barjed: Also, the mobo seems to have set the speed of RAMs to 1333 but I bought 1600s. Is it safe to change it?

barjed: now I am at 49 degrees idle (in BIOS, gonna check it in Probe in a sec) but I am postiive that it's due to my handicapped thermal paste application.

HampsterStyle: Not sure if you're already aware of optimum SSD drive setups but I'll throw this out there just in case.

- First thing you should do before anything when unboxing an SSD drive is to update it's firmware. This is really one of those steps you don't want to blow off.

- SSD drives perform best when using Advanced Host Controller Interface (AHCI). This will also allow for support of the TRIM command under Win7 natively which is basically a clean up/garbage collection maintenance routine that keeps the drive running optimum over time.

- AHCI mode can be setup 2 different ways

1. Running a single drive on a RAID controller (RAID 0 single drive) will enable AHCI mode by default. Intel usually recommends this method for maximum flexibility. Note that some mobos won't show the drive listed in the regular BIOS or under RAID BIOS but the machine will still see them fine.

2. Running on SATA controller in SATA mode with AHCI enabled. Although Intel recommends the previous I've had more luck using this this method (SATA Mode/AHCI) on the normal SATA controllers.

SSD drives will actually work fine in PATA emulation mode but that lack of TRIM command will definitely become noticeable over time. The lifespan of the drive will most likely be affected as well as overall performance.

If you didn't originally setup your machine that way you can easily change it to AHCI under your BIOS and make a reg tweak under Win7 to enable it.

My registry key for the msahci service looks the same as your screenshot so I guess it got enabled automatically.

edit:
Forgot to mention that you would also want to run the latest AHCI driver for your mobo. There is a default MS one but the latest vendor specific one usually yields the best results.

barjed: edit: Also, I wanted to put my two old HDDs into the new rig and one of them has one of the screws damaged - it turns in place and it's not possible to screw it in or unscrew it. What am I supposed to do? Get a saw and slice through the HDD basket? o_O

barjed: *snip*

Right, so:

I have AHCI enabled in BIOS settings. I plugged the OCZ into the gray SATA port. I think I also accidentaly plugged the optical drive into the other gray SATA but since everythign worked Ieft it that way. I am gonna install the AHCI drivers for the mobo just now. Is that enough?

Also, about the Superfetch. I disabled indexing on the disk but I am not sure about killing Superfetch completely because I also have a traditional HDD for all my big files unless there is a way to disable it for only one disk.

I am gonna update the disk's firmware right now and gonna try enabling the Overclock Tuner fe79 mentioned.

Let me just say that I am extremely grateful for all your wonderful posts :)

btw. Asus Probe shows temps. around 30 degrees when idle and ~50 degrees when under stress so I guess it's all good.

btw2. I followed this http://www.lancelhoff.com/how-to-check-if-trim-is-enabled/ guide and verified that TRIM is enabled on my system. The only problem remaining is the stupid "No HDD detected" :/. Is there any way to check if the drive is working in the SATA III mode?

btw3. It seems that's it not possibly to easily flash the SDD's fw when it's also the disk Windows resides on. Will have to try some tricks with Linux booting from USB :(