Setting up win 7 to work with ssd. Optimizing SSD disk performance under Windows

When purchasing and installing an SSD drive in order to transfer a copy operating system from a standard hard drive, you need to carry out certain settings system (optimize it). In cases where Windows 10 is installed "with clean slate", many components are configured automatically.

Therefore, most experts advise installing a “clean” version of the operating system.

The process of optimizing the OS for a specific SSD makes it possible to extend the life of the device, and even speeds up the operation of the system itself. The recommendations that the reader will learn about below are suitable not only for Windows 10, but also for some more earlier versions(7 and 8).

Preparing for optimization

There is no need to rush right away; you must first prepare and check whether all the necessary services are included.

ACHI SATA mode

You can check this indicator online BIOS settings. When the hard drive is in ATA mode, it needs to be changed to ACHI.

By the way, there are two nuances here:

The operating system will not turn on due to a lack of drivers. In this situation, you need to either install them first, or completely reinstall Windows 10.
On some computers (very old) there is simply no setting of operating modes in the BIOS. If this happens, you will need to update the BIOS (at a minimum, you will have to read the information on official resource company and find out if this is possible).

You also need to go to the device manager (this menu opens through the control panel) and open the item with IDE modes ATA/ATEPI. If the user sees a controller named SATA ACHI in the menu, then everything is fine.

This mode must be enabled in order for the SSD drive to work normally, without interruptions. Special function TRIM in ATA mode is needed so that the operating system is able to transmit information to the drive about blocks and the need to work with them. Such features must be taken into account, because in this case, deleting and formatting data occurs on a different principle than in HDD drive X. Using the TRIM command will make the hard drive work more efficiently, and it will also contribute to uniform wear of the cells. Only the newest OS versions (7,8,10) work with this function. If you use the good old XP, you will have to update or buy a disk with this command.

Enabling the TRIM command

To verify that this feature is enabled, you must open a command prompt. After that, enter the command fsutil behavior query DisableDeleteNotify and press “Enter”. If the value next to the command name is set to 0, then it is enabled. If the value is set to 1, then we change the situation using the fsutil behavior set DisableDeleteNotify 0 command.

Operating system optimization

This task occurs in 5 stages:

Optimization using the utility

As you can see, all settings for how the operating system works with the disk can be done manually. But there is another way out of this situation - the use of special software (such programs are called tweakers). Experts advise using the SSD Mini Tweaker utility.

The program allows you to configure the “ten” to work with hard drive this type. Configuring the device using this utility significantly increases its service life. And thanks to some points, it is even possible to increase the performance of the operating system.

The benefits of the utility include:

The entire interface is in clear, Russian (including even hints for all items).
Performs functions on all new versions of Windows OS.
There is no need to install the program.
The utility is completely free.

If the user does not have experience with such things as the registry editor or BIOS, then it is better not to waste time and nerves and use the utility right away.

For many users, replacement hard drive An SSD is the most effective PC upgrade. In terms of reading information, an SSD drive is many times faster, therefore, the performance of the computer significantly increases. But they have one drawback - the limitation on the number of rewrite cycles, characteristic of flash drives.

Configuring an SSD under Windows 7 is necessary because you need to minimize unnecessary write cycles to flash memory cells to increase service life solid state drive.

If you have Windows 10 installed, then it already automatically detects SSD drives and makes adjustments to their operation to achieve maximum performance. Therefore, on Windows 10, setting up an ssd is not so important and is performed at the operating system level.

During the defragmentation process, logically interconnected data blocks that are scattered throughout the media are arranged in a single sequence. SSD drives do not need to be defragmented. If for hard drives HDD defragmentation can increase efficiency in reading speed and thereby speed up the PC, but in the case of SSDs this process can only do harm.

Disabling Perfetch and SuperFetch

The Perfetch folder is designed to speed up Windows boot and program launch. The folder contains information about frequently used programs on the computer and stores them in the initial (system) part of the hard drive.

The SuperFetch service monitors the programs you use frequently and loads them into random access memory (RAM) when you start your computer, so they start faster when accessed. Thus, when you run a program, the computer begins to read its files faster from RAM rather than from a hard drive.

But considering high speed reading solid-state drives, these functions are superfluous.

To disable them, go to the editor Windows registry with administrator rights.

