Need advise

[mkel1966]

Please bear with me. My Asus Rog laptop of more than 10 yrs finally said goodbye. I have a gaming desktop I built 4 yrs ago and still running great that I may upgrade later on. It's an i7-4790k oc'd to 4.6 with gtx 1080 running my triples and a gtx 970 for the 4th monitor, corsair 760w psu, corsair closed loop water cooler. Currently playing rF2, ACC, AMS1 and soon AMS2.
I thought of upgrading it now and use the old components(gtx 1080 with upgraded build for now and gtx 970 to keep with 4790k) to replace the laptop which could save me a few bucks instead of buying a laptop now and upgrading the desktop later.
Questions.
I have a ssd for the os and a mechanical drive on the laptop. Can I install these directly to the board with 4790k that I don't have to do anything else like reformatting them and buying a new OS? Is 450w psu good enough for this and a mid tower case?
What would you recommend for the desktop upgrade(cpu, mb, ram and cooler)? I don't need rgb's here. Will mainly play games mentioned above.
Sorry for the long story, just want to give you the full picture. Appreciate any advise you guys give.

 

[Durge Driven]

Unless you want portability I would forget another laptop

Depends how many hours and need for each system

New CPU/Mobo /Ram + GTX 1080 becomes new gaming tower

4790K / GTX970 is a bit over the top for everyday ?
I would get decent Case PSU Air cooler for it and sell as going unit with Windows key

That would easy pay for AMD 3200G/3400G + SSD setup runs quiet cool cheap 24/7 and years warranty
I use same setup for everyday best thing I ever did


You can uninstall all drivers then reboot in new PC then do new drivers but that is always last option for me

Try to make C:\ contain as little as possible ( i partition SSDs for only 60GB OS ) no need to run any game software on it, 90% of apps will run from a standalone folder on another partition

 

[mkel1966]

Unless you want portability I would forget another laptop

Depends how many hours and need for each system

New CPU/Mobo /Ram + GTX 1080 becomes new gaming tower

4790K / GTX970 is a bit over the top for everyday ?
I would get decent Case PSU Air cooler for it and sell as going unit with Windows key

That would easy pay for AMD 3200G/3400G + SSD setup runs quiet cool cheap 24/7 and years warranty
I use same setup for everyday best thing I ever did


You can uninstall all drivers then reboot in new PC then do new drivers but that is always last option for me

Try to make C:\ contain as little as possible ( i partition SSDs for only 60GB OS ) no need to run any game software on it, 90% of apps will run from a standalone folder on another partition

Yes sir, My c drive only have the OS and the drivers, the rest are on 2nd storage. Could I directly install the storage that has the OS from the laptop to the 4790k build?

 

[Durge Driven]

You mean the actual drive
As long as you never mind losing laptop setup

Basically you would start laptop in offline and remove all drivers
Also right click in device manager on everything you can uninstall and check the boxes delete drivers as well

Then put drive in tower and see if it boots to offline desktop if it does install all drivers run MS updates etc

But for all that it would be much better doing fresh OS

Today is new Cumulative and Netframe update along with anti-malware change in location and download group ( from definitions to quality)

So i just doing fresh OS on my #2 tower with the archive I keep for fresh OS it takes me hour to have everything done and look like mirror from hour ago

I used TrueImage religiously it took 3-4 minutes to redo OS
Now with stable W10 I much rather use my fresh archive takes a hour
Fine tune it all the time, update saved registry firewall W10 and open shell icons

 

[mkel1966]

You mean the actual drive
As long as you never mind losing laptop setup

Basically you would start laptop in offline and remove all drivers
Also right click in device manager on everything you can uninstall and check the boxes delete drivers as well

Then put drive in tower and see if it boots to offline desktop if it does install all drivers run MS updates etc

But for all that it would be much better doing fresh OS

Today is new Cumulative and Netframe update along with anti-malware change in location and download group ( from definitions to quality)

So i just doing fresh OS on my #2 tower with the archive I keep for fresh OS it takes me hour to have everything done and look like mirror from hour ago

I used TrueImage religiously it took 3-4 minutes to redo OS
Now with stable W10 I much rather use my fresh archive takes a hour
Fine tune it all the time, update saved registry firewall W10 and open shell icons

Thanks a lot for replying. This is a big help.
Yes, it's the actual drive. I can't use the laptop anymore. It turns on but all I hear something running/spinning but black screen. Tried to connect to another monitor and nothing also. No responses from any keys. It's a windows 7 updated to w10 that's why i was thinking if I can get away with just putting the actual drive straight to the 2nd pc.

