Solved HDD to SSD Win8.1

I have a Lenovo G510 i7(which does not seem fantastically faster than my celeron Samsung R530!). I have replaced the DVD with a SSD. I have cloned the HDD to the SSD, made changes in the BIOS(changed to ACHI,switched to Legacy, put the SSD first in boot) but get the message "no bootable device insert disc and press any key".
If I use UEFI I do not see the SSD. I have googled this until my finders are sore to no avail. Can anyone help me boot from the SSD and once I can do this can I reformat the HDD? The SSD is called A:, the HDD C:. I cannot change the drive letters.

When you cloned the drive did you clone all the partitions?

I think you may also have to swap your drives placement. You may need to try to pull out the internal HDD and put the SSD internally instead of putting the SSD in the caddy.

If it's still not working I would suggest starting over. Reset the bios to the settings before you changed it. Reboot with the HDD and reclone the HDD to the SSD. Make sure you clone all the partitions. Shutdown, replace the HDD with the SSD. I would leave the HDD out.Then you need to select the SSD as the boot drive when you restart the computer. If done correctly Windows will boot and the SSD should now be the C drive.

Gave up

Thank you to all those who replied.
I am afraid it is all beyond my competence to get this thing working as I would wish.
I wanted a SSD in the DVD bay and the 1TB HDD in place, to be able to boot and store progs on the SSD and data on the HDD.
There seems to be all sorts of problems in getting the SSD recognised in the bay and also problems with Lenovo fiddling with advanced bios.
I've decided to take out the HDD, put a SSD in there, restore the DVD and rely on the cloud!
Thank you once again for those who have tried to help. I have marked this as solved really as a warning to anyone trying to do the same with a Lenovo as it is very difficult - it even baffled an experienced professional(not me!, at least I WAS baffled but am not a professional)

Hi there.

Don't give up so quickly

A good place for the 1TB drive is simply to connect via USB==>SATA cable (very cheap) -- I assume the 1TB drive is an old laptpop 2.5 inch one -- BTW you don't even need any enclosure for these -- I use a few old laptop HDD's for backup / archive data and for storing ripped DVD movies / other movies when I'm travelling -- much easier than taking a pile of DVD's (especially as my machine doesn't have any internal DVD device).

On a desktop you don't actually need to put the SSD into a bay -- there's no moving parts and it's enclosed - so with the SATA and power connectors to the MOBO just let it sit in any spare space (even on the floor of the case). The minimal vibration won't affect it in any way and no dust will get in to it. - That way you can use the old HDD in its original bay.

Have you also checked BIOS Boot priority so the SSD gets to Boot first.

Cheers

jimbo

Thank you for your suggestion of using the 1TB as a travelling disk.
Yes, I did put the SSD as first in the bios boot, along with changing it to AHCI, alternating between legacy and UEFI and loads of other things. In the end I also went back to Win 7, because Win 8 really was not worth my limited time!
Thanks again.

Good tips here!

Wjat software did you uuse for cloneing?

This is why no cloning for me ... ever OP Did you sort it out? Can't you back up data on some other drive and format the SSD?

I use Acronis to clone, or a utility called "Apricorn Disk Clone" that came with an SSD that I bought.