Rebuilding system guidance

Medic-one · 2 Jun 2023 at 10:36

I've bought a few new components and eventhough I build my current system from scratch (new everything, 3 years ago) I'm still not very confident in doing it, so rather ask a few questions before I start, so I don't screw up.

So I currently got :

- Gigabyte X570 AORUS ELITE
- AMD RYZEN 7 3700X EIGHT CORE 4.4GHZ
- Gigabyte GEFORCE RTX 2070 SUPER WINDFORCE OC
- Patriot Viper Steel 16GB (2x 8GB) 3600MHz DDR4 C17

I'm keeping the mainboard, but have bought a new CPU, memory, and will order my GPU after the weekend which is :

- AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D Cache Eight Core 4.5GHz
- Corsair Vengeance LPX Black 32GB (2x16GB) 3600 MHz DDR4
- Sapphire Radeon RX 7900 XT Gaming 20GB GDDR6 PCI-Express

Ignoring my SSD with music and photo's, I've also currently got :

- WD BLUE SN550 1 TB NVME M.2 - Full of games.
- WD BLUE SN550 250 GB NVME M.2 - Running my Windows 10 OS

I've bought a new 4 TB NVME M.2 drive to replace the 250 GB and want it to look like this :

- WD BLUE SN550 1 TB NVME M.2 - Partitioned, running Windows 11
- Crucial p3 plus 4 TB - for games.

I've backed up all my documents etc and am about to flash my bios to the latest version so I can start rebuilding as soon as my GPU arrives.

1) I've got a fairly big case (don't laugh... it's a Thermaltake’s Overseer RX-I

), will I be alright in removing current components and installing the new ones with the mainboard still in situ, or would I have to take it out of the case ? (I'm reusing my current CPU cooler which is already mounted to the board: 'Cooler Master Hyper 212 RGB')

2) What would be the best order to remove and remove and reinstall components ? Am I right in saying GPU last ?

3) I believe my board came with '1X M.2 Thermal Guard' but I'm not actually sure if I'm even using it at the moment. Should I have a thermal guard over the new 4 TB M.2 drive that will sit underneath the GPU or won't that fit ?

4) Would you advise installing the new hardware (CPU, memory, GPU) first, trying it, and then taking out the small M.2 drive with the OS on it, or just doing it all in one go.

5) And what size partition would you recommend for Windows 11, on the 1 TB M.2 drive ?

Also welcome any other tips/advice you can think of it. Cheers.

Medic-one · 2 Jun 2023 at 11:11

mickyflinn said:
If you changing from amd to Nvidia or vice versa uninstall the GPU drivers before replacing the GPU., Ddu uninstall is a good program to use.

Thanks for that.

Though if I was to do it all in one go, would I still need to uninstall the GPU drivers ? As I'm removing the M.2 drive with the operating system on, and replacing it with a brand new one that hasn't got any OS on it. Or will there be 'traces' of Nvidia stuff on the mainboard/bios or something ?

Medic-one · 2 Jun 2023 at 11:13

That 'MSI afterburner', is that for like overclocking and stuff ?

Medic-one · 2 Jun 2023 at 11:45

mickyflinn said:
Are you doing a fresh windows install ? You could clone the drive if you want to the new drive . Do this first if applicable Macriun reflect is a good free cloning program .

Download Macrium Reflect FREE Edition - MajorGeeks

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I am doing a fresh install, but of Windows 11, and I've got 10 at the moment.

Medic-one · 2 Jun 2023 at 12:09

mickyflinn said:
Do you need to copy your games drive to the new m2 ? As I'm guessing you would if you using the 1 tb .

Forgot to ask earlier

If yes then you need to do the first before you format the 1tb drive, I looked and your motherboard has 3 m2 slots put the new 4tb in the spare slot and copy you games over.

I thought it only had 2.

One under the heatsink and one just to the left of that :

Medic-one · 2 Jun 2023 at 12:44

No worries. It confused me as well, as it does almost read like there's 3.

Medic-one · 9 Jun 2023 at 08:53

GPU (Sapphire Radeon RX 7900 XT Pulse) arrives today, but unfortunately working the weekend so will be doing the build on Monday.
Couple more questions...

1) Obviously I'll need to download the latest drivers for that GPU, do I need to download drivers for anything else or should everything work ok after a fresh Win 11 install ?

2) If I'm gonna put windows 11 on that 'WD BLUE SN550 1 TB' hard drive, how big should I make the partition for it ? Does Win 11 take up more than Win 10 ?

3) And what's the advice again re thermal past on the CPU (bought some Artic Silver MX6), is it a little blob in the middle, or an 'X' or what do people tend to do ? Apparently the paste comes with some special alcohol wipes to clean the heatsink etc, so use that, let it dry, and then apply paste ja ?

Medic-one · 13 Jun 2023 at 11:40

Ignore.

Medic-one · 16 Jun 2023 at 14:44

So it's all up and running but the temps were a bit high so following advice from here I've ordered a "Peerless assassin 120" to replace my "cooler master hyper 212" which has just arrived and will be fitted over the weekend.

2 quick questions still.

1) I've updated my Bios to it's latest version, but looking on my motherboard's website there are is also a "AMD Chipset Driver" on there. Do I still need to update that to this latest version as well or would that be included in the Bios update ?

2) I've put my new M.2 drive in the PCIe 3.0 slot, but I should have put it in the PCIe 4.0 one (as it's a PCi 4.0 drive) and my old one (containing my Windows 11) is in the PCIe 4.0 slot. If I swap them round will that cause issue's or will the system just 'realise' on which drive the operation system is and still load from there ?