Some help setting up two hard drives

[selayan]

I ended up getting an SSD 128gb (crucial m4) for $140 . I have a 1TB mechanical drive right now running windows 7 64bit. My pc specs are:

Core i5 2500k
Asrock extreme3 gen3
1TB seagate 7200rpm sata 6gb
1gb msi geforce 560Ti Twin Frozr OC
8gb corsair vengence ddr3 1600

Basically I heard you can install the OS, antivirus, updates, some apps on the SSD and everything else on the 1TB HDD.
I would like to keep the Users directory and User Program Data on the mechanical Hdd. Since I have 8gb ram, I won't need the page file or hibernation and I may run some tweaks on the SSD.

Since I have windows already on the tb drive should I format it and set up folders into it like Program Files (x86) and other folders so that when I install games all I have to do is specify the drive letter? Or is there a way during windows 7 install that I can point the paths for temp windows files and installation directories to the mechanical drive?

 

[GenericUser]

Well, I know for sure you can move your temp folder. After you do your fresh install, right click on Computer, go to Properties. Click Advanced System Settings on the left, then look for the Environment Variables button near the bottom and click on that. The top dialog box will show User variables. Edit the path for TEMP and TMP and that should take care of that.

As far as moving the user directories, it looks like a pretty complicated process. I found a guide here:

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_7-files/win7-how-do-i-move-user-folder-to-a-different/565f16a5-e5ed-43c9-8422-4f56aebb296e

But like I said, it looks complicated and from what I looked up I don't see an easier way.

I would recommend making a "games" or "programs" folder on the mechanical drive and then specify that folder when installing. As far as handling your data for the move though, it depends on what you want to do. Is your mechanical drive just a giant partition? You will want to figure out how you want to get the old windows installation off that when you are done.

 

[selayan]

Yeh my mechanical drive is one partition, currently the C: drive since it is the only drive in my pc as of now. I have a bunch of games on there: orgin with BF3, steam with batma, some other apps and a few songs. Tons of space left. It has Windows 7 64 bit running on there. I figure I will need to reinstall BF3 onto the SSD since origin will not let you install to another drive.

 

[GenericUser]

Yeh my mechanical drive is one partition, currently the C: drive since it is the only drive in my pc as of now. I have a bunch of games on there: orgin with BF3, steam with batma, some other apps and a few songs. Tons of space left. It has Windows 7 64 bit running on there. I figure I will need to reinstall BF3 onto the SSD since origin will not let you install to another drive.

Actually, you can point to a different install directory with Origin. When you log in, look for the picture of the gear with the arrow near your name and click on that. A drop menu should appear. Click settings. You should now see a field where you can specify the path to install your downloaded games. It will only apply for future games though, so any currently installed would have to be reinstalled to be put in the new directory.

 

[selayan]

I see, thanks for that info. I know there is steam mover which will let me move my batman game over to the hdd.

I figure what I will do is use audit mode once the windows 7 is installing and specify where the Users directory and App data should go. Once that is done I will just run the Tom's tweaks for the SSD.

I think for the pagefile I will lower it to 1gb and move it to the mechanical hard drive. I have 8gb ram and there seems to be some controversy weather to turn page file off or leave it.