to a USB drive. Or after installing Windows, temporarily make it visible using DISKPART. Described in the post linked here.

The post linked here provides fairly detailed steps for re-installing Win7. It was written for someone who replaced the HDD in his Series 7 model with an SSD, but most steps are the same.

One thing is different in your case: Being delivered with Win8, your PC will come with UEFI enabled in BIOS (as mentioned above) and the disk partitioned using GPT. You will probably have fewer issues if you install Win7 with UEFI disabled and the disk partitioned using the classic MBR. Unfortunately, I believe converting the disk to MBR will wipe all partitions, including that Recovery Partition I told you to preserve

If you decide to stay with UEFI/GPT (preserving your disk and the Recovery Partition) member gadgetrants made some great posts about his experience going from Win8 to Win7. Try and google it -- or maybe he will see this and respond himself. If I get time later, I'll look it up for you.

Once again, congrats on your new toy. Lots of good people here to help you get the most out of it

Update: The post where gadgetrants describes installing Win7 on a Win8 PC (staying with UEFI/GPT) is linked here. Excellent info he's sharing there.

 

Thanks for the help! But in the end, i deleted the recovery partition. I was trying for almost 2 hours now to install win 7 on the GPT system (the links were a grat help, thanks!) but no matter what i did, the setup wouldnt completely start. I made an FAT32 usb-stick with the needed bootx64.efi, set UEFI in the Bios to on and so on. The setup did start and the screen with the grey status bar at the bottom came up. Then the screen with "Windows is starting" at the bottom. There i had a obscure error, i could see a multi-colored line at the top for a moment, then it disappeared, i think the screnn froze on that moment. So all in all, i made an Admin-USB stick and an Backup of the C Drive before the installation, but deleted the recovery to convert the disk to MBR. I never had to make such an effort to get Win 7 on any device...

 

Thank you for the update. I understand how frustrating it can be.

It's really not all Samsung's fault: With Win8, Microsoft is pushing PC makers to achieve a more Apple-like experience, with hardware and OS blending together, making the machines less friendly for those who want to install a different OS. Even when that OS is an earlier Windows version -- or maybe particularly in that case

I can tell you on my older Series 7 Z3A, installing Windows 7 is a snap -- as long as you avoid a few common pitfalls.

Anyways, hope it all works out. Keep us posted, and ask away if you have more questions.

 

Most of the things run fine until now, excect some issues.
It first i have the feeling that the system has some short "freezes" from time to time. For example, when i install a program, the status bar stands for a little while at 0 (maybe 2/3 seconds) and then begins to go up. I dont know if that s because of the crappy SSD or because i made something wrong. The other thing is, that i have problems with HD video. running on battery, i cant play an hd-video on youtube in 1080p without freezes every 3 seconds. The same goes for a big *.mkv i tested, no chance to run smoothly. After enabling the Setting for high power, the mkv ran fine. But isnt there a possibility to get it working on energy saving (or "Samsung optimized"), too? its annoying to change the energy mode to highest power just for watching a video if youre on the go. Have you made any experiencemade with this problem? The driver is from the samsung page an should be installed correctly.

 

How on earth are you reaching THAT conclusion? The original poster received a working machine with Windows 8 then decides to basically hose it. That's the OS and OS makers fault? Sorry, I am not buying it.

I have two working images. One for Windows 8, and one for Windows 7. Both work well on the NP900X3D-A02US. I am not however using the stock SSD. I am using the Crucial M4 256GB mSATA SSD.

 

@Thor: I did NOT say Win8 is bad (it’s matter of preference). I did NOT say UEFI is bad (it has great potential). I did NOT say Microsoft is evil (I don’t belong in that camp). I did NOT say that installing a new OS is impossible (check some of my other posts).

But it is an indisputable fact that re-installs on new Win8 PCs have caused a lot of headaches, as evidenced by numerous posts on this forum.

The claim that Microsoft has tried to push PC makers to lock down Win8 PCs is not something I invented. I was made aware of it in this thread, specifically in the discussion starting with this post. John links to Wikipedia’s UEFI article which contains the following:

As I described in this post (which is largely a defense of Microsoft), I think they absolutely want to mimic the Apple experience of tight OS-device integration -- both in their own Surface devices and in OEM devices. Feel free to disagree. I don't see anything wrong with that aspiration, but a side effect is that the simple days of the simple BIOS are gone.

I much doubt that it was Samsung who forced Microsoft’s hand in these matters. But of course I acknowledge that Samsung’s implementation has flaws, as evidenced by yknyong1’s UEFI warning.

