Apologies if this has been covered elsewhere but I would really appreciate some help setting up my new build. I have all the components and am confident about putting all the hardware together. I've rebuilt OS and software on XP and W7 to a lesser extent so i have a reasonable understanding but this is my first go at building from scratch and using an SSD and raid etc. Components listed at the bottom of post.
I've done a fair bit of research and the best option looks like setting up to use the SSD as the boot / OS, and as its 128gb also using it to cache the 300gb HDD [which I may replace with 1TB later]. Applications and user data to be kept on the HDD. I had thought of just using the SSD for the OS but wanted to take advantage of the unallocated space to boost HDD performance.
I am aware that W7 needs to be configured with the correct drivers and raid settings at installation and was hoping someone could provide a simple, step by step guide to setting the system up in this configuration.
The key elements are that its easy to follow, and clearly indicates what settings need to be changed and drivers installed and exactly when and what order to install them. For the driver, if the recommendation is not to use the discs provided with the new hardware, please provide links to where I can get them.
For simplicity I had planned on doing the minimum build first i.e. just use the onboard graphics etc until I have got a stable system up and running and then simply install the new card. This was to reduce the number of new drivers etc to be installed right at the start. Does that seem sensible albeit a little slower.
Can someone please help me out or at least point me to somewhere that setting up a sustem, like this explained.
Components as follows:
Zalman Z12 Plus Midi Tower Case
Gigabyte Z87X-D3H Motherboard [Rev 1.0]
Intel Core i5 4670K
OCZ VTX4-25SAT3-128G 128GB Vertex 4 Sata III-6Gb/s 2.5 Inch Internal SSD
Corsair Vengeance 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 1600 Mhz
Asus Radeon HD 7770 DirectCU Graphics Card 1GB
Zalman ZM550-XG 550W ATX 12V V2.3 Semi Modular Power Supply
Pioneer DVR-S20LBK 24x SATA Internal DVDRW
Maxtor 300gb SATA HDD
also have a 16gb fast USB3.0 stick
Windows 7 Ultimate [64 bit]
