How can I delete OS from hard drive and keep the rest

yejiahao2

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Dec 26, 2017
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510
Hello, I have a 1tb hdd thats has been my main drive for a couple years, it has everything in it, os, programs, games, school projects and what not
And its becoming slower by the time.
So I got myself a ssd and put win10 on it, and wanted it to be my boot drive and put some main programs I use so its not so slow and have my hdd as my storage
But the catch is, I set the bios to boot from the ssd but it ignores it completely and boots from the hdd anyway
Btw I have a laptop, and have the ssd mounted on a caddy on the odd bay
So on the bios it sees the ssd as odd
Even thou o put it in first, it still refuses to boot from it and skips to hdd
When I take out the hdd and leave the ssd on the odd bay, it boots just fine.
I did try to swap it around and have the ssd on the main sata connection and the hdd on the odd bay and it boots correctly, but then the hdd gets unbearably slow its unworkable, so I dont want to.
So was thinking if theres a way to delete the OS from the hdd and keep all the other data
Thank you
 
Solution
**SSD BOOT PRIORITY**

Even though the laptop is skipping the SSD for some reason, it is programmed to find the first BOOTABLE device.

If you delete the BOOT section of your HDD it should ignore that and boot to the SSD (hopefully).

Just boot to the SSD, then use Windows Explorer (File Manager), show the HIDDEN FILES and delete them.

View-> Options-> Change Folder and Search Options-> View-> UNCHECK "hide protected operating system files.."

Click on C: then delete the root files (especially Bootmgr)

Hopefully it doesn't just give an ERROR as I'm not sure why it's skipping the SSD when it's supposedly selected in the BIOS (did you check to see if that SAVED?) but you can try and see.


OTHER:
Then you'd move the drives around. Not...


What's the point as it works fine on the OTHER SATA connection.

The HDD then has problems with the FIRST if you swap so it sounds like maybe a HARDWARE problem with the first SATA connection that the SSD was originally on.

My advice thus is to get a 2.5" USB HDD bay and put the HDD in that for those files; keep the W10 SSD in the fast SATA port. I don't see how else to do it.
 

yejiahao2

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Dec 26, 2017
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510
I did install the OS with the hdd unplugged, as I didn't want any possibility of overwriting onto the hdd by mistake

And by getting a usb bay, wouldn't it be even slower than using the connection on the caddy?
 


I'm not sure what you mean by "unbearably slow" because first of all the HDD should be working EXACTLY the same in the other SATA connection on the laptop.

And what choice do you have? You can't use the SSD at all unless it uses the original SATA connection.

If the connection is USB2 then you will be limited to a max transfer of about 32MBps which is not actually that bad. I'm sure games will be slower to load (hard to say, maybe less than 2x slower).

If anybody else has a suggestion great, but the facts appear to be:

1. caddy slot SATA connector doesn't work with the SSD + HDD, and
2. caddy slot SATA connector is abnormally slow with the HDD

My guess again is that that the 2nd SATA connection is defective in some way.

*Actually I've got a follow up below.
 
**SSD BOOT PRIORITY**

Even though the laptop is skipping the SSD for some reason, it is programmed to find the first BOOTABLE device.

If you delete the BOOT section of your HDD it should ignore that and boot to the SSD (hopefully).

Just boot to the SSD, then use Windows Explorer (File Manager), show the HIDDEN FILES and delete them.

View-> Options-> Change Folder and Search Options-> View-> UNCHECK "hide protected operating system files.."

Click on C: then delete the root files (especially Bootmgr)

Hopefully it doesn't just give an ERROR as I'm not sure why it's skipping the SSD when it's supposedly selected in the BIOS (did you check to see if that SAVED?) but you can try and see.


OTHER:
Then you'd move the drives around. Not sure why the HDD is slow in one SATA connection but not in the other.
 
Solution

Math Geek

Titan
Ambassador
if you installed the ssd with the hdd out, then it has its own boot partition.

you can delete the one from the hdd and then it won't be able to boot anymore. the laptop will be forced to skip past that connection to the ssd to find a boot partition it can use which only points to the new win 10 install.

then you cna delete anything from the hdd you don't need anymore. like the windows folder, program files folder and so on.

i'd make a new folder on the hdd and move all the data i want to save into that. once done, you will know exactly where the files are and can delete everything else without worry. i am assuming you want to save data and not programs. programs should be reinstalled through the ssd win 10 install but can be pointed to the hdd as install location. this will ensure the registry gets updated and such so windows knows what is what.

it is possible to save programs and such but it's often more trouble than it is worth to do it.

edit: i see photonboy had the same idea. :) it's what i would do if i had the same issue. diskmanagement is where you can find and delete the boot partition for the hdd. just be sure it is the hdd and not the ssd!!
 
GAMES:
If the above works, I should add it's possible to keep Steam games, Origin Games and Blizzard games without reinstalling (not sure about UPLAY).

You can GOOGLE if need be for Blizzard (I think you can just point to the game folder via Blizzard launcher). For Origin I forget. I think I may have had to VERIFY the game or something.

Here's how it works for STEAM.

First, as long as you keep the STEAMAPPS folder you have the games. The SAVES are usually in "Documents" or its subfolder "My Games" so I'd copy the entire Documents folder to as suggested a new folder to move DATA to before DELETING everything else (not the games folders though).

Example:
1. Make a new folder "Saved stuff"
2. Copy the "Documents" folder to that
3. Make a folder called E:\Steam (on HDD. may not be "E")
4. MOVE or cut/paste the "Steamapps" folder (in C:\program files (x86).. Steam or similar... should be LARGE) to E:\Steam

5. Install Steam to Windows SSD, login
6. go into Steam settings-> library (or similar) and create/point to a new folder same as the one you created (E:\Steam)
7. Games may work or need to be VERIFIED individually before playing (verify local content; ask if need be)
8. Find SAVE folder if need be (usually need to start game once for folder to be created

9. COPY back save file (usually can GOOGLE to find location)

10. SAVE other data you may need
11. DELETE all but the new folders you want to keep (E:\Steam, My Stuff etc)

12. I also recommend creating a compressed backup Image of the SSD to the HDD that you can RESTORE if problems (may want to make a NEW one periodically and delete the old one). You can manually do it with Acronis True Image Free (if WD HDD) or Seagate Disc Wizard (Seagate HDD). I'm guessing less than 30GB if 2nd highest compression for a fairly clean install.
 

yejiahao2

Prominent
Dec 26, 2017
3
0
510
Took me a while to do it but it worked somehow
The only pain in the backside was how to delete windows folder
Since I couldn't just delete it by hitting delete button
Luckly there was tutorials on YouTube
But thanks anyway