Win 7 on SSD / USB3 PCIe / Above 2TB partition
 

Hi

(1a) Am putting together an old rig comprising Asus PQ-EM, Q6700, 4GB RAM, 60Gb SSD, 250Gb 3.5" SATA, Win 7 64.
No experience with installing Win on a SSD. Read about setting AHCI in bios but not clear what I really need to do. Need to load any other drivers ?

(1b) Do I reach full USB3 speeds if I add a PCIe USB3 card to the motherboard ?

(2) I have a home machine on Win 7 64 and I added a external 3.5" (Astone 2 bay USB3) and plugged a 3TB disk into it. However in Disk mgt, it sees/allows only 2TB per partition when I tried format it. Is this normal ?

Thanks !

(1a) No different than installing Windows on a hard drive. Yes, AHCI is required.

(1b) I don't see why not.

(2) In order to support over 2tb, the USB bridge chip has to support it, and you have to partition it GPT instead of MBR.

Many thanks. Did (1a) and 1(b)