Now lets get back on topic to the OPs questions: I try to provide answers the best I can, based on my own experience and on other posts I read on this forum. But I don’t have a Win8-delivered Sammy myself. I am sure any advice you can provide or experiences you can share would be greatly appreciated.

 

Thanks for the update

Sounds like a latency issue: Some piece of software (device driver, service or app) is monopolizing the CPU for brief moments of time, preventing other apps from running smoothly (causing latency spikes).

The installation guide I linked to in my first response to you is part of a thread specifically on reducing latencies. Some Samsung utilities are notorious in this regard. But Intel's full PROset driver is pretty bad as well. Check it out, see if it helps.

Update: The post linked here lists the various software items that came with my NP700Z3A and my take on which to keep and which to lose.

 

Installing Windows 8 on the NP900X3D-A02US I have could not be easier. However, I turned off UEFI and Secure Boot on my clean re-install. I have no need for such features. After turning that off in the BIOS/UEFI settings, I booted from the Windows 8 DVD and installed to a brand new Crucial M4 256GB SSD without issue. Downloading the Samsung SW Update tool and installing a few drivers and tools was pretty trivial, too.

We could debate the other stuff later I guess. I am not one to blame Microsoft and Samsung for all of the customers missteps I see in the forums. I see people paint themselves in the corner every day so sometimes THAT needs to be pointed out.

 

@Thor: Thanks, got it, makes sense. I keep UEFI off as well and kept my disk MBR, and I never had any of those troubles during dozens of installs.

But I can tell you after the Win8 models were released last fall, the character of problems posted here changed from, well, almost trivial (which partitions to delete or keep, USB vs DVD install, ExpressCache, drivers and bloat, touchpad, WiFi, brightness and backlight etc) to more severe (cannot boot at all, cannot get into BIOS, cannot F4 Recovery etc).

I am sure many are user errors, but I also think complexity went up a notch with UEFI/SecureBoot on these Win8 models. Users who have successfully done clean installs in the past suddenly found that the same actions semi-bricked their PCs and they've had to sent them in to Samsung for service. Users who updated their BIOS reported horror stories too.

I don't know if your PC came pre-installed with Win8 (ie UEFI/SecureBoot/GPT). But the fact that you installed on a different SSD means you had the option to safely disable UEFI for the new install. Users like the OP had to choose between staying in UEFI-land or losing all partitions. I think that's where the train often leaves the track.

User errors or not, all we can do is try to be helpful and put our best advice out there.

Thanks again.

 

All of the models I have come with Windows 8 Pro installed with UEFI/SecureBoot/GPT. Yes, by removing the 128GB U100 SSD and replacing it with a 256GB M4 SSD, I removed the risk.

Even if I had not replaced the drive, I would have changed the BIOS/UEFI settings and nuked all of the partitions. 128GB (really 119) isn't much space and I always flatten OEM drives to remove the restore partitions and other fluff.

 

That was my problem, I tried to install Windows on GPT which was somehow impossible. Just the instaling process wasn't a problem after nuking the recovery partition and changing the system to MBR. And thank you, Dannemand, the FN-keys work well now with the .exe. Easy Settings really seems to be the origin of my HD-Video delay, after deinstalling it it works fine.
So its looking good until now, but is there a .exe in the Easy Settings folder, which activates the "Wake Up from Sleep after Opening"-function too? This doesnt seem to work right now. Thors.Hammer, how did you manage that on your Win 7 image? Or do you use Easy Settings?
Again, thank you very much for the great help!

EDIT: Ok, with some Trial&Error i found out that smartsetting.exe is the important program for waking the pc up. Unfortunately I am not able to put it n autostart or scheduled tasks, hmm...

EDIT 2: I found a solution. I installed Easy settings again, copied the folder in //Programs(x86) an also exported the tasks set by the program (for almost every task except WLAN and Batterymanager). Then I uninstalled Easysettings, named the copy of the folder like the original and imported the selected tasks again. Now everything works fine

 

@Janta: That's great, good work!

If I hadn't been still in bed when you first posted, I could have told you that Lid Open Action can be set in your Windows Power Profile ( Choose what closing the lid does). But the way you ended up doing it is great too (and preserves a few more Easy Settings features). As long as those additional tasks you load don't create latency spikes, you're good to go.

Now enjoy your new laptop

 

Hey! I've just become the proud owner of a new Series 9 NP900X4D-A05US, and today decided to also go down the road of reversion to Windows 7. Unfortunately for me, I went into it thinking it would be as easy as my Windows installs in years past, on HDDs and before Windows 8. I quickly found myself to be way out of my depth, never having heard of EFI or the like.

After three hours of pain and Googling, I finally have a booting machine again, thanks in large part to this thread -- I greatly appreciate it!

