[SOLVED] adding storage to an older laptop

[lump3r]

I have a Toshiba P75 A-7200 Laptop I bought new years ago.
I want to add storage but I have a few questions.

I believe I can add an internal drive as well as a ssd?

Im interested in adding a second drive I can use to dump all my mutli media files onto, mostly movies.

Essentially just a storage drive so I can open up space on my C drive and operating system drive.

Im not sure what to buy or which will work better.

I was going to add an external usb drive but Id rather install an internal, and I want to know, does this laptop support and have room for an ssd drive or only a regular hdd?
I bought this laptop about 7 years ago from best buy, its been great, I only want to increase its storage.

The movies and stuff I am looking to dump on this drive I use in a network configuration with my tv as a media server that I play movies from at times to my tv, so a drive that performs well and is 1tb or so is what I am looking for.

Thank you for any help or information

Back in the early 2000's I was a regular Toms poster and reader, back then I built gaming pcs, but since 2008 when I was injured in an accident I stopped building pc's and haven't been on, matter of fact I've been away so long I couldn't remember my old email and credentials, so although this looks like my first post, it is from my new ID but I used to be quite active here and Love this place, Tom Pabst? taught me everything I knew about platforms and upgrading back in the day, 2002 - 2008.

 

[USAFRet]

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Review-Toshiba-Satellite-P75-A7200-Notebook.103741.0.html

There are apparently 2x spaces for a 2.5" drive.
You should be able to add a 2.5" format SATA III SSD quite easily.

What sizetype drive is in there now?

 

[lump3r]

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Review-Toshiba-Satellite-P75-A7200-Notebook.103741.0.html

There are apparently 2x spaces for a 2.5" drive.
You should be able to add a 2.5" format SATA III SSD quite easily.

What sizetype drive is in there now?

Im not quite sure as I havent opened it in a long time, just whatever was stock with it, I think the 2.5" but I havent confirmed it yet.
So no support for an ssd then huh?
which if not is fine, I just wanted to find out of that was an option as well or not.

 

[USAFRet]

Im not quite sure as I havent opened it in a long time, just whatever was stock with it, I think the 2.5" but I havent confirmed it yet.
So no support for an ssd then huh?
which if not is fine, I just wanted to find out of that was an option as well or not.

SSD = 2.5" SATA III. Samsung 860 EVO or Crucial MX500. Miles faster than a spinning HDD.

You can't put an NVMe in there. It is too old.

 

[lump3r]

SSD = 2.5" SATA III. Samsung 860 EVO or Crucial MX500. Miles faster than a spinning HDD.

You can't put an NVMe in there. It is too old.

Ok, thanks that's what I was looking for.

I didn't realize how fast this stuff faded from memory and evolves when you aren't looking at it for a few years.

So, the SSD is what I need then, I saw in a pic from another board of my laptop open, if seemed to have an open space for a second drive, I am assuming I just buy one and open it and plug it and go from there? anything I should know?

I bought this laptop after I was injured in an accident and stopped building gaming pcs back in 2011 or 2012 I think?
so it has been a while since Ive upgraded anything and this is my first laptop.

I always used to build a new gaming rig every two years, an addiction I learned on this site back in 2001 or so when I learned about platforms, how they worked and what a front side bus was and a pencil trick on an old AMD 800 chip and KT7a Abit boards back in the day, so....it's been a while.

 

[lump3r]

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Review-Toshiba-Satellite-P75-A7200-Notebook.103741.0.html

There are apparently 2x spaces for a 2.5" drive.
You should be able to add a 2.5" format SATA III SSD quite easily.

What sizetype drive is in there now?

Thanks for taking the time, I really appreciate it.

 

[USAFRet]

You might consider going with an SSD only. Ditch the existing spinning drive completely.
Or, use that spinning one as a secondary drive.

The OS and you applications will be better served being on the SSD.
This, having 2 applicable bays, is even an easy candidate for migrating directly from the HDD to a new SSD of appropriate size.

 

[lump3r]

Thanks for taking the time, I really appreciate it.

