Installing OS X on secondary SSD

I have a MacBook Pro 17" Late 2011. Today I removed to optical drive and installed a SSD (where the HDD was) and moved the HDD to the optical drive location.

Now I want to make the SSD my primary drive, and use the HDD for storage only. the problem is that I can't clone all the HDD to the SSD because the former has 750GB and the latter is 250.

I only want to install the OS to the SSD. I don't mind installing all other apps manually afterward, but I'm just not sure what should I do next.

How do I install only OS X on the SSD and make it the main boot disk?

Solution 1:

1. Download the installer to the current system
2. While it downloads, partition the SSD as GPT/OS X Extended
3. Run the installer and install the OS onto the SSD instead of the current boot drive
4. Use Startup Disk preference pane to set the new SSD as the boot volume default - NVRAM points to the SSD for all subsequent boots

Solution 2:

If you boot to the Recovery Drive (restart holding Command and R) you'll get a window with an option to "Re-install MAC OSX". Choose this and then choose your SSD as the target. When installation is complete, go to System Preferences > Hard Disk and select your SSD as the boot drive. Alternatively, you can reboot holding Alt/Option and you will be asked to choose which disk to boot from.

When you are 100% certain the SSD is working then you obviously have the option of deleting all system files from the original HDD; or keep the system intact and you will have a 100% functioning back-up to boot from in the event the SSD fails. If you need to maximize storage go ahead and delete all the system files on the HDD. At that point it should be recognized as a just a storage device, not a start-up drive. Better yet, you might consider erasing the HDD completely and then re-populating it with your data files. Of course, to be safe you'll want to create a complete back-up of the HDD before you start any of this.

P.S. I also have a 2011 17". Love it. Was thinking about doing something similar to extend its lifetime. Problem is these computers have had problems with their GPUs dying which scared me away. Please let me know how it goes and how much faster the computer is with the SSD. That might encourage me to do this.