Like Janta, I initially tried scrupulously following instructions on installing 7 in native UEFI, only to have my modified FAT 32 installer hang on the "Starting Windows" screen of the installer, long before even presenting any partition management options. Switching UEFI to CMS and returning to a NTFS USB drive did enable partition management, allowing me to erase everything that remained and install on MBR. Which seems to have worked. Phew.

Unfortunately, the first thing I did -- even before I realized I couldn't install on a GPT hard drive -- was get rid of the Samsung recovery partitions, sans forethought or backup. Live and learn. I'll have to get all drivers and tools fresh from the internet.


My question now, then, is whether your guide here:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/samsung/688064-how-reduce-latencies-samsung-laptops-6.html#post8985846

is still what I should be following on my new Windows 7 Series 9. It looked like in this monster thread -- at least as far as I understood it -- there were some problems with SW Update installing Windows 8 drivers by default; is that something I'm going to need to worry about? It didn't sound like Janta ran into this problem.

Right now, the machine is fresh and clean, with W7 SP1, and I want to do these drivers, etc. right!

 

Welcome to the forum, Filius. And congrats, both on that nice new Series 9 machine, but also on working it out with the Win7 downgrade.

You're far from alone. Many people were caught on the wrong foot with that GPT/UEFI thing -- including ones with lots of previous installation experience.

It sounds like where you are now is about at step 7 in this Win7 install guide. I suggest you simply go from there.

Although much of the discussion in the latencies thread you reference is still relevant, Easy Settings 2.x has made things a lot easier (also covered in the Install guide I linked). Unless you need an extremely low-latency environment for real-time audio/video processing, I recommend you just go with that.

Once thing I would add, though, is to disable Easy Settings Boot Optimization which messes with the loading order of other startup tasks, in order to pretend a faster boot time -- sometimes screwing things up. It's not as simple as it may sound, but absolutely doable: Check this recent thread from a fellow Series 9 owner. I might even add it to the install guide.

The only other advice I would add: Save an image backup of your virgin Windows partition (or at least a Restore Point) before you start adding drivers and tweaking it. Makes it SOOO easy to start over without actually having to start over

 

Ah! That was incredibly quick! And just what I was looking for; I'll use it with glee. I'm not terribly worried about squeezing out every last drop of latency, so I'll probably just stick with the 2.x.

Regarding the partition -- I didn't create the two partitions when I did the install; I was given to understand that it's something of a pain, what with redirecting default software save locations and the like. But you'd say it's worth it in the end?

 

That's great, thanks for quick feedback.

If you mean the separate Windows and Data partitions, you can still do that: Defrag your Windows partition, then use Windows Disk Management to shrink it to 50-60GB and create a new Data partition in the empty space.

The sooner you do it, the more Windows will let you shrink it (before files get in the way). You may have to temporarily disable Hibernation and Page File (Virtual Memory) and defrag again. You can always re-enable Hibernation and Page File afterwards.

 

Well, I'm planning on syncing most of my data to my desktop with my university's Box subscription, as I'll be working on both machines. I've never really used imaging before; I used to employ Windows Live Mesh to synchronize and backup data across multiple machines, so failures wouldn't touch me.

As someone who's never used a separate data partition before, it does seem like a bit of a hassle -- by the sounds of articles like this one on Lifehacker, I'll have to initially redirect all my "My _____" folders to the new drive, then continually be interacting with applications that don't play well with the new directories -- do you find this to be a problem?

I guess my question is, do you think it's worth the hassle, even for less competent/adventurous users like myself?

And if so, what would you recommend for an imaging application? And where do you keep the images -- on the other partition, or on an external HDD?

 

Excellent questions: I IS a bit of a hassle to move your "My..." folders when you first start out. In fact, you also need to set your Explorer Favorites and Libraries (see below). But I've not seen any ill effects once it's set up. You just tell programs to save files on your Data drive (in your personal Documents folder or some other folder on that drive).



My wife has a separate account on each of our PCs and it didn't take me long to explain to her that "data goes on this drive, an this is where your personal Documents folder is". We have some shared folders for Photos and and Music that are part of the libraries on both our accounts.

For me, keeping a separate Data drive and making image backups of my Windows partition has been the single most time saving "Best Practice" in decades of computing. I can update or replace my Windows partition (or even dual boot several of them) with affecting my Data partition at all. Going from XP to Vista to Win7 to Win8, my Data partition always stayed untouched (of course copied to progressively newer PCs over the years).

If my Windows gets messed up (as it did last week after receiving the latest Microsoft Updates) I simply restore my latest image backup and I am back where I left. It literally takes only 10 mins. If my HDD fails (as happened to my main HP HDX18 laptop last year) I put in a new drive, restore the latest Windows image, then create a new Data partition and restore all my data from backup. Done.

