Windows 10 Installation

[RJB]

I'm looking to order a custom pc. After much back and forth I pretty much have the spec lined up but wanted to know a few things. I have a Win 10 licence. If I sent you the key when I order would you be willing/able to install it (trying to save ££ on the price, and not too confident in my own ability to do a 1st time install and set it up right)?
Also, I wanted to know the brand of the "stock" PCS 256GB PCIe M.2 SSD? I am looking at having this as my system drive, and using a 2nd M.2 (the 1TB SAMSUNG 970 EVO PLUS M.2, PCIe NVMe ) as my data/games drive. I read a thread where Scott mentioned having separate system and application drives. This sounds like a great idea in case I need to reinstall windows. What I wanted to know is am I kneecapping my data/application/games drive's speed ability by having a slower windows system drive?
Cheers.

 

[Scott]

PCS don't really monitor these forums, we are mainly comprised of volunteer-enthusiast-customers, etc.

That being said, I don't think sending in the key is a good idea. I doubt PCS would accept it as there are possibly implications of sharing such information over a phone/email/etc. I can't be certain though so you could call and ask.

When PCS build your PC and send it out to you, it WILL have Windows 10 installed on it. It just won't be activated. When you initially switch it on, there will be an "activate now" button. Simply click it and fire in your key.... job done. After this point, check everything is working as it should be and then I would highly recommend downloading a fresh copy of Windows 10 from Microsoft and load it onto a USB stick to perform a completely clean install. There are loads of guides for this and if you need any help along the way give us a shout.

Regarding your storage options, you would be better to have a 500GB primary drive and a 1TB secondary drive. The secondary drive is the least important for speed so I would recommend doing the opposite with the brands. 500GB Evo for the primary drive and 1TB PCS drive for the secondary. Regarding the branding, you would need to phone PCS and ask them. They used to sell the ADATA drives, which are excellent, so you could even ask if they would install one of those for the games.

It may be a good idea to post your entire spec to get advice. There are often things missed or misunderstood when speccing a PC. The configurator won't stop you from making bad choices.... it will only stop you from making incompatible ones.

 

[Rakk]

I'm looking to order a custom pc. After much back and forth I pretty much have the spec lined up but wanted to know a few things. I have a Win 10 licence. If I sent you the key when I order would you be willing/able to install it (trying to save ££ on the price, and not too confident in my own ability to do a 1st time install and set it up right)?

As far as I remember they won't do this, for one thing what happens if the key is invalid (a typo or whatever), but yeah if you go here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/software-download/windows10 it gives instructions on how to create the usb boot drive and how to install, and its actually fairly simple.
You can just enter your key as Scott suggested though (his post came through as I was writing this) - I just prefer a clean install and when I did it I was putting Win10 professional on it anyways

 

[RJB]

Thank guys. Didn't realise that it would arrive with an unactivated copy.
Sorry for not understanding this, but why would I need to perform a re-install after I activate it with my key?
Scott, I've taken your advice on the storage options. I intend to use the 2nd drive for gaming, recording (webcam, games, music). Would doing lots or write actions mean that I would probably need to replace the drive in a couple years? I've only ever used HDDs for this before and they can last a good number of years before needing to be replaced.
Here is the link to my build:
Unique URL to re-configure: https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/amd-am4-gen3-pc/HFuCmSpFgB/

 

[Scott]

The 660p wouldn't be recommended as it has less write potential than other options (I would still check with PCS to find out the brand so that you can look this up).

I've only had one SSD fail on me due to coming to the end of it's life and it was a notorious Kingston drive that went on everyone. Other than that, I've never had an issue so I wouldn't consider it. The whole reason for having that drive is to lower the amount of writes required. Once your games are on there.... they are on, save for updates, so that itself limits the writes to it.

If the system is predominately for gaming you could save a fair few quid and go for the 3300X. That's going to be my new recommendation for any gaming build as it stands up against any CPU on the market (within 5% fps above 1080p).

 

[RJB]

Ah yes, I was looking at the 3300X. I also do video and sound editing, so thought the 3600 would be a bit faster. Correct assumption?
Regarding the storage, would this be better?

PCSPECIALIST - Top Spec Custom PCs & Laptops Built to Order

Manufacturer of performance custom computers and laptops. Customise your ideal gaming PC or laptop using our advanced configurator.

www.pcspecialist.co.uk

PS: I have an old Creative Blaster Audigy Fx 5.1 I plan to add to the build. Would it be compatible?

