I just created an account to thank all of you for your contributions. I got my laptop just after Christmas and I discovered this thread not long after that. I've been waiting for SSD prices to come down and last week I saw a SanDisk 512GB X300s for $130 on NewEgg and pulled the trigger. Just installed it tonight. It even came with a couple of mounting screws and a tiny screwdriver. So far, so good!
I cloned my internal drive to a 1TB USB drive I had laying around just in case, then did a fresh install of Windows 10. Before installing I selected "repair my computer" (or whatever it's called) and used diskpart to blow away all the partitions on the original 1TB drive, then installed Windows. I didn't make any changes to the BIOS, still using UEFI boot. I also didn't remove the existing HDD prior to install. The BIOS lists the SSD as Drive 0 and the HDD as Drive 1, but the Windows installer has those reversed. It doesn't seem to matter. Windows is installed on the SSD and automatically activated and all is well.
Many thanks!