Month: March 2021

Get a new, younger… computer! – 3

Part 3 – Swapping the hard drives

This is part 3 of my instructions for transforming your old laptop (or desktop) running Windows 7 into a Windows 10 version that works. Today we are going to perform the hardware related tasks.

Now unplug the USB external hard drive. Unplug the power from your laptop and turn it upside down so that you can see its back. You should see usually two separate covers, held by screws. One will let you access the memory, the other will let you access the hard disk. It this later that you need to open. Note that on some laptops, you remove the entire back cover to reveal all of the innards.

Tip: take a picture of the hard drive with your phone so you can remember how it was all setup. Unscrew and lift the HD end opposite the connector (with its anti-vibration protection if applicable – bright blue on picture). Then gently unplug the connecting cable to the hard drive (HD), noting which way the connector is lying. Remove the HD from the laptop, noting which way and how the connector is facing the cable.

Now install the new SSD in the place of the old HD (putting it first in the antivibration protection if applicable). Make sure the SSD is facing the same way as the old HD, so that the connector presents itself to the cable in the same way as the old one, gently connect the cable and push the SSD down in its location (or screw it in). Replace the cover on the back of the laptop.

Now try switching your laptop back on, and it should be the same as before, with Windows 7 , with no difference, except it was so much quicker to boot up! (and also closed down you will see).

This is one of the advantage of upgrading your disk drive is that you are not going to touch the old one. So should anything go wrong, all you need to do is pop the old drive back in, and you are back to where you started. So it is as risk-free as possible.

The other advantage of this setup is that at the end of the day, you can put the old HDD into the HDD case and can then use it as an external USB hard drive. A bonus for backing up data or for extra storage.

In my next post, I will explain how to upgrade Windows 7 to Windows 10.

Get a new, younger… computer! – 2

Part 2 – Cloning the HDD to the SSD

This is part 2 of my instructions for transforming your old laptop (or desktop) running Windows 7 into a Windows 10 version that works. Today we are going to prepare the new hard drive.

We purchased a 2.5″ HDD enclosure. Following the instructions that came with it, slide the plastic cover. Insert the new SSD, making sure its the right side up so that the connector engages properly. Replace the cover. You now have a new USB external drive that you can connect to your laptop using the USB cable supplied.

Connect it to one of the USB port of the laptop. Let windows 7 recognise the external hard drive and load the driver. When you can see the device, ensure that the SDD is formatted. If it isn’t, then go to “Computer Management” and “Storage” and format it.

Now download the “Samsung Data Migration Software for Consumer SSD” v3.1 from this site onto your laptop:

https://samsung-data-migration.software.informer.com/3.1/

Normally, as per their instructions, you would download it from the Samsung site:

https://www.samsung.com/semiconductor/minisite/ssd/download/tools

But Samsung only has the new version 4.0 on their site at the moment, and it did not recognise my slightly “older” 860 serie SSD. This is a big miss by Samsung not to have left a link to v3.1! (how did I work that out? well experience from having done it before many times!)

Now use the software to clone your laptop’s hard drive onto the external USB drive, by following the instructions from Samsung. Note that you need to make sure that the USB drive has a larger capacity than the amount of data you are using on your laptop. If not, you need to remove some data files (music, video, photos) before performing the operation, or you should have bought a larger SSD !

https://www.samsung.com/semiconductor/global.semi.static/Samsung_SSD_Data_Migration_User_Manual_(ENG)_v.3.1.pdf

  • Select the source disk: your laptop’s hard drive
  • Select the target disk: the USB drive
  • Press Start

This will take a little while, depending on how much data you have. It will effectively transfer everything from your laptop onto the USB drive, making it an exact copy (a clone).

In my next post, I will explain how to physically swap the hard drives in your computer.

Slow Cooked Beef Stroganoff

From www.RecipeTinEats.com by Nagi

Difficulty: Very Easy

Serves: 2-3

Prep time: 15 min

Cooking time: 7-8hrs

Ingredients

  • 600g beef chuck cubes
  • 1x onion
  • 2.5 garlic cloves
  • 250g mushrooms
  • 1.5 tbsp Dijon mustard
  • 2 tbsp plain flour
  • 350ml beef stock
  • 100g (0.5 cup) sour cream

Special Equipment

  • Slow cooker
  • Large heavy-base frying pan

Preparation

  • Step 1 – Onion and garlic
  • Peel, halve and slice the onion into 1cm slices
  • Peel and finely chop the garlic
  • Step 2 – Mushrooms
  • Wash the mushrooms
  • Cut in medium slices

Pre-Cooking

  • Step 1 – Pan
  • Pour one table spoon of olive oil into the heavy pan
  • Brown the beef cubes all over, using high heat – approx. 4 minutes
  • Season to taste while cooking
  • Remove and put aside
  • Let the pan cool down a bit and then return to fire to cook the onion and only 1.5 (out of the 2.5) cloves of garlic – approx. 3 minutes or until softened
  • Stir in the flour and then the mustard
  • Add the beef stock and stir well, scrapping the bottom and sides, bring to simmer

Cooking

  • Step 1 – Slow cooker
  • Transfer all the content from the pan into the slow cooker
  • Add the beef cubes
  • Put lid on and cook for 7-8 hours on low (or 4-5 hours on high)

Finishing

  • Step 1 – Mushrooms
  • Melt some butter and fry the mushrooms over high heat until golden
  • Add them to the slow cooker
  • Step 2 – Finishing
  • Extract 1.5 cup of liquid from the slow cooker
  • Mix thoroughly with it the 0.5 cup of sour cream, before adding back to the slow cooker (not doing it directly in the slow cooker enable you to mix it thoroughly and also apparently avoids getting sour cream specs in the sauce)
  • Step 3 – Serving
  • Serve with rice or pasta
  • Sprinkle a bit of parsley on top for colour

Might try to experiment with adding a few spices to give it a more exciting taste when I next do this recipe