Upgrading To An SSD

[Propheciah]

I am looking into upgrading from my current single-HDD configuration and add in a 250 GB SSD. I understand how the migration process would work, however, my HDD has near 700 GB of space used on it, mostly media and steam games. I would prefer not to trim ~500 gigs of space to migrate because redownloading my games onto the HDD would be a pain. Would I run into issues if I just popped the SSD in and install a fresh Windows copy onto it, then set it to be first in the boot priority? I pretty much want the SSD to run a few specific programs and my OS and then operate and store games on HDD. Considering Windows is tied to the motherboard and not the storage in question, that would also lead me to believe that I wouldn't run into any licensing issues, correct? My apologies for the basic question, I would just like to avoid the time consuming pain of a full migration.

 

[fudgecakes99]

I'd say that should work. What do you plan on doing? Putting windows 7 or 8.1 onto the new ssd then upgrading it to windows 10? It should work i think. Changing boot priority should work incase it doesn't just disconnect the windows 7 or 8.1 old o.s. install the new o.s. onto the ssd then change the boot priority.

 

[Groveling_Wyrm]

Installing a fresh copy of windows and setting it to 1st in boot priority will work, but you will have the option to double boot.

You would need to manually remove windows from the older HDD to remove the double boot issue.

You shouldn't have any issues with reinstalling windows on that ssd, since you are installing on the same computer. Just make sure you have your product key....

 

[Propheciah]

Installing a fresh copy of windows and setting it to 1st in boot priority will work, but you will have the option to double boot.

You would need to manually remove windows from the older HDD to remove the double boot issue.

You shouldn't have any issues with reinstalling windows on that ssd, since you are installing on the same computer. Just make sure you have your product key....

Yep I still have my original key and CD. Hopefully I will be able to remove Windows from the HDD without really affecting the storage, but it should be alright. This makes a lot more sense than migrating in my situation, so I'm happy to hear it.