*HP ENVY 14 SPECTRE (3XXX series) Owners Lounge*

[aak1992]

You could make a guide for us.

Sounds good, I'll have to check out where/how to post that here first haha. But a few pics and guiding words don't sound too hard.

Gotta find a good mSATA first though, the search continues...

[smeegle]

Gotta find a good mSATA first though, the search continues...

Hi aak, How do you envisage and additional ssd will be dealt with by the BIOS?
I read somewhere that it would expand the primary hdd. Is this correct?

[zenkinz]

I'm getting about 218 MB/s read, and 181 MB/s write. Are you sure you don't have a bad SSD? You should contact HP about this and see if they can shed some light on it.

I used CrystalDiskMark version 3.0.1 for my tests, if that helps.

I got 192.4MB/s read and 181MB/s write is that good enough? I thought my crucial ssd performs much better.

also I assume this is just sequential read/write? because random read/write seems to be slower ...

[zenkinz]

4.7 overall as well, and this is with my i7.

I'm scoring a 7.5 for the hard drive, and a 4.7 for aero as well. Are you sure you have your index updated? Sounds like something is off if it's that low for your SSD...

Also, after taking a peek at the HP support assistant program this came with, I believe the hard drive is a Samsung mzmpa128hmfu-000.

i have the same ssd but index still shows 5.9 after few run I have also apply the ssd tweaks found in the net...

I use crystaldisk to benchmark, sequential read is only 192MB/s and write is 188MB/s, but rest of the read/write (random, 512k vs 4k, etc) doesn't seem to be as good ...

I am beginning to worry if I got a lemon ssd

[zenkinz]

i have the same ssd but index still shows 5.9 after few run I have also apply the ssd tweaks found in the net...

I use crystaldisk to benchmark, sequential read is only 192MB/s and write is 188MB/s, but rest of the read/write (random, 512k vs 4k, etc) doesn't seem to be as good ...

I am beginning to worry if I got a lemon ssd

LOL. turns out it's the stupid windows experience index program that's faulty


http://www.awesomes.net/?p=79


after a defrag, my SSD is now reported to have performance index of 7.4

[aak1992]

@zenkinz; I'm glad you got that figured out. But we careful about de-fragmenting your SSD too often, it isn't hurting the SSD per se but you are using up "cycles" of the SSD and lowering it's lifespan.

[aak1992]

Hi aak, How do you envisage and additional ssd will be dealt with by the BIOS?
I read somewhere that it would expand the primary hdd. Is this correct?

That is something I was curious about as well actually, I would hope that the current Local C would be enlarged, as that is probably how the Spectres with the two 128GB drives were setup from factory. However, I am not sure how the BIOS would react to a much larger SSD- should someone install a 256 or 300GB.

But yes to answer your question, I believe you are correct and that (hopefully) getting a second SSD would simply enlarge the C drive as the factory models do.

[zenkinz]

@zenkinz; I'm glad you got that figured out. But we careful about de-fragmenting your SSD too often, it isn't hurting the SSD per se but you are using up "cycles" of the SSD and lowering it's lifespan.

yes, I only defrag just to 'prove' the poinnt. my previous crucial ssd, have not defrag for the last 1 year..

[smeegle]

....(hopefully) getting a second SSD would simply enlarge the C drive as the factory models do.

I think this might be too much to ask for. I don't have a Spectre but I expect it ships with a hidden recovery partition plus a C drive. My bet (hunch only) is it will expand the size of the primary HDD while leaving the existing partitions & volumes intact at their current sizes. So after adding the extra hardware you may initially see no gain. You might need to use a partitioning tool to expand the C drive to allow use of the extra space.

Main thing is the bios willl treat the extra module as the same hdd and not a second one, which would be PITA. I suppose it all depends on how clever the BIOS is and how it has been set up. In a worst case scenario - adding the second SSD may wipe and format the whole expanded HDD. Unlikely, but in the factory they would surely be fitting both SSDs prior to loading any software images. ie they would not go down the path we envisage. So I'd be doing a full system backup first to be sure.

Look forward to seeing what you discover.

[aak1992]

I think this might be too much to ask for. I don't have a Spectre but I expect it ships with a hidden recovery partition plus a C drive. My bet (hunch only) is it will expand the size of the primary HDD while leaving the existing partitions & volumes intact at their current sizes. So after adding the extra hardware you may initially see no gain. You might need to use a partitioning tool to expand the C drive to allow use of the extra space.

Main thing is the bios willl treat the extra module as the same hdd and not a second one, which would be PITA. I suppose it all depends on how clever the BIOS is and how it has been set up. In a worst case scenario - adding the second SSD may wipe and format the whole expanded HDD. Unlikely, but in the factory they would surely be fitting both SSDs prior to loading any software images. ie they would not go down the path we envisage. So I'd be doing a full system backup first to be sure.

Look forward to seeing what you discover.

Hmm yes this could very well be a problem. We do have a 15GB recovery partition (visible). You may be right about having to use a partition tool, that never crossed my mind, actually. I'll definitely be doing a full backup, and let you guys know what happens but in the meantime I really hope the BIOS isn't that hard to work with- I am only going off of what I have seen with current envy 14 owners and how their systems have dealt with additional SSDs over the years...

Hopefully if our BIOS are written anything like the older 14 series, we will simply have a game of 'plug and play'.