Need help with choice for great gaming desktop UK

spirit

Moderator
Staff member
We're swapping because today he got himself a few upgrades (256GB SanDisk Extreme SSD, Iiyama touch screen monitor, Windows 8 etc etc) so he doesn't need the 128GB SanDisk anymore and he was thinking of putting it in his laptop, but as the SanDisk is a bit faster than my Crucial, he said if I wanted I could put the SanDisk in my desktop and then give my Crucial to him for him to use in his laptop. His laptop is only SATA 3GB/s anyway so he'd be limited to about 270MB/s read, but with my SATA 6GB/s I can get over 500MB/s read speed.

Was I the one who gave you instructions on how to get Windows 7 working nicely on SSDs? Basically plug the drive into SATA 6GB/s and make sure AHCI is enabled in the BIOS, then install W7. Make sure only the SSD is plugged in whilst installing 7, you don't want any other disks plugged in too.

128GB should be OK, if you want I'd get another hard drive and install games onto that. That's what I do - my games go on a 2TB HDD.
 

alexjb

Member
We're swapping because today he got himself a few upgrades (256GB SanDisk Extreme SSD, Iiyama touch screen monitor, Windows 8 etc etc) so he doesn't need the 128GB SanDisk anymore and he was thinking of putting it in his laptop, but as the SanDisk is a bit faster than my Crucial, he said if I wanted I could put the SanDisk in my desktop and then give my Crucial to him for him to use in his laptop. His laptop is only SATA 3GB/s anyway so he'd be limited to about 270MB/s read, but with my SATA 6GB/s I can get over 500MB/s read speed.

Was I the one who gave you instructions on how to get Windows 7 working nicely on SSDs? Basically plug the drive into SATA 6GB/s and make sure AHCI is enabled in the BIOS, then install W7. Make sure only the SSD is plugged in whilst installing 7, you don't want any other disks plugged in too.

128GB should be OK, if you want I'd get another hard drive and install games onto that. That's what I do - my games go on a 2TB HDD.

That's awesome! I didn't know Windows 8 was out already?

Thank you so much! :) Yes I'm worrying about installing the Windows 7 on the SSD - it sounds really complicated to me, if I just had an SSD installed on my computer would it be easier? I'll follow your instructions - thank you so much! :) I'm just going to post this link so I remember which one to buy :) -

GIGABYTE GA-Z77X-D3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) Motherboard
 

spirit

Moderator
Staff member
spirit said:
By the way, if you're getting an SSD, you want to do the following:

- Plug the SSD into a SATA 6GB/s port (look in your board manual if you can't find them)
- Go into the BIOS (again, look in your board manual if you don't know how) and set the SATA type to AHCI.
- Make sure no other hard disk drives are plugged in.
- Install Windows 7 on the SSD.
- Once Windows has installed, install your SATA/AHCI drivers (they should be on the CD or DVD which came with your board).

That's how you get the best performance out of an SSD.
That's what you need to do. It's important you do all of that to get the best performance.

I've got to go now.
 

alexjb

Member

wolfeking

banned
That drive is SATA and it is compatible. The only issue comes up if it were SAS or SATA, and I think they are compatible one way but not the other. Not sure how it works really. Anyway, that drive will work on any intel or AMD based desktop or laptop from Core 2 (athlon 64 maybe?) forward.
 

alexjb

Member
That drive is SATA and it is compatible. The only issue comes up if it were SAS or SATA, and I think they are compatible one way but not the other. Not sure how it works really. Anyway, that drive will work on any intel or AMD based desktop or laptop from Core 2 (athlon 64 maybe?) forward.

Thank you :) that's great news :) I am buying i5 3570k 3rd generation :) http://www.dabs.com/products/intel-core-i5-3570k-s1155-3-4ghz-6mb-7YXJ.html

It is compatible i think? :) thank you :)
 

spirit

Moderator
Staff member
I've found that most places in the UK which say their free delivery can take a few days actually often deliver next day.
 

alexjb

Member
I've found that most places in the UK which say their free delivery can take a few days actually often deliver next day.

I hope so :) the other reason I ordered some parts from other places was because some places had no stock, I got the motherboard from ebay because novatech wouldn't have them in stock for 2-3 days, and the same with other places :) so hopefully everything will arrive soon together :) before friday I hope :)
 
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