In the “HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE” directory, find the “SYSTEM/CurrentControlSet/Control/SessionManager/MemoryManagement/PrefetchParameters” key and change the “Enable Prefetcher” and “Enable Superfetch” values to “0”.

Disabling ReadyBoot

ReadyBoost and working together with SuperFetch service. While SuperFetch loads program files into random access memory (RAM), ReadyBoost uses the flash drive as a cache for the slow hard drive.

To disable ReadyBoost you need to do the following:

Start;
Control Panel;
System and security;
Administrative tools;
Performance Monitor;
On the left side, expand the Data Collector Groups section and select Startup Event Tracking Sessions;
double click on “ReadyBoost”;
Tracking sessions;
Uncheck the box next to “Enabled”.

Disabling or moving the paging file to the HDD

The page file increases the size of your computer's cache. In case of physical insufficiency RAM memory, the Windows operating system moves some of the data out of RAM and thus prevents software or system errors.

If the computer is equipped with a small SSD and a traditional HDD, then the page file can be placed on the SSD. If you have Windows x64 installed, the page file can be disabled.

TRIM function

In the Windows 7 operating system, it is important to check whether the TRIM function is enabled. Note that this function informs SSD drive, which area on the disk is no longer used and can be cleaned. If the feature is disabled, it may reduce the performance of the SSD.

To check:

go to the command line as administrator;
enter the command “fsutil behavior query disabledeletenotify”;
If after execution DisableDeleteNotify = 0 appears, then the service is enabled.

Disabling sleep mode (hibernation)

The hibernation feature clearly reduces the time it takes for the Windows operating system to start from the hard drive. SSDs vs. hard drives The information reading time is much faster, which makes the startup process much shorter. Therefore, hibernation mode in computers with SSD does not bring tangible benefits and can be disabled.

When entering sleep mode, all data from RAM is saved to hard drive in the hiberhil.sys file, which is quite a decent size. This is especially true for small SSDs; disabling sleep mode frees up valuable space on the SSD drive.

To disable, use the Win+R keys to launch a command prompt as administrator and type the command “powercfg -h off”.

AHCI mode

For a complete SSD operation-storage, including using TRIM function, you need to enable it in BIOS AHCI mode. If you simply change the mode, then after turning on the Windows boot process may be interrupted by an error (blue screen).

To fix:

go to the Windows Registry Editor as an administrator;
find the entry “HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/System/CurrentControlSet/Services/Msahci” or “HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/System/CurrentControlSet/Services/lastorV”;
Click twice on “Start” and change the value to “0”;
restart your computer;
change in BIOS SATA mode AHCI controller.

Windows 7 was not originally designed to run on SSDs. Since their introduction, Microsoft has released numerous updates designed to improve the performance of the OS on solid-state drives. However, it is necessary to carry out additional optimization manually, which gives much more effect.

SSD drive

Solid State Drive (Solid State Drive) is a storage device based on flash memory and a control controller.

They are widely used in computer technology and have some advantages over HDD:

high speed;
impact resistance;
heat resistance;
small size and weight;
noiselessness.

In Windows 8 and higher, they work stably and quickly, but under older OS, problems with wear and performance are inevitable. To avoid this, you need to optimize the parameters, which is what this article is devoted to.

What does optimization give?

Windows 7 has several services that increase the performance of regular hard drives. But with SSDs, they not only do not bring any benefit, but interfere with operation and significantly reduce the service life of the device. Windows setup 7 on an SSD nullifies all attempts by the OS to destroy it, and allows you to achieve better performance.

Are solid state drives faster?

Even if you compare the maximum read/write speed declared by the manufacturer, the difference will be huge.

The linear speed of solid-state drives is 3-4 times higher.

A typical hard drive can rarely achieve a read speed of 180 MB/s. At the same time, he does not waste time moving the head, but focuses on reading the data.

For a regular SSD, such as the Kingston SKC380S3, the limit is 550 MB/s. for reading and 520 for writing. In mode linear reading it uses all channels and reads data in large blocks. However, if you take a deeper look at performance, the superiority of SSDs becomes even more impressive.

When testing the reading speed of 512 KB blocks (small files), the gap becomes even larger. The SSD does not spend much time searching for a block, as a result of which its speed still remains within 500 MB/s. The hard drive spends more time moving the head than reading files. Its speed is reduced by three times and averages 60 MB/s, which is 8 times slower than an SSD.