 

[Durge Driven]

Well if you can't use Laptop anymore no harm trying that method to start
If it boots into windows go to updates in offline mode
Perform W10 recovery and restore system settings

I assume you using this SSD for the 4970K

If new CPU/Mobo/Ram I would get a new M2 drive and do fresh OS
All boards now support at least 1 M2
You don't have to spend a arm and leg either, lower end ones perform great

I brought 2 Samsung M2 960 " plus" as main drives for 3900X and 3200G towers
I really can't see the value for gaming won't get caught again.... 3,500mb/s is so far from
real world sim operations it's not funny .....500mb/s SSD is plenty




P.S. just realized DOH you can't remove laptop drivers ...sorry

In that case just put drive as primary in tower
disconnect all other drives
boot up
If you can get to "windows update/ recovery / RESET THIS PC /Get Started " then run it , reboot and go from there
Actually this method is better as you get fresh OS drivers and registry but can retain some stuff you want
Then do fresh drivers for 4970K system

Check CPU-Z score at stock clocks, submit and compare to stock 4970K
If performance is lower then to be expected then need new OS

 

[Durge Driven]

A good trick when re-formatting drive in W10

#1.
Only C:\ existing
In setup select custom and delete all partitions
Don't click NEW click NEXT

#2
C:\ D:\ etc existing
In setup delete C:\ and the small partitions only leaving D: E: etc
Don't click NEW click NEXT

In setup click on " don't have CD Key" and " Don't have Internet" so you can stay offline to properly install all drivers

now when you connect to internet and do W10 updates it will auto-validate

That is why on new SSD first I setup W10 as just C:\ drive and use all drive " JUST CLICK NEXT"
Then later in Disk Management you shrink C:\ and make your D\ etc
Then on next fresh OS do the same as #2

 

[mkel1966]

I may have built my own pc but still uncomfortable with everything because I'm not really a tech person, if you know what I mean. I just have to carefully follow your instructions and hope for the best.

Now unto the main gaming tower. I'm not an intel fanboy but it's what I have right now which I'm a bit used to. Could you recommend a good combo on cpu,mb and ram? Of course, I want this to last another 4 to 5 years. Games I'm playing are rf2, ACC, AMS1 towards AMS2. If Microcenter have these I might go this Monday.

 

[mkel1966]

Well if you can't use Laptop anymore no harm trying that method to start
If it boots into windows go to updates in offline mode
Perform W10 recovery and restore system settings

I assume you using this SSD for the 4970K

If new CPU/Mobo/Ram I would get a new M2 drive and do fresh OS
All boards now support at least 1 M2
You don't have to spend a arm and leg either, lower end ones perform great

I brought 2 Samsung M2 960 " plus" as main drives for 3900X and 3200G towers
I really can't see the value for gaming won't get caught again.... 3,500mb/s is so far from
real world sim operations it's not funny .....500mb/s SSD is plenty




P.S. just realized DOH you can't remove laptop drivers ...sorry

In that case just put drive as primary in tower
disconnect all other drives
boot up
If you can get to "windows update/ recovery / RESET THIS PC /Get Started " then run it , reboot and go from there
Actually this method is better as you get fresh OS drivers and registry but can retain some stuff you want
Then do fresh drivers for 4970K system

Check CPU-Z score at stock clocks, submit and compare to stock 4970K
If performance is lower then to be expected then need new OS

Finally was able to rebuild 4790k. It boots up fine and the laptop setup is carried over with new drivers. I tried to do the reset. It would go to its procedure but would not finish. It keeps saying there was an error completing it(can't remember exact message). So probably I would need fresh OS. It's running ok right now so might just do it later as I am having issues with the new build that I will be returning the mb and get something else.

 

[Durge Driven]

That is good, still think it's over the top for 2nd PC
4790K - GTX970 gets good money , blow dust out of it, buy cheap key and do fresh OS

Build brand new everyday tower 3200G (or whatever ) mATX save a bit more plus money left towards new gaming build
For everyday build you can go 8GB ram and save more

All the sims I run on my 3200G -Vega 8
GPL, GTL, GTR2, PnG, rFactor
Steam ATS, ETS, Spintires, Mudrunner, Rocket League, TM Canyon, Stadium, Valley

The maximum recommended memory for any of above is 6GB
( 8GB system = 2.1GB for video 5.9GB sims )