I am reading from that review you gave me, and it says

"There are two 9.5 mm height drive bays available (both accessible from the bottom service panel), so two drives can be preconfigured from the start or a second drive can be easily added later. "
and
"Our Satellite P75-A7200 review unit came preconfigured with a lone Hitachi Travelstar 5K1000-750 (model number HTS541075A9E680) hard drive, "

So im assuming this is essentially what I need?
Im going to look up the others you mentioned I am guessing those are newer more modern options available right now.

 

[USAFRet]

The two I mentioned are pretty much the best choices for 2.5" format SATA III SSD.
It will plug right in to the second drive bay.

 

[lump3r]

SSD = 2.5" SATA III. Samsung 860 EVO or Crucial MX500. Miles faster than a spinning HDD.

You can't put an NVMe in there. It is too old.

Will either of these work?

Samsung 860 EVO 1TB Internal SATA Solid State Drive MZ-76E1T0B/AM - Best Buy

Samsung 870 EVO 1TB SATA Solid State Drives MZ-77E1T0B/AM - Best Buy

 

[lump3r]

The two I mentioned are pretty much the best choices for 2.5" format SATA III SSD.
It will plug right in to the second drive bay.

Ok, thanks again.

So, to swap them or reverse them, which Im all for, I just need to do some reading and re learn what is involved at this point,

This laptop came with Win8 and upgraded itself to Win 10 over time, I dont own a disc and it has ben so long since Ive done anything with installing Os's or builds I really dont remember lol.

But seeing the cost of these, I really wouldn't mind ditching what I have and adding a 500 gb for my main drive and a 1 Tb for a storage drive, I guess I just need to do a some reading to figure out how to do it and not wipe my drive and lose everything Im currently storing.
I think I can add the storage drive dump everything I want to save from my C drive and then pull and replace the C drive with a new one of these and do a clean install? so buy a copy of Windows or is there a way I can copy my C: drives working os to the new drive?
You dont have to explain it, but if you have a link I can go learn it, that would be great.

 

[USAFRet]

Either or both of those will work, the 860 or 870.

As far as moving from the existing HDD? Yes, we can do that.
Reasonably easy, moving everything. Then, adding a second SSD if desired.

How much space is consumed on the current drive?

 

[lump3r]

Either or both of those will work, the 860 or 870.

As far as moving from the existing HDD? Yes, we can do that.
Reasonably easy, moving everything. Then, adding a second SSD if desired.

How much space is consumed on the current drive?

the existing drive is or was 750Gb and has 114 Gb free, BUT I have a TON of stored stuff I could easily drag and drop to another drive before we do whatever we will do to clone the drive or create a copy or however we are going to do it.

 

[USAFRet]

the existing drive is or was 750Gb and has 114 Gb free, BUT I have a TON of stored stuff I could easily drag and drop to another drive before we do whatever we will do to clone the drive or create a copy or however we are going to do it.

OK.

To clone into a 500GB, the actual consumed space needs to be below 400GB.
Into a 1TB SSD, what is there right now is fine.

 

[lump3r]

OK.

To clone into a 500GB, the actual consumed space needs to be below 400GB.
Into a 1TB SSD, what is there right now is fine.

Ok,
So, to end up with a 500 Gb OS C: drive and a 1Tb storage drive, I would need to clone to the 500 Gb, and to do that I would need to dump files that I have on there now to bring below 400Gb used space.

So it might be the long way around, but, what if I buy the two drives, then I take the 1 Tb drive and install it, dump my movies and files from C: to the new drive bringing the capacity of my 750 Gb drive way way down under 400Gb?

then I can remove the new storage 1Tb drive temporarily, add the 500 Gb drive to clone too and from there, clone my existing C: drive to the new 500 Gb ssd?

Then once that is done, remove the old drive and put back the 1 Tb new ssd that I added my movies and stuff too earlier, so I would then have 2 drives, a 500 Gb C: drive and a 1Tb E: drive ?

 

[USAFRet]

Yes, that way would work.

So...

Install the 1TB.
Copy stuff from the existing HDD to the new 1TB.
Get under 400GB.

