Following an earlier question, I've found that (as suggested) my slow
running on latest Win10 upgrade was down to the 4GB of RAM, adding
another 4GB from my backup machine has made it much happier. But, as
advised, I decided to upgrade to SSD as well and I have hit a problem in
that the Acer isn't detecting the SSD before the cloning stage. I'm
using an ancient IDE/SATA to USB connector which has been fine on other
SATA drives, but do you think I need to get a more modern one?

It has a 2A power supply, so should have enough oomph for my 1.7A
Crucial 1TB ssd, but when plugged in "out of the box" neither the Acer
nor my Dell desktop give any response. The Acer does have a USB 3 port.

In article <bZSdnc1FVNQlXTf9nZ2dnUU78QnNnZ2d@brightview.co.uk>,
newshound@stevejqr.plus.com says...
>
> Following an earlier question, I've found that (as suggested) my slow
> running on latest Win10 upgrade was down to the 4GB of RAM, adding
> another 4GB from my backup machine has made it much happier. But, as
> advised, I decided to upgrade to SSD as well and I have hit a problem in
> that the Acer isn't detecting the SSD before the cloning stage. I'm
> using an ancient IDE/SATA to USB connector which has been fine on other
> SATA drives, but do you think I need to get a more modern one?
>
> It has a 2A power supply, so should have enough oomph for my 1.7A
> Crucial 1TB ssd, but when plugged in "out of the box" neither the Acer
> nor my Dell desktop give any response. The Acer does have a USB 3 port.

Just a sanity check - the SSD (via adapter) isn't visible *at all* in Disk
Management - not even as an "Uninitialised" disk?

--

Phil, London

On 23/05/2021 21:53, newshound wrote:
> Following an earlier question, I've found that (as suggested) my slow
> running on latest Win10 upgrade was down to the 4GB of RAM, adding
> another 4GB from my backup machine has made it much happier. But, as
> advised, I decided to upgrade to SSD as well and I have hit a problem in
> that the Acer isn't detecting the SSD before the cloning stage. I'm
> using an ancient IDE/SATA to USB connector which has been fine on other
> SATA drives, but do you think I need to get a more modern one?
>
> It has a 2A power supply, so should have enough oomph for my 1.7A
> Crucial 1TB ssd, but when plugged in "out of the box" neither the Acer
> nor my Dell desktop give any response. The Acer does have a USB 3 port.

It is possible the USB ports don't work, or work only intermittently.

There should be two internal SATA ports, you *may* be able to remove the
DVD by removing one screw. You *may* then be able to use the DVD SATA
port for the SSD without fully opening the case.

<https://www.myfixguide.com/manual/acer-aspire-e1-531-e1-531g-disassembly/>

I would just open the case fully now, you will have to eventually. Be
carefully of the ribbon cables and the "sockets" they attach to.
Otherwise this is a very robust case.

On 24/05/2021 07:34, Pancho wrote:
> On 23/05/2021 21:53, newshound wrote:
>> Following an earlier question, I've found that (as suggested) my slow
>> running on latest Win10 upgrade was down to the 4GB of RAM, adding
>> another 4GB from my backup machine has made it much happier. But, as
>> advised, I decided to upgrade to SSD as well and I have hit a problem
>> in that the Acer isn't detecting the SSD before the cloning stage. I'm
>> using an ancient IDE/SATA to USB connector which has been fine on
>> other SATA drives, but do you think I need to get a more modern one?
>>
>> It has a 2A power supply, so should have enough oomph for my 1.7A
>> Crucial 1TB ssd, but when plugged in "out of the box" neither the Acer
>> nor my Dell desktop give any response. The Acer does have a USB 3 port.
>
> It is possible the USB ports don't work, or work only intermittently.
>
> There should be two internal SATA ports, you *may* be able to remove the
> DVD by removing one screw. You *may* then be able to use the DVD SATA
> port for the SSD without fully opening the case.
>
> <https://www.myfixguide.com/manual/acer-aspire-e1-531-e1-531g-disassembly/>
>
> I would just open the case fully now, you will have to eventually. Be
> carefully of the ribbon cables and the "sockets" they attach to.
> Otherwise this is a very robust case.

An even better, a disassembly video.