Photo: reading test of arbitrary blocks of 512 KB in size

If we go deeper into the tests and check the speed on 4 KB blocks, the SSD will outperform the hard drive by 50 times. Loading the OS, copying documents, small images and launching programs - all this corresponds to this mode of operation. In addition, solid-state drives can simultaneously handle multiple requests, while HDDs are single-threaded.

Video: how to properly configure the system for operation

Setting up an SSD in Windows 7

This process, requires patience and includes the following procedures:

Setting up Windows 7 for an SSD begins with flashing the drive's firmware. All manufacturers regularly release new versions of software for their devices, which eliminate errors and weak points previous versions. You can download it from the official websites of the brand. The software package also usually includes instructions for installing it and updating the firmware.

AHCI and TRIM

The SATA interface has many features that speed up data transfer. In order for them to become available, you need to enable AHCI controller, since most PCs are still configured by default to work with an outdated ATA controller. You can switch to AHCI either automatically or manually.

Automatic switching:

During the next Windows startup 7 will do the rest of the work itself. If for some reason the utility does not work, then you can do everything manually.

Manual switching:

As a result, after a reboot, the AHCI controller will be visible in the device manager.

AHCI is finished, the TRIM command is next. It helps the OS notify the SSD about what data file system no longer contains, and which the drive can delete. That is, this command removes garbage and does not allow it to reduce the level of performance.

You can enable TRIM if the following conditions are met:

The SSD controller supports this command;
SATA: AHCI mode is enabled.

If the conditions are met, you can proceed to enable TRIM:

Disabling system protection

The instructions are quite simple:

It is important to understand that by disabling protection, the OS will not do control points recovery and in case of failure resort to Windows recovery will be impossible. Therefore it is worth taking advantage software other developers to provide recovery functionality, e.g. Acronis True Image.

Disable disk indexing

Indexing is carried out only to speed up the search process. hard drive. Given the SSD's multi-threading and performance, an indexing and search service is not needed.

Disable search like this:

We disable indexing like this:

open “Computer”;
click right key mouse on the section -> Properties;
at the very bottom of the window that opens, uncheck the “allow indexing...” checkbox;
apply and close the window.

Along the way, you can also disable defragmentation, which is useless on SSD drives due to quick access to cells.

You can do this:

Disabling paging

The paging file is necessary for the operation of programs that require large volume memory. If there is not enough RAM, then temporary data is loaded into this file. You can disable it only if you have sufficient RAM installed on your computer (at least 8 GB). Otherwise, it is better to move the swap to another partition, that is, to the hard drive.

Disable:

Disabling hibernation

Computer hibernation or deep sleep was invented by Microsoft so that the computer does not spend a lot of time starting up. This feature allows you to turn off the computer's power without closing applications. When you wake up the next time, all programs continue to work.

At the same time, when the PC goes to sleep, a large amount of data is written to the drive and the SSD wears out faster. Also, for many people, hibernation is not needed, since PCs with solid state drive loads very quickly.

If you decide to disable hibernation, you can do it like this:

To optimize your system to use the SSD drive automatically, you can use SSD utility Tweak Utility. The program allows you to quickly and easily do everything that was stated above, except for enabling the AHCI mode. The program is published with a different set of tools.

Eat free version With basic set functions:

disabling defragmentation;
disabling recovery;
stop indexing.

IN paid version Other features available in Tweaker Pro:

enable and disable services;
setting hibernation settings;
validation and experimental optimization of the TRIM command.

The program allows for more deep customization, which includes many more parameters. After starting the program, on the right side of the window you can see detailed description and tips for setting up the system.

To start optimization, just click big button In the middle of the program window is the auto-tuning configuration. The utility itself will configure the basic parameters and provide a report.

Setting up and optimizing Windows 7 for SSD is not a quick process, accompanied by several system reboots and visits to the BIOS. However, if you do not configure it, you cannot disable unnecessary services, then after a few months the once-fast SSD may exhaust its supply of write cycles and stop working.

To prevent this from happening, after each reinstallation of the system, it is necessary to optimize it. This can be done either manually or automatically using SSD utilities Tweaker.

Best to install on computer SSD disk. They have a higher data read/write speed and are also less likely to fail compared to conventional hard drives. But to experience all the benefits of working with a solid-state drive, you must do the right thing. Windows setup 10 for SSD.

