Can I Add A Solid State Drive To My Laptop

GalaxyDreamer90

New Member
I have a 17" HP laptop that I currently use mostly for College. It's not a bad laptop but it seems to take a little while to load. My mother just got a new HP Envy desktop computer with the OS installed on a solid state drive while the rest of the files are on a 1TB regular hard drive with similar specs to my laptop and it loads really fast. So now I'm wondering if it's possible I could put a solid state drive in my laptop and have the OS on that while everything else is on my regular hard drive like my mother's desktop computer.
Here are the specs of my laptop
Model: HP Laptop 17-bs0xx
Hard drive: 1TB regular hard drive
Processor: core i7-7500 @ 2.70 GHz
Memory: 12 GB RAM
Graphics: AMD Radeon R5 M430 2GB
As you can see it's a fairly good laptop for a college student. It just loads a little slower then I would sometimes like, which is why I'm wondering if I could add a SSD to have the OS on like my mother's computer.
 

Darren

Moderator
Staff member
Highly unlikely the computer has two hard drive bays, probably only could run one SSD and have everything on it. You can get ~500GB SSD's for not too much these days.
 

GalaxyDreamer90

New Member
You're probably right. I would have to actually look inside my laptop to see for sure. I really just want a SSD for my OS (which, I forgot to mention is the latest version of windows 10) so I think I'll pass on putting everything onto a 500GB SSD. My laptop isn't too terribly slow. It just isn't as fast as my mother's desktop. I suppose I can live with it the way it is for hopefully the next 5 or so years.
 

aldan

Active Member
if your laptop has a cd/dvd rom,you might be able to remove that and install an ssd there.
 

voyagerfan99

Master of Turning Things Off and Back On Again
Staff member
Highly unlikely the computer has two hard drive bays, probably only could run one SSD and have everything on it. You can get ~500GB SSD's for not too much these days.
You'd be surprised. Many 17" HP's have two HDD slots.
 

Agent Smith

Well-Known Member
All you do is clone your existing hard drive to the SSD drive with a SATA to USB adapter. Once the clone is complete you insert the SSD into the computer replacing your previous hard drive and that's it.

How much data do you have on your current drive now? You could get by on a 256 GB SSD or 500 GB SSD as was mentioned. Spill over storage on a platter like your mom's computer has is mostly for desktops. But some laptops do have two hard drive bays. In which case you could use your slow platter hard drive as spill over and the SSD as the main drive.

I don't even see the specs for a HP 17-bs0xx.
 

ssal

Active Member
The HP Laptop 17-bs0xx is not anywhere near the top of high-end lineups. Matter of fact, it is more like an entry level laptop. So expecting to find a 2nd bay for an extra hhd/ssd is not realistic.

But you can still do it.

You'll need to replace the current HHD with a SSD (240gb) for the OS and applications/programs. Get a DVD caddy ($8 on eBay) and put the current HHD into the DVD slot as your data drive. Get a SATA cable for your DVD just in case you may night it.

All for a bare minimum cost and you'll find your laptop booting up in under 30 seconds and loading your most massive application in 15.
 
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