Did I pick the wrong Hard Drive? Have I made a huge mistake?

unplanned bacon

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Jan 11, 2014
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So my built has been going for about 2 weeks now and I found out today my drive is one of those Intellipower (my fault for not checking up on the drive more before buying, guess I assumed it was like all the other 7200 rpm drives out there) drives and I hear this is bad. Since my build was only intended to have the one HDD it means all my stuff's on it.

So, will I run into problems using this drive only? So far I haven't, and it's pretty much buttery smooth

If I did get another drive, say an SSD or another 7200 rpm HDD, how would I move Windows to it?

And here's another question that's not entirely related, can I turn on UEFI BIOS after installing Windows without breaking Windows (cause it wouldn't install with it on, I had to use Legacy)
 
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Oh, a green drive. That is a bit worse. They are not intended to be used as a boot drive. As you've noticed they run slower (5400RPM) and some have a tendency to spin down when not in use for long periods. They are perfect safe to use, just low performance. If it were me, I'd think about replacing it with a std 7200 rpm drive... or go with a SSD and use the green drive as a storage drive.

As to your EUFI question, I've never come across that before. I have heard another poster mention that, but I have never experienced it with the UEFI boards I've built with lately. Which MB do you have?
I can see no...

clutchc

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Was it one of WD's Red Drives? Those are marketed to businesses that have their drives running 24/7. The drive may spin down to 5400 RPM when not busy or slightly busy. Overall they provide extended life and 'green' technology for economical use. Not exactly a performance drive, but OK.

If you decide to add a SSD as your boot drive and use the HDD as a secondary drive, here is a guide for migrating your Windows 7 installation to the SSD:
http://www.howtogeek.com/97242/how-to-migrate-windows-7-to-a-solid-state-drive/

...and a few more pointers for best performance from the SSD: http://www.computing.net/howtos/show/solid-state-drive-ssd-tweaks-for-windows-7/552.html
 

clutchc

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Oh, a green drive. That is a bit worse. They are not intended to be used as a boot drive. As you've noticed they run slower (5400RPM) and some have a tendency to spin down when not in use for long periods. They are perfect safe to use, just low performance. If it were me, I'd think about replacing it with a std 7200 rpm drive... or go with a SSD and use the green drive as a storage drive.

As to your EUFI question, I've never come across that before. I have heard another poster mention that, but I have never experienced it with the UEFI boards I've built with lately. Which MB do you have?
I can see no reason you can't switch from legacy BIOS to UEFI if the option is available. Personally, I prefer the legacy BIOS for easy access to settings.
 
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