What to check before optimization?

Before starting the optimization process, check whether the system supports TRIM and whether AHCI SATA mode is enabled.

You can check the controller's operating mode in the BIOS. Find the “SATA Operation” or similar section in the settings. If it is set to ATA operating mode, switch it to AHCI.

This may cause difficulties:

old BIOS version does not support controller operation in AHCI mode. In this case, go to the manufacturer's website motherboard, find out if your model supports AHCI mode, then download and install the new BIOS;
The OS won't boot because it doesn't have necessary drivers. In this case, install drivers on your PC in advance. The best option– immediately reinstall the operating system.

Enabling TRIM

TRIM function when using SSD increases the speed of its operation and ensures equal wear of memory cells. This has a positive effect on the performance of the solid-state drive.

IN command line running under the Administrator account, enter the command: fsutil behavior query DisableDeleteNotify. If:

0 – parameter enabled;
1 – parameter disabled.

To enable, enter the command: fsutil behavior set DisableDeleteNotify 0.

Setting up Windows 10 for SSD

If all the above points are configured, proceed to optimize Windows 10 on a computer with a solid-state drive.

Disabling features

When using a solid state drive on your PC, disable some Windows features 10, which help when working with HDD disk. Below it is written in detail how to do this in several steps.

File indexing

Indexing is designed to speed up the OS. She provides quick access To the necessary files. But an SSD drive has a high speed of information exchange with the system, and frequent rewrites will quickly damage it. Therefore, it is better to disable file indexing.

This PC → right-click on the SSD drive → Properties menu → uncheck the “Allow files on this drive to be indexed in addition to file properties.”

Search service

Hibernation

Hibernation saves an image of the working OS when the computer is turned off. He signs up for internal storage. This increases the subsequent boot speed of Windows 10. In the case of an SSD drive, hibernation is not needed, because the system boot speed is high, and frequent overwriting of information negatively affects the service life of the drive.

In the command line (you can read how to work with it in the article “How to open and use the command line in Windows 10”), running as Administrator, enter the command: powercfg -h off.

Prefetch and SuperFetch

Prefetch speeds up startup of frequently used software, and SuperFetch predicts what program you're about to launch. In both cases, the OS preloads information into memory. If using SSDs, disable them.

Important! When "clean" Windows installations 10 on an SSD disk, these parameters initially have the value “0”. But when combined on a PC SSD and HDD drives crashes happen. Therefore, double-check these values after installing the OS.

Defragmentation

Defragmentation increases speed HDD operation disk, arranging the arrangement of clusters of information one after another. A solid-state drive has the same access speed to all memory cells. Defragmentation is not relevant for him, so disable it.

Automatic optimization with SSD Mini Tweaker utility

Portable free utility optimizes Windows operation 10 for solid state drive. Since she was created third parties, you use it at your own risk.

Download and run the program. In the window that opens, select the items that you consider necessary and click “Apply changes.”

Conclusion

After installation or Windows migration 10 on an SSD disk, you need to optimize its operation. This can be done manually by disabling functions that are not relevant for the solid-state drive, or using special utility SSD Mini Tweaker.

In this article we will talk about setting up an SSD drive for the Windows 7 operating system. We will look at what needs to be done for this and why to set up SSD devices in Windows 7 in general.

So, just recently a friend of mine bought powerful computer. And for greater speed, it was decided to install an SSD drive there to install the operating system on it.

Let's see how SSD differs from regular HDD. As Wikipedia tells us:

SSD - Solid-state drive (English solid-state drive, SSD) - a computer non-mechanical storage device based on memory chips. In addition to them, the SSD contains a control controller.

Unlike SSD, HDD is a hard drive magnetic disks or HDD (English hard (magnetic) diskdrive, HDD, HMDD), hard disk, in computer slang“hard drive” is a random access storage device (information storage device) based on the principle of magnetic recording. It is the main data storage device in most computers.

The main advantage of an SSD over a standard hard drive is the absence of mechanical (moving) parts, which increases its reliability. Also advantage of SSD This is a high speed operation, it heats up less and does not make any sounds during operation. But SSDs, in addition to many advantages, also have disadvantages. Main disadvantage of SSD is a limited number of write/rewrite cycles. Conventional (MLC, Multi-level cell, multi-level memory cells) flash memory allows you to write data approximately 10,000 times. More expensive types of memory (SLC, Single-level cell, single-level memory cells) - about 100,000 times. In order to reduce the number of accesses to the SSD drive and, accordingly, extend its life, it is necessary to fine tuning. Well, one more drawback is incompatibility with older operating systems (below Windows Vista).

