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

[redbaron_snoopy]

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 !

[glc]

(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.

[redbaron_snoopy]

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