New PC. what programs to get? tips?

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Mookeylama

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Aug 30, 2012
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Hello,
just got my new pc but unsure as to what programs to get. Microcenter(who built it} loaded all Windows 7 stuff i think, but that's it. i know i had a buncha versions of NET Frameworks that some of my game mods used. right now looks like i only have NET 4 client profile. is this backwards compatible? which other NETs do i need and where to get'em?

also, someone gave me a great tip. not to ever defrag my SSD. i woulda definitely done that if i hadn't known. so any tips like that would be helpful too.
and my 2TB harddrive is showing 0C in Speedfan. was it not installed correctly? do i need to format it?
thanks!
 
Solution
mmaatt747
Yea you can boot into BIOS and then go to the Advanced section. Then click on the "Advanced" tab at the top and go to "SATA Configuration". It will then tell you the color of the SATA port that contains your drives. (This is on page 3-24 of the manual for your board).

On page ix of the manual it tells you what the ports are by color. So brown is Intel and gray is Asmedia.

Hope this helps.
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here's a cutnpaste...
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NZXT Crafted Series Phantom ATX Full Tower Gaming

Intel Core i7 3770K 3.5GHz LGA 1155 Processor

ASUS SABERTOOTH Z77 LGA 1155 Z77 ATX Intel Mobo

850w Corsair PSU

Cooler Master TPC-812 CPU Cooler

EVGA 04G-P4-2673-KR GeForce GTX 670 Superclocked 4GB

Corsair Vengeance Series 16GB DDR3-1600 PC3-12800)

Crucial m4 CT256M4SSD2 256GB SATA 6.0Gb/s 2.5" Int

Seagate 2TB 7200 SATA 6
```````````````````````````````````````````````````

looks like the gtx 670 is using an old driver (8. something). should i get the 301 driver or 306 beta?
 
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dont know why you got a 4gb 670 when the extra vram is useless. if you are running multi-monitor, you should be getting a 7970

sabertooth armour traps heat more than it would reduce heat

should have gotten the phantom 410 but ok



your software should work fine. try installing it
 
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do you have a temperature sensor on the hard drive so that it can actually display a temperature? chances are the 0c reading is because it has no data. unless you have zero case airflow i wouldnt worry about them overheating. i put a wd black drive in a external enclosure and it gets a little warm but nothing i would worry about so you should be perfectly fine.

not sure about NET

programs you should have:

latest windows updates (check)
latest video card drivers (check)
check the mb disk for programs you might like
adobe reader X
winrar
ms office, openoffice or equivalent
latest ie (or firefox or chrome if you so desire)
some form of image editor be it ps or paid software or free software like gimp

optional....
nero suite or equivalent (nice for copying disks, burning disks, creating iso files)
daemontools (useful for reading iso files and editing iso files if you have pro)

as far as other programs... this depends on what you plan to do with the pc. we all have programs we like to use...

personally i do not use speedfan or any other temperature monitor. i do not find it necessary.
 
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First off, you should download and install all the latest drivers for applicable hardware...

Here's a list of the components you should download all the latest drivers for...

Drivers:
Motherboard
chipset
network interface card
usb
audio
Video card

Afterwards, you should download and install all critical updates for Windows 7. Depending on your internet speed, this could take quite a few minutes.

After downloading drivers and updates, get an antivirus. I'm gonna recommend two free and effective options. I suggest you download and install Microsoft Security Essentials. It is an amazing, light-weight antivirus. Afterwards, download and install Malwarebytes Antimalware. This program is to be used in conjunction with your antivirus. You only have to run it every month or so. This program will detect any viruses that MSE leaves behind. Links below:

Just download, install, and update (both programs):

MSE:
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows/products/security-essentials

Malwarebytes:
http://www.malwarebytes.org/

Oh, and I almost forgot; you'll definitely want a browser other than that god-forsaken internet explorer 😛

Try Google Chrome...

https://www.google.com/intl/en/chrome/browser/

It's generally light-weight, simple, stable and fast.
 
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Actually that's one of the problems I have with Steam. I'm pretty sure it defaults all the game files to the C drive... anyway, you can't change it. The only way is to fake Steam by physically moving the game files yourself after you installed that game and then create a link on the C drive pointing to the drive you located it to. I haven't done this yet myself but need to as my SSD is filling up.
 
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where do i find all those drivers? would a utility like Slimdrivers get all these updated drivers?
 
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This is not entirely true. If you install steam into its default location (C: ) then steam, in turn, will install all of the games you have onto the C: drive. If, however, you install steam onto a different drive (say E: ) then steam will install all of the games onto that drive instead.


About the drivers, they should all be available from the motherboard vendor's site. Just go there and find a link for drivers then it should ask you in some way what motherboard you have. After that it should give you a list of all the drivers available for your motherboard (which will also cover the chipset, network card, usb, and audio).
Same for the Video card, go to the vendor's website and tell them what video card you have.
 
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thanks! i went to ASUS to the Sabertooth z77 area. checked Windows 7 64bit, and it's giving me a buncha downloads, like BIOS, bios utility, SATA, chipset, VGA, ect. do i need all of these? there's multiple files for each that i just listed. like there's 7 files for BIOS
 
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Ok, so you can decide the install location. But my point was once you've decided on where you want steam games, then that's it. You can't change it. The reason I don't like this is because I would like to be able to choose where to install games. My resource demanding games (Skyrim, BF3, etc.) I have on my SSD. This is to get the best performance and load times. But all of my other games I would like to be able to install to my HDD as there is much more room available there.
 
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Oh nice Mookeylama. Just watched a video on youtube about that app... pretty cool. I'll have to give it a shot thanks. 😀

As for the updates. I found updates for BIOS, network interface card, usb, and audio all on ASUS' website (I have an ASUS motherboard as well, different board though).

Here is the link for your board:
http://usa.asus.com/Motherboards/Intel_Socket_1155/SABERTOOTH_Z77/#download

For the video card, you can simply download that from Nvidea's website.

Some people suggest that you don't update BIOS unless you are experiencing problems... otherwise you could actually make things worse.
 
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yeah that SteamMover looks pretty good. i went ahead and installed STEAM to the SSD so i'll use it later to move games.

but yes ...i have the ASUS site with the drivers. but does ANYONE know which of those goddamn updates i need to install?! there's multiple ones for each catagory. even excluding the bios, there's like 7 SATA, 4 LAN, 17 Utility, 2 chipset, ect. so far the only one i've felt comfotable installing was the chipset, since there were only 2 and 1 was an installation utility.
 
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