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDLhgnHdWmw>

On 23/05/2021 23:46, Philip Herlihy wrote:
> In article <bZSdnc1FVNQlXTf9nZ2dnUU78QnNnZ2d@brightview.co.uk>,
> newshound@stevejqr.plus.com says...
>>
>> Following an earlier question, I've found that (as suggested) my slow
>> running on latest Win10 upgrade was down to the 4GB of RAM, adding
>> another 4GB from my backup machine has made it much happier. But, as
>> advised, I decided to upgrade to SSD as well and I have hit a problem in
>> that the Acer isn't detecting the SSD before the cloning stage. I'm
>> using an ancient IDE/SATA to USB connector which has been fine on other
>> SATA drives, but do you think I need to get a more modern one?
>>
>> It has a 2A power supply, so should have enough oomph for my 1.7A
>> Crucial 1TB ssd, but when plugged in "out of the box" neither the Acer
>> nor my Dell desktop give any response. The Acer does have a USB 3 port.
>
> Just a sanity check - the SSD (via adapter) isn't visible *at all* in Disk
> Management - not even as an "Uninitialised" disk?
>
I was hoping that the Acronis "clone" software would take care of
everything. Disk Management originally saw an uninitialised disk, so I
have initialised it and then formatted it, then gave it a letter, and
checked that files will copy to it.

At each of these stages I get the message when re-running the clone
software, "Acronis True Image for Crucial"

"This product edition requires at least one Crucial SSD to be installed
on your system. You can upgrade to the latest unrestricted version at
<URL>."

The "Continue" button is greyed out, the only available button is "Cancel".

I thought it at first it might be because I had MS Ransomware Protection
enabled, but it's not :-(

Still, at least this shows my old SATA to USB connection is working, and
the machine is recognising that it has a mounted volume. I'm currently
looking at the Crucial web site and support on that error message. They
I are saying I might have to run Acronis from some other bootable media
"to rule out other program conflicts". I think I already have some, I'll
have to look up how to hack into the bios boot order. It's a long time
since I needed to do that.

Thanks for the help!

On 23/05/2021 21:53, newshound wrote:
> Following an earlier question, I've found that (as suggested) my slow
> running on latest Win10 upgrade was down to the 4GB of RAM, adding
> another 4GB from my backup machine has made it much happier. But, as
> advised, I decided to upgrade to SSD as well and I have hit a problem in
> that the Acer isn't detecting the SSD before the cloning stage. I'm
> using an ancient IDE/SATA to USB connector which has been fine on other
> SATA drives, but do you think I need to get a more modern one?
>
> It has a 2A power supply, so should have enough oomph for my 1.7A
> Crucial 1TB ssd, but when plugged in "out of the box" neither the Acer
> nor my Dell desktop give any response. The Acer does have a USB 3 port.

Hah! My earlier post was wrong, the problem *was* the ancient IDE/SATA
to USB unit. Amazon just delivered the goods on a £7 SATA to USB3,
plugged it in and away it went. Now just need to wait and see!

On 24/05/2021 12:38, newshound wrote:
> On 23/05/2021 21:53, newshound wrote:
>> Following an earlier question, I've found that (as suggested) my slow
>> running on latest Win10 upgrade was down to the 4GB of RAM, adding
>> another 4GB from my backup machine has made it much happier. But, as
>> advised, I decided to upgrade to SSD as well and I have hit a problem
>> in that the Acer isn't detecting the SSD before the cloning stage. I'm
>> using an ancient IDE/SATA to USB connector which has been fine on
>> other SATA drives, but do you think I need to get a more modern one?
>>
>> It has a 2A power supply, so should have enough oomph for my 1.7A
>> Crucial 1TB ssd, but when plugged in "out of the box" neither the Acer
>> nor my Dell desktop give any response. The Acer does have a USB 3 port.
>
>
> Hah! My earlier post was wrong, the problem *was* the ancient IDE/SATA
> to USB unit. Amazon just delivered the goods on a £7 SATA to USB3,
> plugged it in and away it went. Now just need to wait and see!

Final summary, the combination of more RAM and an SSD has given the Acer
a very respectable boost in speed. If anything it now boots faster than
the 2014 MacBook Pro (which of course already has an SSD).