Then...
Remove the 1TB, connect the 500GB.

Clone from HDD to 500GB SSD as below.

-----------------------------
Specific steps for a successful clone operation:
-----------------------------
Verify the actual used space on the current drive is significantly below the size of the new SSD
Download and install Macrium Reflect (or Samsung Data Migration, if a Samsung SSD)
If you are cloning from a SATA drive to PCIe/NVMe, install the relevant driver for this new NVMe/PCIe drive.
Power off
Disconnect ALL drives except the current C and the new SSD
Power up
Run the Macrium Reflect (or Samsung Data Migration)
Select ALL the partitions on the existing C drive

If you are going from a smaller drive to a larger, by default, the target partition size will be the same as the Source. You probably don't want that
You can manipulate the size of the partitions on the target (larger)drive
Click on "Cloned Partition Properties", and you can specifiy the resulting partition size, to even include the whole thing

Click the 'Clone' button
Wait until it is done
When it finishes, power off
Disconnect ALL drives except for the new SSD
This is to allow the system to try to boot from ONLY the SSD
Swap the SATA cables around so that the new drive is connected to the same SATA port as the old drive
Put the new 500GB in the same port the old HDD was. This may not be "required", but sometimes it makes a difference. Better safe than sorry.
Power up, and verify the BIOS boot order
If good, continue the power up

It should boot from the new drive, just like the old drive.
Maybe reboot a time or two, just to make sure.

If it works, and it should, all is good.

Later, reconnect the old drive and wipe all partitions on it.
This will probably require the commandline diskpart function, and the clean command.

Ask questions if anything is unclear.
-----------------------------

 

[lump3r]

Yes, that way would work.

So...

Install the 1TB.
Copy stuff from the existing HDD to the new 1TB.
Get under 400GB.

Then...
Remove the 1TB, connect the 500GB.

Clone from HDD to 500GB SSD as below.

-----------------------------
Specific steps for a successful clone operation:
-----------------------------
Verify the actual used space on the current drive is significantly below the size of the new SSD
Download and install Macrium Reflect (or Samsung Data Migration, if a Samsung SSD)
If you are cloning from a SATA drive to PCIe/NVMe, install the relevant driver for this new NVMe/PCIe drive.
Power off
Disconnect ALL drives except the current C and the new SSD
Power up
Run the Macrium Reflect (or Samsung Data Migration)
Select ALL the partitions on the existing C drive

If you are going from a smaller drive to a larger, by default, the target partition size will be the same as the Source. You probably don't want that
You can manipulate the size of the partitions on the target (larger)drive
Click on "Cloned Partition Properties", and you can specifiy the resulting partition size, to even include the whole thing

Click the 'Clone' button
Wait until it is done
When it finishes, power off
Disconnect ALL drives except for the new SSD
This is to allow the system to try to boot from ONLY the SSD
Swap the SATA cables around so that the new drive is connected to the same SATA port as the old drive
Put the new 500GB in the same port the old HDD was. This may not be "required", but sometimes it makes a difference. Better safe than sorry.
Power up, and verify the BIOS boot order
If good, continue the power up

It should boot from the new drive, just like the old drive.
Maybe reboot a time or two, just to make sure.

If it works, and it should, all is good.

Later, reconnect the old drive and wipe all partitions on it.
This will probably require the commandline diskpart function, and the clean command.

Ask questions if anything is unclear.
-----------------------------

ok. thats great, thanks very much for walking me through that.
I think that will work, except in the end, once it boots to the new drive, I will then put the other new ssd into the other spot, so I have the drive I dumped all my media on as a storage drive, and the new ssd as my boot drive and Windows disc, the old original Ill just put in drawer or something in case I ever need to use it to boot up, but otherwise it wont go back in.

Im in the middle of buying a new tv and audio set up, and my truck just came down with some expensive gremlins all at once, so even though this project is not very much, I cant start it for a few weeks, so once I do Ill most likely have questions for you once I have the discs in my hand and I am getting ready to do it.
But it sounds super easy.
Thanks again very much.