Question Upgrading Lenovo Legion from HDD with Intel Optane to SSD (keeping HDD)

[NNat]

Hello all,

Kind of a noob at some of this. I just picked up a Lenovo Legion Y530 and it came with a 1TB HDD with the Intel Optane memory module. I bought a Samsung 970 EVO 500GB SSD at the same time knowing that I wanted to upgrade but keep the 1TB HDD for photo backup and video projects.

I opened it up and switched out the Intel Optane memory module and replaced it with the SSD. Upon booting, I got an error that there was not boot drive.

Opened back up to put the memory module back in. It booted back up.

Now my question is, what is the proper process for ditching the Intel Optane memory module in lieu of the SSD that I would like to make my bootable drive but keep the 1TB drive for the storage.

I have downloaded Samsung Magician and Data Migration Tool. I have a feeling I will have to enter the BIOS at some point but I have no experience with that.

I do not have any files on here that I care about yet but I'd rather not install all of my added software again.

Any advice is greatly appreciated!

Love this computer by the way. I returned a ThinkPad and replaced it with this to serve as my work computer because it seems you get a little more bang for your buck and there were better component options. I'd recommend it.

Thanks in advance for your help.

 

[NNat]

@USAFRet moved it!

 

[USAFRet]

This being a new system, I'd strongly recommend a clean install on the new drive.

The combination of the Optane+HDD, and having 1x m.2 port, makes any cloning operation a pain.

 

[NNat]

Ah that sucks. Novice lessons, right?

Any advice for how to best do that? I picked up a 32GB USB drive in case I needed to make some kind of bootable drive or something.

 

[USAFRet]

Ah that sucks. Novice lessons, right?

Any advice for how to best do that? I picked up a 32GB USB drive in case I needed to make some kind of bootable drive or something.

Create a Win 10 install on that USB.
Here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

That install should be enough to get it up and running, but just in case, you might want to download all the relevant Lenovo drivers on another USB stick. Primarily the LAN driver.

This guide should get you all the way through the install process.

How To - Windows 10 clean install tutorial If you are looking for the Windows 11 Clean install tutorial, you can find that here: Windows 11 Clean install tutorial (Click here) Otherwise, welcome to the Windows 10 Clean install tutorial This tutorial is intended to help you, step by step, to perform a clean install of Windows... forums.tomshardware.com

 

[NNat]

Thanks, I'll do that later today.

Will I have to disable Intel Optane or change the boot drive in BIOS before physically installing the SSD?

Again, thanks. I'm a teacher and just been trying to learn by doing. Robotics and 3D modeling are more my thing.

 

[USAFRet]

Not sure about the specifics for your particular BIOS, but you shouldn't have to do anything before the physical installation.

 

[NNat]

I got the SSD installed. Created a boot drive, backed up my Drivers. Disabled Intel Optane. Removed Optane memory module, replaced it with the SSD. Left the HDD.

Booted from HDD. Used Samsung Data Migration tool to copy drive to SSD.

Restarted but kept booting from HDD.

Finally, removed the HDD and the computer is not booting from the SSD. What a difference!

I looked into doing a clean install of Windows but that seemed so daunting given all the software and settings I had already set up so I figured I would give it a shot.

However, now if I plug the HDD back in, it automatically boots from it.

Is this the proper solution?

Reinstall HDD
Boot into BIOS
Change boot drive to SSD

Once I have the SSD as the boot drive, should I just reformat the HDD to be able to use it as a storage drive?

Thanks

 

[USAFRet]

Is this the proper solution?

Reinstall HDD
Boot into BIOS
Change boot drive to SSD

See if you can change the boot order before you reconnect the HDD.

 

[NNat]

BIOS only lists SSD. When the HDD is connected I don't see the SSD. It's like the computer can only see one drive at a time.

 

[geofelt]

I did something similar with a y700.
It had a 120gb ssd boot device and a 1tb HDD.
I replaced the HDD with a ssd to which I wanted to build a second os.
The thing that got me stumped was how to get into bios to pick the device I wanted to boot from.
The key was to discover that one needed to shut down completely.
By default, windows will continue fast booting from the device last booted from.
The easy way to shut down completely is to hold down the shift key when shutting down.
When next power on is pressed, you can enter the bios(del or f2) or F12 for boot device selection.

Now, how to do what you want.

1. go back to the original optane/hdd setup. Install the Samsung pcie drivers from their web site.
2. Use the migration app to move your OS to the 970 evo. Attach the 970 evo to the laptop using a usb to sata adapter cable.
3. When done, you should be able to remove the optane and hdd devices and insert the 970 into the m.2 pcie boot slot

4. when done, you can do whatever you wish with the HDD. I might just delete all partitions and reallocate it as one large data drive.