 

[Scott]

Ah yes, I was looking at the 3300X. I also do video and sound editing, so thought the 3600 would be a bit faster. Correct assumption?
Regarding the storage, would this be better?

PCSPECIALIST - Top Spec Custom PCs & Laptops Built to Order

Manufacturer of performance custom computers and laptops. Customise your ideal gaming PC or laptop using our advanced configurator.

www.pcspecialist.co.uk

PS: I have an old Creative Blaster Audigy Fx 5.1 I plan to add to the build. Would it be compatible?

Ideally you want a 500GB primary drive. The Evo's are expensive unfortunately. If I were in your position I would go with the 500GB primary Evo drive, the 2TB Seagate conventional drive and I would fit my own 1TB drive. There are no known budget options with PCS, whereas the SX6000 or SX8200 Pro are known excellent drives and can be purchased for reasonable money. PCS have an open case policy so you're free to fit whatever drives etc you want yourself, as long as you are careful and don't damage anything of course.

The 3600 makes more sense for the editing, yes definitely. Ideally you would want the 3800X on there but that would bump up the price significantly as you would want a good cooler on there too (Minimum £50 extra just for the cooler).

With regards to the sound card, you're not going to gain anything from it. The onboard 7.1 audio card is going to be high end. If you wanted better for a sound studio then you would be looking at an external DAC to have something more meaningful.

 

[RJB]

Yes - would love the 3800X - but the budget doesn't quite stretch that far. I went for a better mobo so I can upgrade the CPU in the future if needed.
Thanks - last question: why the 500GB primary drive? I think ! only plan to put the basic system stuff on it (windows, recovery, maybe office). Other applications will be on the 2nd drive (photoshop, premiere, games). I also have 2x 2TB HDDs in my current system that I will use for data dump/storage.
Wouldn't 250GB be enough for the system?
Once again, thanks for all the helpful feedback. I really do appreciate it.

 

[Scott]

Yes - would love the 3800X - but the budget doesn't quite stretch that far. I went for a better mobo so I can upgrade the CPU in the future if needed.
Thanks - last question: why the 500GB primary drive? I think ! only plan to put the basic system stuff on it (windows, recovery, maybe office). Other applications will be on the 2nd drive (photoshop, premiere, games). I also have 2x 2TB HDDs in my current system that I will use for data dump/storage.
Wouldn't 250GB be enough for the system?
Once again, thanks for all the helpful feedback. I really do appreciate it.

I wouldn't recommend 250GB for a primary drive now, everything is getting bigger and bigger. With a fresh install Windows is only around 20GB but after use it easily creeps up to double that. You need space for updates, recovery files, generic documents and desktop usage etc. There's the page-file and the hibernate file (the same size as your RAM), etc, etc, etc. 100GB is gone in the blink of an eye. 200 will follow soon after and a 250GB drive doesn't leave a lot of headroom. I have games that are 100GB now, it's madness. The softwares are ALL getting larger. You don't want to run your drive much over 50% capacity. I tend to keep my primary drives around the 50% mark. Secondary and storage drives are different, I almost fill them to the brim.

Premiere projects use a LOT of space when working.

I would put Photoshop & Premiere on the primary drive also though. Just point them to the secondary M2 drive as a cache/scratch disk when loading/creating a project for a speed bump when the RAM gets close to full. Your software will benefit from fresh installs along with Windows too in all honesty. It's just the games you don't want to be faffing around with every time

 

[RJB]

You make a good point. Thanks for clarifying that. So I've opted for the 500 EVO as primary and the 1TB EVO as secondary (more money, but what can you do ).
I've gone to the next section of the order and it is asking about partitions. Anything specific I should be looking to set here?

 

[Rakk]

I've gone to the next section of the order and it is asking about partitions. Anything specific I should be looking to set here?

Unless you have a specific reason for wanting/needing partitions you don't need them, so no (I'm guessing that if you knew you needed them you wouldn't be asking )

 

[RJB]

I'm guessing that if you knew you needed them you wouldn't be asking

Not specifically. My current system has a recovery partition. I don't know if that is a default windows thing, or something I should manually set up.

 

[Rakk]

Not specifically. My current system has a recovery partition. I don't know if that is a default windows thing, or something I should manually set up.

That gets created by the windows installation, in fact the Windows installation creates a couple of partitions, so you don't need to worry about those (for a start you get no choice for them )

 

[RJB]

Awesome - thanks for the help.
Order placed.
Fingers crossed.
Eeeek!