Can I put my laptop's SSD directly into a desktop that I may buy?

[Asp184]

I'm planning on ordering a gaming pc from Ironside Computers and was thinking that I could nix the HDD to save some money, but only if I can put my Samsung 830 500GB SSD that I installed in my laptop directly into the desktop. I'm quite tech savy but I don't understand the full implications of doing this. Would it cause issues because the drivers for my laptop's hardware are on the SSD and not the hardware in the desktop? Are there other possible issues? I know I can always backup my SSD and then do a repair install (not exactly but you know) or something similar but that takes so much time, is never easy, is quite frustrating, and will lower the life of the SSD.
Thank you very much.

 

[aredflyingbird]

I'm planning on ordering a gaming pc from Ironside Computers and was thinking that I could nix the HDD to save some money, but only if I can put my Samsung 830 500GB SSD that I installed in my laptop directly into the desktop. I'm quite tech savy but I don't understand the full implications of doing this. Would it cause issues because the drivers for my laptop's hardware are on the SSD and not the hardware in the desktop? Are there other possible issues? I know I can always backup my SSD and then do a repair install (not exactly but you know) or something similar but that takes so much time, is never easy, is quite frustrating, and will lower the life of the SSD.
Thank you very much.

Yes, the 2.5 form factor that is common to SSD's means they will work equally well in a laptop or a desktop. Just format it, and your good to go. No driver issues.

 

[kewlguy239]

if your intent is to pop the laptop SSD into the desktop, then that wont work. the only way to really make it work is to, a aredflyingbird said, format the drive and do a fresh install.

if you wanted to move everything over from the laptop to the deskop, you could use acronis for that. acronis can back up the system image of the SSD and then you can restore to the SSD using UNIVERSAL RESTORE. This will put everything back into the ssd, but will strip away the drivers and other hardware related things. if you did this, when you boot the drive on the desktop, all you would need to do is install the hardware drivers for the system.

 

[clarkjd]

I'm planning on ordering a gaming pc from Ironside Computers and was thinking that I could nix the HDD to save some money, but only if I can put my Samsung 830 500GB SSD that I installed in my laptop directly into the desktop. I'm quite tech savy but I don't understand the full implications of doing this. Would it cause issues because the drivers for my laptop's hardware are on the SSD and not the hardware in the desktop? Are there other possible issues? I know I can always backup my SSD and then do a repair install (not exactly but you know) or something similar but that takes so much time, is never easy, is quite frustrating, and will lower the life of the SSD.
Thank you very much.

Are you wanting to be able to boot your desktop and your laptop with the SSD from your laptop? In other words, move your boot drive back and forth between the two machines? If so, I think there would be licensing issues for Windows.. If not, then yes you could put the SSD in the desktop, Format it and install your OS. Then you should be good to go!

 

[USAFRet]

Will it fit? Sure. Will it run with the current install? That's a whole different story.

It might boot, it might not. Even if it does, you may be chasing issues for quite a while. Different motherboards, different chipset, etc, etc.

Save all your personal data elsewhere, install the SSD, format and reinstall Windows and your applications.