While cloning does work for SSD's (as with all drives) that is a practice you do not want to do with 1st time OS installs on an SSD (unless it's from one SSD cloned to another SSD). Reason being you will not get the best read/write speeds possible from your SSD.

With SSD's windows 7 detects the drive setting (IDE vs AHCI) and installs drivers for optimal speed. However, beyond IDE vs AHCI there is also frequently reported secondary issues of non-optimal speed doing a clone migration vs fresh install. If you simply clone over your HDD install into your new SSD you will not be getting the maximum speed out of your drive more than likely. It is better to "give in" the 1st go around and do a full windows install on your your new SSD. Then do your clone backup afterwards for future recovery. As a side note, there is a way to tweak the registry to circumvent a fresh windows install to the SSD to eek out more SDD performance after a clone migration, but these are never as clean or as effective as just doing the full install. Not to mention SSD's are all about speed so a fresh install of windows is not a long process ...it's so quick it's not worth being lazy about the 1st time.

The best technique for installing an SSD on the laptop is as follows. (If you are going to do a 100% fresh install non recovery method... which I highly recommend if you are serious)

-Keep your current HDD in place install the SSD to the empty slot.
Here is a video of how to get to your drive bay


-Boot up into your current Windows 7 install.

-Go into administrative tools in windows > Computer management >> disk management

-You should see the new SSD present... create a volume on it and format it... set it to "active partition" This means it's the primary boot up partition from this point forward.

-This next step do at your own risk, but it's wise to do this now never later if you're going to do it at all. That is... to update the SSD's firmware... which I am sure you know always runs a risk of bricking the item you are updating. I have yet to brick an SSD due to firmware updates (I have done it maybe 4 times now across laptop's and PC's), but things happen. The updates are occasionally worth it to eek out more speed or get smoother performance on the drive. You really shouldn't do firmware updates once you install your OS to the the SSD this can cause corruption issues not to mention if it bricks you are in an even worse position of data loss.

- Obviously before you reboot get all the things you need for fresh install
Get all the latest drivers downloaded from ASUS for g75 located here
http://support.asus.com/download.aspx?SLanguage=en&p=3&s=388&m=G75VW&os=&hashedid=gkyI9iViQxXxueTd

-Get a fresh copy of Win7 from Microsoft's website and use the CD key located on bottom of your laptop to register.
Microsoft explains the process on their help site.
http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_7-windows_install/need-windows-7-home-premi...
As odd as it may seem.. yes this is legit .. right from the lips of MS on their site.. check the link above.

-I recommend you burn the iso to disc and avoid mounting it to a bootable thumb drive. You can run into issues with the thumb drive not booting up properly and giving you corrupted installs of windows (its a common.. but freak occurrence... related to system bios boot order... after windows is installing is loses it's location and can't be found even if you point to it)... avoid the drama and burn to disc

-IMPORTANT: Before you get started with window 7 install check your system bios and verify your drives are set for AHCI (it should be by default on the G75 .. at least it was on mine... but it's important to verify this before you install windows

-Use windows 7 during early steps to decide if you want to delete the original HDD partition and it's default recovery space and possibly split the partition up into multiple drives (if that is what you want) I did this since I will not be using ASUS recovery tools since I knew I was doing it all from scratch myself and using Acronis afterwards for backup utility.

-Select the SSD as your OS installation location and let her rip... the rest of the driver updates after you get into windows I am sure if second nature for you.

All you have to do is install windows from the discs you burned. They are full installation discs and don't require the recovery partition. I installed a Crucial M4 in me G75 and the discs worked perfectly.

(Though it is possible it DID require the recovery partition but the laptop saw it on the other HDD that came with the laptop)

and go into the bios and make sure the ssd is the primary drive to boot

The SSD should be at my doorstep when I get home from work. So I'll likely do this surgery tonight or in the morning. From all the info I've gathered in this thread, lemme get a few things straight:

I need to power down, and remove my factory 1TB drive, and replace it with the SSD. Then I need to power up while holding ESC. Follow the steps, putting in each DVD when prompted. I now have a bootable SSD with a fresh, clean Windows 7 install?

That leaves the original HDD. Am I safe to plug it back in, format it, and use it as storage? Also, I'm a little confused about the W7 image. What's it for? And at what point in this process do I need it?

Sorry for the questions. This is all pretty new to me.

If you have the DVDs, you do not need the image. Yes, it is safe to format and use as storage in the second HDD slot. In fact, if you go into the BIOS, you can simply install the SSD to the second slot and set that to be the first boot choice. Then you do not even need to remove the other drive!