How to format a boot drive Samsung EVO 850 500GB SSD?

[fyrflygrl]

I just had a new computer built. My boot drive is a Samsung EVO 850 500GB SSD. I decided that I needed a bigger drive as my boot drive. So, I bought a Samsung EVO 850 1TB SSD to replace the 500GB. I want to completely wipe and format the 500GB drive to its original state. How do I format a boot drive with Windows 7 on it?

 

[gskill support]

If you have the new drive set up, you can simply manage it in your new operating system environment, I'm assuming Win 7. It can be formatted like any other storage capacity in My Computer, or Disk Management, or using software for secure erase.

 

[fyrflygrl]

If you have the new drive set up, you can simply manage it in your new operating system environment, I'm assuming Win 7. It can be formatted like any other storage capacity in My Computer, or Disk Management, or using software for secure erase.

Hi, I do not have the new drive, yet. That will be coming in the mail tomorrow. Should I wait and install the new drive as the boot drive first, before formatting the old one? If you think that I should install the new drive first, will there be a conflict in putting Windows 7 on the new drive when Windows 7 is still on the old drive?

 

[fyrflygrl]

I actually found this article online that is extremely helpful.
http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/securely-erase-ssd-without-destroying/

 

[ArtPog]

1. First of all, and this is IMPORTANT. DO NOT FORMAT or modify your current boot drive in any way - the 500 GB SSD - UNTIL you've finally created a bootable, completely functional OS on your new SSD.

2. It appears that your objective is to install the same OS (Win 7) currently on your 500 GB SSD on your new SSD. If that is the case have you considered simply cloning the contents of your current boot drive to the new SSD? That assumes, of course, that you're completely satisfied with the system as it now resides on the old SSD, i.e., it boots and functions without any problems. If that is not the case, forget about a disk-cloning undertaking.

3. On the other hand you may be interested only in fresh-installing the Win 7 OS on your new SSD. That's fine, as well. The choice is yours of course.

4. If & when the time comes that you're thinking about formatting the old SSD my advice would be to do just that, i.e., perform a simple formatting operation. There is no need to perform a Secure Erase operation on the SSD unless you have specific reasons for doing so, e.g., for troubleshooting purposes when there's some indication the SSD needs a "resetting" of sorts. This is an extremely rare situation.

 

[fyrflygrl]

1. First of all, and this is IMPORTANT. DO NOT FORMAT or modify your current boot drive in any way - the 500 GB SSD - UNTIL you've finally created a bootable, completely functional OS on your new SSD.

2. It appears that your objective is to install the same OS (Win 7) currently on your 500 GB SSD on your new SSD. If that is the case have you considered simply cloning the contents of your current boot drive to the new SSD? That assumes, of course, that you're completely satisfied with the system as it now resides on the old SSD, i.e., it boots and functions without any problems. If that is not the case, forget about a disk-cloning undertaking.

3. On the other hand you may be interested only in fresh-installing the Win 7 OS on your new SSD. That's fine, as well. The choice is yours of course.

4. If & when the time comes that you're thinking about formatting the old SSD my advice would be to do just that, i.e., perform a simple formatting operation. There is no need to perform a Secure Erase operation on the SSD unless you have specific reasons for doing so, e.g., for troubleshooting purposes when there's some indication the SSD needs a "resetting" of sorts. This is an extremely rare situation.

I did consider cloning the old ssd. However, there are a couple of things that I don't like about how the old ssd was set up. So, I would rather do a clean install on the new ssd. I've already downloaded the updated drivers to a USB flash drive to make things easier.

I will do what you recommended. Thank you so much for the advice!