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First build in over a decade begins today. i7 system. Lord help me!

Matt_Stevens

Matt_Stevens

Senior member
Thanks to all here who helped me decide on what to and not to purchase. Clearly I could have waited for some cheaper B3 MB's to come out, but I was not patient and just said **** it and went ahead and dived in.

What I am not sure of is how many drivers Windows 7 will take care of by itself and which ones I will have to do myself. When I upgraded my HDD and OS on my current Shuttle XPC I was stunned to find Windows 7 handled all of the drivers for the motherboard and it's various hardware perks.

This i7 system is based off of the brand spanking new MSi P67A-GD65 (B3) MB so I don't know if Windows 7 will have all the latest drivers at its disposal or via download from Microsoft.

What would the resident experts advice about this? I was unsure of the Shuttle having the right drivers and sought help here to understand. Man, things are so different compared to the 90's when you had to install every darned driver yourself.

Video card is the MSi GeForce GTX 460. It looks like the driver CD has the same ones on MSi's website (at least I think it does).

This system will be based off of Intel's 120GB SSD so I will install that drive first and then, when everything is super duper fricking stable I will start adding hardware piece by piece (BD drive, then the two Western Digitals in a RAID 0, then the two Samsungs in a mirror RAID).

First impressions of the Rosewill case is so-so. About what was expected. Decent, but the real negative is that the side panels are horrible to remove. I need to use a screwdriver in the back to pry it open a bit. This brings back memories of the 90's for sure.

I'll post updates as they come. Thanks for your help, gang.

systembuild01.jpg
 
Windows usually loads and installs enough for it to work, you should be able to download the most recent drivers from the manufacturer. I know for sure that you will have to install the video card drivers manually.
 
Nice array of parts you've got there!

Windows 7 is very good with driver support as you say. I usually only go out of my way to load the GPU drivers and drivers for any device that shows up as undetected in the Device Manager.
 
Best of luck with this build. I am in the same situation as you. I am currently running a Shuttle sn41g2v2, which is on its way out. Hope the build goes well.
 
Went to war tonight. 😀 Well, not really, but I am dead tired. It was sloooooow going with it being over a decade since the last build. At times I was mightily confused but as of now, after a good five hours...

Motherboard is IN and hooked up.

The hard drives are in place (but not cabled, except for the SSD).

The DVD drive is in place and cabled (the BD drive is in place and not cabled).

CPU is seated, fan/heatsink are installed. Video card is installed.

System was powered up and I can successfully get into the rather surprisingly colorful bios. Using the included drivers CD it took me onto the internet where it checked for a BIOS upgrade (found none). Does the CD have Linex or something to do that?

Bios detects the DVD drive and my SSD, but when it boots up the initial DOS looking text says no hard drive found. Does the SSD need to be in SATA 1 to be detected? It causes less stress on the cable if it is in SATA 3.

Am I right that it doesn't really matter where the drives are hooked in?

What I would like to do is find the program I read about a while back where I can force the CPU to go blazing so as to make the thermal paste cure and to test just how good the cooling is. In the bios the temp for the CPU is at 38 and the system 27.

Does NewEgg have a restocking fee for unopened parts? I bought an extra fan I don't need and a 2.5 to 3.5 drive adapter that is also not needed. Whoops.

I now will go to bed and pass out. My back aches. Ugh. In the morning I will get up and install Windows 7. Should that go well, I will get the two Western Digital hard drives installed and try them in a mirrored raid.
 
My B3 Sabertooth with 1305 bios STILL says no HD detected...

...at this point I'm not even worrying about it, PC is running like a champ!
 
Make sure your BIOS is set to ACHI

I would try and get it in SATA 0(1)

Newegg sometimes wont charge for opened parts, so you should be good.
 
BIOS to ACHI? Now, if memory serves, with XP that was a problem. It kind of had to be installed separately, but during Windows' installation or something. But with Windows 7 is that not at all an issue? Just enable in the BIOS and move on?

The parts I want to send back to NewEgg were never opened so hopefully they will say okay.
 
Matt_Stevens said:
BIOS to ACHI? Now, if memory serves, with XP that was a problem. It kind of had to be installed separately, but during Windows' installation or something. But with Windows 7 is that not at all an issue? Just enable in the BIOS and move on?

The parts I want to send back to NewEgg were never opened so hopefully they will say okay.
Click to expand...

You are correct about W7 and ACHI. Just enable.
 
Ran into my first real hurdle. WIndows installed blaazingly fast. The SSD was just blowing my mind. But then, just about when I was done installing the drivers for the MSi motherboard, things slowed down. A reboot took three minutes. The next reboot took five. All subsequent reboots take at least five minutes and it took 40+ minutes to install the nVidia drivers (just the main driver, as I have yet to do the other drivers).

Something is certainly wrong.

I wonder if this Winki Loader thing is interfering? I actually went to go and uninstall it, but it is not listed under windows. WTF?

And last... nowhere in the manual or papers does the MSI info have anything about setting up a RAID. I'm basically in the dark and have to guess, which I don't like.

So that is where I'm at. Oh joy.

I stared a specific thread on this.
 
Last edited:
Matt_Stevens said:
Ran into my first real hurdle. WIndows installed blaazingly fast. The SSD was just blowing my mind. But then, just about when I was done installing the drivers for the MSi motherboard, things slowed down. A reboot took three minutes. The next reboot took five. All subsequent reboots take at least five minutes and it took 40+ minutes to install the nVidia drivers (just the main driver, as I have yet to do the other drivers).

Something is certainly wrong.

I wonder if this Winki Loader thing is interfering? I actually went to go and uninstall it, but it is not listed under windows. WTF?

And last... nowhere in the manual or papers does the MSI info have anything about setting up a RAID. I'm basically in the dark and have to guess, which I don't like.

So that is where I'm at. Oh joy.

I stared a specific thread on this.
Click to expand...

Try starting fresh, but this time, don't install anything from MSI. As a general rule, I never install drivers from the mobo manufacturer, and certainly not the ones that came on the CD.
 
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