Placed an SSD in the laptop, yet Windows continues to start from the HDD.
Placed an SSD in the laptop, yet Windows continues to start from the HDD.
You might use tools such as gparted to delete partitions from your HDD. Other issues could arise if you've cloned the drive—your registry will still list it as a mounted device, showing the C drive as the physical HDD even when the system boots from an SSD. Disconnecting the HDD for a single boot changes the drive letter mapping correctly, but if both drives are connected everything functions normally. In the registry path HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\MountedDevices you see all devices and their letters. After a reboot from the HDD, open regedit, run "load hive", mount the SYSTEM folder from the SSD (located at Windows\System32\config without the .exe), rename it as "SYSTEM", then clear the mounteddevices section and unload the hive. Once you restart, the system will reassign drive letters starting with your actual C drive (the SSD). This method is simpler than repeatedly using boot options or registry tweaks.