i7/ evga X58 Install

[Tommy Trauma]

Going to install W7 pro upgrade today using vista64 for the validation or whatever and back when I built this rig last year I remember I had issues with installing Vista, or even XP Pro that I had trouble in the bios setting the AHCI up. I wont be doing raid, and am going to install W7 on my WD 300g raptor (GLFS model). I just checked and its in IDE mode. So my question is, before I boot from my upgrade disc of 7 should I hop in the bios and set it to AHCI, or leave it as an IDE? I will be unplugging my two other drives (Seagate 200g barracudas) before I install 7 to my 300g raptor. Will W7 install the necesary drivers to enable AHCI or what. Sorry for the confusion on this. Running the SZ1G bios, and please dont ask me to upgrade the bios first as I'm very uncomfortable doing flashes for some reason. Will I see that much gain in performance from IDE to AHCI, or is that a moot question. I've done quite a bit of reading here on the W7 forums, and apparently I wont even have to run my X58 disc to install the motherboard drivers. Everyone says W7 will install the current (to them) ones during the install.

Thank you
Tom

 

[OpSysWiz]

WIN 7 includes ACHI, but you might consider using IDE, especially if you plan to upgrade to a SSD in the future. Some SSDs have issues with ACHI and work best with the plain-Jane MS IDE drivers.

 

[Saltgrass]

I decided not to use AHCI because it showed my hard drives removable along with USB flash drives and I did not like that. They say AHCI might be good for the larger hard drives, but may not be enough for you to try it.

It is an interesting question, though. If the install can't read the IDE drives to validate the Vista install, will it activate...

Not sure, but if you feel like doing a registry hack, you can change the current drive setup to AHCI. If you were to do that, the question would no longer be relevant.