Next, let's look at what exactly needs to be done to configure a solid-state drive under operating conditions. Windows system 7. Since when I set up my friend’s SSD, I didn’t take screenshots, I will perform these settings on my old computer with a regular HDD.

So let's go.

Point one: disable hibernation. You need to disable it for the reason that every time the computer switches to this mode, a large amount of information is written to the hard drive, and I always turn it off because sometimes it is difficult to exit this mode. In addition, by disabling hibernation we will free up space on system disk approximately equal to the amount of RAM. Hibernation is needed for fast loading operating system, but since we have an SSD drive installed, Windows already boots in just 5-10 seconds. To disable hibernation, launch the command line (Start - Run here write the command cmd) . On the command line we write powercfg.exe /hibernate off. After you restart your computer, you will see free space on the system disk.

Or go to “Start” - “Control Panel” - “Power Options” - “Setting the power plan” - “Change power settings” - find the “Sleep” item, open it, enter the “Hibernate after” item and enter the value “0”.

Point two: move the storage folder temporary files TEMP to a regular HDD.

To do this, click right click on the “My Computer” icon – “Properties” – “ Additional options systems" - tab "Advanced" - button " Environment Variables" - and change the path of the variable TMP And TEMP to another folder (I created it in advance on the D:\ drive).

Point three: disable "System Protection".

To disable system protection, right-click on “My Computer” - “Properties” - “System Protection” - “System Protection” tab - “Configure” - “Disable system protection”.

By disabling system protection, in the event of a system failure, we will not be able to recover from backup copy, but we don’t need it, because the system is installed in about 10-15 minutes.

Point four: transfer the swap file to the second hard drive. To do this, right-click on “My Computer” - “Properties” - “Advanced system settings” - “Advanced” tab - “Performance” section - “Options” button. Here we change the parameters as in the figure (depending on free space on drive D:\ you can set a larger volume).

Point five: disabling indexing.

Indexing is necessary to speed up disk searches. But, for example, I have never used the search, and besides, the search works quickly on an SSD even without it. That's why this option you can safely turn it off. To do this, go to “My Computer”, right-click on the C:\ drive, and select the “Properties” drop-down menu item. In the “General” tab, uncheck the “Allow the contents of files on this drive to be indexed in addition to file properties.”

Or you can remove indexing for all disks by disabling the WindowsSearch service. To do this, go to “Control Panel” - “Administration” - “Services” - find our service and double-click on it - select the startup type “Manual” and click the “Stop” button.

Point six: turn off Preftch And .

Prefetch is a technology that allows you to speed up loading Windows by proactively reading data from disk. It is not needed for SSDs, because SSDs already have a high speed of random data reading.

To disable Prefetch, launch the registry editor (Start - Run - write regedit and press Enter). Next, open the registry branch:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINES\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management\PrefetchParameters

and change the value of the Enable Prefetcher key to “0”.

RedyBoot is an extension to Prefetch. In order to disable it, we follow the path:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINES\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\WMI\Autologger\ReadyBoot

Here we change the value of the Start parameter to “0”.

Point seven: transfer of application caches. Here, first of all, we mean transferring the browser cache to second hard disk. I won’t describe how to do this, because each browser has its own method. Therefore, if you decide to transfer the cache to a second hard drive, then Google will help you. But I wouldn’t do this at all, because we installed the SSD to speed up work, and transferring the cache to second HDD will not increase our speed. In general, it's up to you.

It is also necessary to disable defragmentation, but for Windows 7, unlike Vista, defragmentation is automatically disabled when installed on an SSD drive (the same is written about Prefetch and RedyBoot, but I did not have them set to “0”, so check) .

That's all. You can find more tips on the Internet for optimizing SSDs for Windows 7, but they are not as important as these. However, even without such SSD settings It will last quite a long time, but if you want to extend its life as much as possible, I recommend following the above points. Plus, we will free up some space on the system disk, and considering the cost of a gigabyte of memory for an SSD, this is quite justified.