I save my partition images to an external HDD, then copy a backup of the most critical to my Data drive on the laptop HDD. That's just to keep two copies of anything I'd hate to lose. Also, it makes the most critical images available directly on the laptop, in case I ever need to restore while I am away from my external backup HDD. Of course on a Series 9 with SSD, you don't want to use space for large partition images, so just keep them all on an external HDD.

I use an old version of Terabyte Unlimited's Image for Windows which I bought almost 10 years ago, and it still works. I may update when I start playing with GPT disks -- or buy something else. Many people here use Acronis, but I don't have firsthand experience.

All that wonderfulness aside, it is STILL a highly relevant question if this is worth it for everyone. I does take some tweaking to get it running, and few people mess around and test as much as I do. But it's really an individual choice. I wish Microsoft would give us a simple Use separate partition for User data option. That would make it a no-brainer.

Oh, something else to consider: On an SSD with limited space, separate Windows and Data partitions mean you'll be setting aside a fixed amount of space for your Windows partition. Having everything on one partition, you're not "wasting" any space. That may be a deciding factor for you...

 

I prefer not to split the drive up into different partitions. If I need to boot more than one OS, I either boot from a VHD file container or use real virtualization.

I use Acronis True Image Home 2013 for backup and recovery. It just works.

 

Thank you, Thor. Makes perfect sense for OS installs when disk space is at a premium (you're on an SDD like Filius). But where do you put your data, and how do you share it across OS installations?

 

Without going into too much detail, I keep merged master copies of my personal data on external hard drives. I routinely sync a copy of the master to the machine I plan to use for a while.

 

Thanks both for the information; this gives me a pretty good insight into something I knew almost nothing about, which is always a nice feeling! I ended up just going with the single partition this time 'round, thus making the most out of my 128GB. Though if things go south, I will likely regret this decision.

So, I ended up following the proffered guide, and it worked beautifully. BIOS and chipset driver updates failed to install the first time 'round, but then worked in a second pass; no idea why. Other than that, everything is functional, and thus far seems fast. I've not yet messed much with Easy Settings Boot Optimization, though the "Samsung Fast Boot Mode" seems to be off by default, and I've left it that way. The only oddity -- and this is something I can definitely live with -- is that the trackpad behavior seems to have changed; I swear the two-finger scrolling behavior is inverted relative to what it did in Windows 8, and there doesn't seem to be an option to change it. I'd've thought this would be using identically-designed drivers, so who knows.

My machine is now sleek and functioning, and I am happy, in large part thanks to this thread. So thanks much!

 

Oh! There was one more thing, while I'm at it -- in the Device Manager, there's a device listed as not having drivers, with the little yellow exclamation-marky triangle. It's labeled as a PCI Simple Communications Controller, and Windows doesn't seem to be able to find anything relevant.

The only uninstalled updates in SW Update that seem even remotely relevant is the recommended Intel Rapid Start driver -- but I was given to understand that used a rapid start partition on my SSD? Which I imagine no longer exists, thanks to my GPT -> MBR conversion?

 

Good job getting all that working, Filius. Sounds like you're almost there. I agree, on a 128GB SSD I would keep it all on a single partition as well in order to maximize use of that space.

About Boot Optimization / Samsung Fast Boot Mode in Easy Settings: Yes, it's disabled by default, but without telling you, it STILL messes with loading of other background tasks in order to make it appear that the laptop boots faster. Marketing folks designed this, very sneaky. Check this post if you want to REALLY disable it.

About your Touchpad: It definitely should work properly if you installed the Touchpad driver offered by SW Update. You should have a control panel to configure it. Also, there is an undocumented, more extensive control panel called ETDAniConf.exe for more options, described in this post. If you still have problems, there is a ton of discussions about touchpads in this thread.

About that yellow exclamation point in Device Manager: It could be Intel ME. You can either install the Samsung provided driver in SW Update (which is quite bloated) or check if Windows Update provides a driver for it. I use the latter.

About Intel Rapid Start: Yes, the guide I sent you to assumes you are re-installing and your old iRST partition is still there. In order to use it on a new disk, you need to make space available for an iRST partition. I don't know if you're willing to allocate that space on a 128GB SSD. If so, you have to shrink your Windows partition to make room for it, then check John's iRST guide here.

Hope that gets you going. Again, keep us posted.

 

Well, it's been a month, now, and everything seems to be perfectly smooth and responsive; I could scarcely be happier.


Thanks so much for all the help on the setup! You guys are heroes! :thumbsup: