Anyone here have experience with migrating HD to SSD?

As far as I know, worrying about ssd writes is more or less just a myth coming from older ssds. You shouldnt really reach its "capacity" to write any time soon.

Defragmenting ssd in windows 8.1 is replaced with Trimming, which should be done like once a week. And should also help extend its use.
If you cant Trim over windows, you should be able to Trim over the ssd Software.
(Trimming should not require you to have some free space I believe)

Defragmenting the old way seems useless for ssd, if not actually worsening it.
It should be better to keep the firmware assign the place for data as you write on it. (+Trim it every now and then, best to do after you write a lot)

...anything like not using your pagefile on ssd to reduce writes or similar things like that I would ignore...unless, you dont want to actually use your SSD

 

Thats something else.
Trimming:
Software (for me its disabled, because of windows 8):

OS:


What you said was this:


Then, there is rapid mode:


I personally use all of the additional functions.

What SSD u got?
Your software should include trimming.
Its quite fundamental feature
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TRIM_(SSD_command)

Also I believe there are many tweaks you should use for win 7. Like disabling Prefetch/superfetch and adjust other windows features.

You should definitely google windows 7 and ssd.

Windows 7 isnt very built for ssds by default, so it often requires manual tweaking for optimized use. (more than win 8)

http://lifehacker.com/5640971/check-if-trim-is-enabled-for-your-solid-state-drive-in-windows-7
http://www.zdnet.com/pictures/windows-7-and-ssds-trimming-the-fat-from-your-system-drive/2/

Seems like a nice tweaking guide:
http://www.overclock.net/t/1133897/windows-7-ssd-tweaking-guide
But you should watch out...there are often many myth tweaks...also for example this guide cares about the limited writes, so there are many tweaks to reduce them...
I wouldnt pay much attention to those tweaks, you would have to have some seriously serious use of the SSD (meaning industrial kind of use) to really reach max writes in any near future.
...or you can just read following posts in that topic
(I would however still disable defrag if your OS didnt automatically detect the SSD and disabled it for it)

The following guide "should" be myth free, as they often care about showing you the fake/myth tweaks:
https://tweakhound.com/ssd-tweak-guide-sort-of/
EDIT: This last guide seems to include most important things, so you should probably read just that one.

As far as I know, the TRIM command should dramatically increase the lifespan of SSD.
Actually, the TRIM command is why you dont anymore have to care so much about reducing the writes.
So TRIM is rather super important.

If you dont use TRIM, then you should be concerned about your writes.

And btw, you should also TRIM your android smartphone, if your firmware doesnt already do so automatically.
But for those you gotta google it yourself, and root might be needed.

Better explanation of trim: http://www.anandtech.com/show/2738/10


More on bad tweaks from https://tweakhound.com/ssd-tweak-guide-sort-of/

Code:

Bad SSD Tweaks

These are tweaks that are either unnecessary, don’t do anything, or hurt performance.
Many of these are based on the misguided assumption that the SSD will wear out quickly.
True, SSD’s are only good for so many writes (unless they are DRAM). But, the number of writes an SSD is good for is, well, astronomical.
Let’s take this quote from Anandtech:
“Intel estimates that even if you wrote 20GB of data to your drive per day, its X25-M would be able to last you at least 5 years. Realistically, that’s a value far higher than you’ll use consistently.” This was written August, 2009 and SSD lifespans are getting better all the time.
Truth be told you’ll most likely move on to a new computer before you wear out your SSD.
For example: I have an Intel X25-M SSD (80GB). As of this writing it is approximately 16 months old. It has had 2 firmware updates. It has had installed on it: Windows 7 Home & Ultimate, openSUSE 11.2 & 11.3 , many Virtual Machines, and more programs than you can shake a stick at. Because of this and all the testing I do it has been restored from an image dozens of times. It has also been beat on by numerous benchmark tests. To this date I haven’t seen any loss in performance.

1 – Disable The Pagefile.
What better place for a pagefile than on an SSD?
Yeah, I know, folks are always saying disabling the pagefile is a tweak. I’ve covered this topic many times over the years (look around my site). Windows (all versions) were designed to use a pagefile. Many programs you may use count it too. BTW, Windows is going to page some stuff to your disk anyway if it needs to. Just leave the pagefile alone.
If you want to optimize it then see here (personally I think it’s a waste of time).

2 – Disable Indexing
OK, most people agree that Indexing in XP and Vista sucks. Go ahead a disable it for XP and Vista if you desire. But for Windows 7, you know the handy, dandy Start Menu Search Box? Yup, disabling Indexing renders it useless. Configuring Indexing to suit your needs is a better option:
Type indexing in the Start Menu Search Box and choose Indexing Options (Control Panel > Indexing Options) > Click the Modify button to add or remove folders.

3 – System Restore
I know, this was listed in the Optional SSD Tweaks For Windows section above. I put it here for those who didn’t bother to read it. Please do.

4 – Turn Off Windows Write-cache Buffer Flushing on the Device
Yup, this was in the Optional SSD Tweaks For Windows section too. Read it please.

5 – NtfsMemoryUsage=2 Tweak
See my NtfsMemoryUsage=2 Tweak article.

6 -Disable LargeSystemCache
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management
“LargeSystemCache”=dword:000000000
Um, it’s not enabled by default anyway?!

7 – Uninstall Remote Differential Compression
What the? Well, OK, it’s a useless feature for home users and should be uninstalled anyway. But how this ever got listed as an SSD tweak is beyond me. System Resources tweak, OK. Network tweak, maybe. SSD tweak, not.

My SSD software samsung magician includes some adjustable OS tweaks by default:

 

I haven't picked my SSD out, I was merely just gathering information on reputable experienced gamer's/developers/pc geeks.

If I were to pick a ssd I'd probably go with the Samsung Evo 500 g.b considering my regular HD is 500gb and I would then have 1tb which would hold me over.

If anyone could link me on a super fast, 500 g.b ssd that's around... like $ 60-120 be my guest.

Neoony... Holy shit! Thanks man, that what was an outstanding post.

 

Seems like Samsungs SSDs in my area dont go below 141€ if you want the 500gb one.
But its quite a rule that bigger the capacity the better the cost per GB.
It should also be a thing that the bigger capacity you got the better speeds you can reach. Because you got more ways for the data to flow through or something like that. (I know I read something on that, just cant remember the details...I just know it had something to do with having more data blocks and thats why / more points of access, or something in that way...probably better for the random writes and reads)

https://tweakers.net/categorie/674/...8T2pGHKSrxy8cKmUhB3TU99afYUItIxWbfYnEWX90a-0N

//that site is in Dutch...just might be good for comparison of many of them

Most of them are 540/520MB/s for read write speeds.
Wouldnt go below that.

Just not sure if you can fit the 500GB SSD into your 120$ limit.
Also I would rather buy a little bit more expensive 250GB than some cheap 500GB. They also tend to have some different features and technologies.

The one I got, but in 500GB version would currently cost me around:

(EDIT: Or I guess you could find a shop with 159€ on it, on tweakers.net which is a site that searches shops in my area...I just used the shop I used before in the image above)

While the 250GB version which I got, costed me € 117,90
I got EVO version btw.

Also.
There are also things like chiptypes: TLC, MLC, SLC
Which makes huge difference for the prices

You can read more about it here: http://www.speedguide.net/faq/slc-mlc-or-tlc-nand-for-solid-state-drives-406

Or rather google some more.

 

my dang ssd in my laptop died after 2 years and my 12 year old ide hard drive is still alive