How to correctly (fresh) instal Win10 on a BRAND NEW (unformatted) SSD (Kingston NVME 2TB)

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Moratorium

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Hi

I currently have windows 7 on some Samsung 500 GB SSD (850 evo?)

I bought and already physically installed (additional) SSD - brand new - Kingston 2TB NVME (Kingston KC3000 2048GB, SKC3000D/2048G). I did NOT format or in any other sense "touched" the new SSD in my current windows 7 (so i dont even see it among the drives). I want to instal fresh Win 10 on this new SSD (kingston) and i want to do it "correctly".

I will be installing the windows 10 from an USB stick, with some up-to-date instalation of windows 10 that i plan to download beforehand (from my current windows 7 running system) from the microsoft website. Couple of questions:

1) Before Installing Win10 on my new Kingston SSD, i DEFINITELLY should unplug the old Samsung SSD (with current windows 7) from the motherboard SATA connector...? ( i can leave the power sata connector in place (its hard to reach))?

2) I can LEAVE all other of my HDDs (4 magnetic standard HDDs) connected during the process of Win 10 instalation on my new SSD...? (I dont see a reason why i should disconnect them, although people online sometimes say you should) (none of the 4 magnetic HDDs has or had any windows instalation on them ever)

3) The "pre-instalation" wizard of the Win 10 installer (from the USB stick) will let me format and partion the brand new untouched SSD Kingston drive before the instalation of the win 10 itself, correct? Cause the Kingston SSD is currently NOT formatted or partioned etc.
I would like to make 2 partions 1) 565 GB (give or take) for the system (C:); and secondly - 1 300 GB for my work related files (E:). I can do this from the USB stick "pre-instal wizard". Correct ? ( I do not have to format, partion or whatever the new SSD from my current windows 7 OS enviroment beforehand...?)

4) What "format" should i choose...? I assume NTFS for both partions...? What about MAttach filesBR vs GPT, which one should i choose for System and Work partions...?

Thank you
 
  1. Disconnecting the old system volume is a good precaution, but not strictly necessary. It's more likely that the user will goof and reformat/install to the wrong disk than it is that the Windows installer will hose it on its own.
  2. Pretty much the same as above.
  3. Yes, the installer will handle all the partitioning functions. Unless you have a really specific need, I'd highly recommend simply going with a single partition for everything. It's just far easier to manage and you don't have to worry that you incorrectly sized a partition (and then have to go through trying to resize it).
  4. The installer will use the proper options automatically (NTFS on top of GPT).
Before you install, verify that your PC has secure boot enabled in the BIOS/UEFI, and if there's a TPM module available enable it as well. It's much simpler to install with secure boot active than to try and enable it later.
 
BlueLineSwinger said:
  1. Disconnecting the old system volume is a good precaution, but not strictly necessary. It's more likely that the user will goof and reformat/install to the wrong disk than it is that the Windows installer will hose it on its own.
  2. Pretty much the same as above.
  3. Yes, the installer will handle all the partitioning functions. Unless you have a really specific need, I'd highly recommend simply going with a single partition for everything. It's just far easier to manage and you don't have to worry that you incorrectly sized a partition (and then have to go through trying to resize it).
  4. The installer will use the proper options automatically (NTFS on top of GPT).
Before you install, verify that your PC has secure boot enabled in the BIOS/UEFI, and if there's a TPM module available enable it as well. It's much simpler to install with secure boot active than to try and enable it later.
Click to expand...

Hello

Thanks for reply. This is the 1st time im reading about the enabling secure boot and TPM...? Why is that? I currently have them disabled i believe...?
 
Secure Boot is less about security, and more about control. Microsoft created the Secure Boot standard and are the only ones that can sign keys for it. SB was defeated back in 2016, and isn't really a security measure anymore. All of the CPU architecture vulnerabilities that keep being discovered these past several years also render SB rather pointless. If you can't trust the CPU, there's no point in worrying about the boot loader.

The TPM is a similar story, hardly anyone outside Government agencies used them until Microsoft forced the requirement for Windows 11. Even then, there are still several known attacks on TPM modules that aren't properly fixed.

The only reason you'd want to use Secure Boot and a TPM (2.0) is if you want to run Windows 11. Otherwise, you don't need them.

You do want to at least use UEFI booting, because it is a whole lot faster than the older BIOS type booting.
 
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BTW i have a new SSD drive that i will be installing windows 10 on. Its not formatted yet. Im planning to format/partition the C system partition to approximately 565 GB. Im planning to have Windows 10 and my programs on that drive, nothing else... 565 GB should be plenty enough space for this ussage (system+programs), correct?

Also, i know that each memory "cell" of an SSD has limited times you can write to it, before it goes bad (dead)... AFIK ssds have some function that ensures that each new byte of data is written to a new cell, that way, every cell of the SSD is written to, before any old one is overwritten. This basically distributes the written data EQUALLY all over the SSD (in order to prolong the life of the ssd). My question is simple - does this even/uniform/equal distribution of data all over the SSD respect partitioning...? If i create a partition that has only 50 GB for example (or those 565 GB of mine, but lets take an example of 50GB). And i write and overwrite the 50GB again and again and again... Are those 50 GB still distributed all over the drive, or basically are those 50GB written in particular small part of the SSD only and thus those memory cells degrade fruther and further (and much faster than the rest of the drive)...
My hope is that this uniform data distribution ignores the partitions and writes the data still uniformly all over the drive... Correct...?
 
Just curious how are you liking that drive so far? I'll be picking up the same one this weekend as a matter of fact!
 
Moratorium said:
565 GB should be plenty enough space for this ussage (system+programs), correct?
Click to expand...
Maybe, maybe not.... depending on the programs & how much space they require....

On my work box, W10Pro only takes up about 35GB, and about another 10GB for the company's proprietary stuff, but my CAD, flowpath, & analyzer apps take up 300 GB each, plus about a TB for each of their temp/working files, plus MS office & the other normal stuff, so for me, 565GB don't cut it, which is why we have 2x 4TB drives :)
 
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