Windows 10: buying a computer with 2 hard drives

I am thinking about buying a new computer that has both a solid state and hard disk (not sure if it is a hybrid or separate drives). Most that I have seen have a 120G SSD and a 1 or 2TB HDD. I am sure I want Windows 10 as my OS.

Here is my question:

will the HDD be recognized as the C: drive or just the SSD? I ask this because I am used to installing everything on the C: drive and don't want the D: drive as my storage drive and 120G is not big for storage.

:)

 

Windows 10 on 2 hard drives in same computer?

Hello,

Can I install Windows 10 on 2 hard drives on the same computer and activate it with the same license?

1st HDD -> Windows 10

2nd HDD -> Windows 10

It will only be active every time 1 HDD only.

 

Windows 10 on 2 hard drives in same computer?

You will still need a separate license (product key) for both. You can't use the same product key to activate two installations.

 

The laptop i'm using here has a 250GB SSD and 1 TB HDD. The c: drive is on the former. I would definitely not go less the 250gb, but I knew that from my last c: drive which is imaged onto this one. Cleaned up a lot of crap when I'd got it moved and have 126gb free.
All work and data etc goes on the hdd.
Boots off the ssd really fast too!*Eek

 

The C drive is from wherever (partition) runs the OS. In your case it could be either, but from the SSD it will be faster.

 

And why wouldn't you want your stuff on the other drive? I never keep my stuff on the same partition were windows is install

 

I am asking because when you go to install most software it wants to install on the C: drive.

 

I recommend to install the programs where the OS is. But the user data should be in a separate partition. If the OS goes down, that's easy to replace. If the data goes down, you may have a problem - unless you make frequent images that I recommend.

 

How much data do you have? Ordering a PC with a 1/2 TB SSD should be possible. Though if it was me I would keep the OS+programs in a separate partition from data.

 

A 1/2 TB SSD will cost you a good penny. That would not be my choice. I would take a 120GB SSD for the OS and put the data on a spinner.

 

I always back up my computer once a week.

 

Using an SSD for the OS and applications is a good compromise between performance and economy. Using an SSD for everything would be better but that is still quite expensive.

The different usage patterns of the OS+application code and application data make such a division possible. Access to the OS and application code typically consists of small reads scattered over multiple files. SSDs handle this very well but it is a major weakness of conventional drives. Access to data typically consists of large reads confined to a single file. Conventional drives handle this quite well and most of the advantages of an SSD are lost. An SSD for data is still better but expensive.

If possible you want applications installed on your OS drive. This is true for a convention drive but even more so when it is an SSD. For me a 120 GB SSD is more than adequate but many people require more.

The downside of such a division of applications ans data is that you must take an active part in choosing where data will be stored. If you accept the defaults for everything the SSD will fill rapidly while the storage drive remains largely empty. Windows won't make this choice for you. When there are multiple drives Windows assumes the user knows what he is doing and will do the right thing. Unfortunately that often isn't the case.

 

This setup is very similar to what I'm using. I have a 256 GB SSD as C drive and a 1 TB conventional hard drive as D.

Is it possible to move the entire "Users" directory from C drive to D drive and have it be recognized without doing anything special?