So to that end I would like to replace the (I am guessing) 5400 RPM HDD with a SSD and watch it speed up considerably. I don't know where to start with this.

There are few ways to make a laptop faster that are as easy and cost-effective as replacing your existing hard drive with a solid state drive (SSD).

Are you still looking for a safe and reliable clone HDD to SSD freeware? Windows doesn’t offer a built-in free SSD cloning tool to migrate a hard disk to another drive.

Learn how to install Windows on SSD and everything else on HDD to optimize performance and storage capacity of your PC.

For your information, Windows 10 and Windows 11 have no pre-installed settings to enable users to clone either an HDD or SSD. The only option is to seek out some third-party disk cloning software.