Noob in deep: Going from Lion/Boot camp on one HDD to Dual boot SSD and HDD

[NumNumNum]

Hi all, I've researched and posted on similar minded threads and I can't seem to find a good answer, so I'm going to start my own thread.
I have an old 2007 macbook and a new 2011 macbook pro. I've bought two intel 320 120GB SSDs to install in each to have dual boot Lion/Win 7 machines.

Hopefully some of you experts can help me with the following

1) Before I start: I'm going to do a clean install of Lion and Win 7 on both machines' SSD, rather than just super duper clone/copy boot info from each OS to the partitioned SSD. For the MBP its not as important, but the MB i've had for a while without ever doing a clean install. How necessary/valuable is a clean install to the SSD, or should I just copy the boot info and applications over? If it doesn't really matter whether I do a clean install or not then the rest of my questions are moot.

2) If I'm doing a clean install, here is my plan. (after I make clone my HDD to an external to be safe)
a) format the SSD, create a lion boot usb,.
b) physically install SSD in HD bay and install OSX onto the SSD
c) use boot camp to partition the SSD (80/40) to install win7
d) physically install old HDD into the optibay.

Here's where I'm stuck. Should I wipe the old HDD, then (somehow) transfer all files except for the OSX/Win7 and applications to the HDD and then drag any files I need from my external to the wiped HDD? Or should I just keep the old HDD as is and erase the operating systems off of it?

Either way, how best to partition/format the HDD?

Finally, how do the operating systems know how to find the info that they need on the HDD?

What I really need is a step by step instruction on how to optimally go from a single HDD with both Lion and bootcamp Win7 to a SSD/HDD set up with a dual boot option on the SSD. You'd think someone on macrumors has done this but I can't find it. It is a lot to ask of you guys but any help is appreciated. I'll surely find some way to pay it forward.

 

[ashtangiman]

Dual boot Lion Win7

Hello, I am wanting to do the same thing on my late 2011 mac mini. I have the ssd and the kit for installing it, and plan to have an 80/40 split on the ssd for OSX and Win7 respectively. I also plan to have a 350/150 split on the existing hdd for OSX and NTFS partitions. I will create the partition on the existing HDD before I do anything else, and will leave the OSX on the HDD so that if anything goes wrong it is easier to recover. I have a backup of everything on a timecapsule, so just in case the repartitioning doesn't work I can recover.

Then, after the partitioning on the HDD, I'll physically install the SSD in the second disk drive spot. Then I'll boot back up and install (using my recovery thumb drive) lion onto the SSD, creating the partitions as part of the process. Once lion boots Ill create symbolic links so that my iTunes library can reside on the HDD (music, movies, and tv shows), and install the old software (xCode etc) to the SSD.

Finally I'll install windows onto the 40GB SSD partition and reformat the 150GB HDD partition to NTFS.

Once I get to this point it is just a matter of experimentation to see what I want to run from the SSD and what can reside on the HDD. I think that the TC will not back up the NTFS partitions on either drive, so I may have to think about the best way to handle backing up the Windows side of things. I am guessing that I can link the entire Users volume to the HDD, and let the Library and Applications reside on the SSD. Once I am comfortable with the way it runs, I'll begin deleting the unnecessary files from the HDD.

That is my plan in a nutshell . . . I will post more as I do it if I run into unforeseen problems.

 

[VMMan]

Don't forget to update your Intel 320 SSDs' firmwares.