[ale] upgrading desktop

[Bob]

Charles has me thinking about upgrading my 8 year old lenovo desktop. 
I'm thinking of increasing memory and installing an ssd.

I don't know much about hardware, so I'm hoping some of you might give 
me some advice and maybe keep me from doing something stupid.  I'm not a 
gamer, so that might make things simpler.

1)  Memory.  Currently, there are  two 4 GB ddr3 1600 memory modules in 
the two memory slots.  There is no graphics card in my desktop and the 
integrated graphics uses some of the memory.  I can upgrade to two 8 gb 
ddr3l 1600.  According to crucial.com, the crucial 16gb kit (2 x 8GB) 
ddr3l-1600 udimm are compatible.

I believe my motherboard can use either ddr3 or ddr3l.  Is there an 
advantage of one over the other?

(The power supply unit has been fine, but it's only 280 watts.  I don't 
know if that would affect the above choice or not.)

Microcenter has a variety of brands:  Neo Forza, G. skills ripjaw, 
crucial, ....  Are there brands to avoid?  Are there brands that you'd 
recommend?


2)  ssd.  This seems more complicated.

There are 4 empty pci express slots---one is x16 and the others x1.  I 
do not believe that the motherboard supports pcie ssd.  The motherboard 
does not have mSATA or m.2 slots.  So pcie ssd seems to be impossible. 
(I don't know what I'd ever use these slots for.)

The chipset on the motherboard only supports SATA at 3.0 gb/s.  There 
are 3 SATA ports and one e-SATA port.  (There has been no update to the 
bios/uefi firmware.)

One SATA port is connected to the optical drive, and the other two SATA 
ports are connected to the two 1TB HDDs Both drives have plenty of free 
space.

I don't know why I get slightly different info for the following.  When 
I execute "sudo hdparm -I /dev/sda | grep SATA", the result is:

	Transport:          Serial, SATA Rev 3.0

but on /dev/sdb, the result is:

Transport:          Serial, SATA 1.0a, SATA II Extensions, SATA Rev 2.5, 
SATA Rev 2.6, SATA Rev 3.0

The e-SATA port is connected to a usm hot-swappable bay where I'm 
supposed to be able to plug in a portable SATA drive.  The connector is 
supposed to be a standard SATA connector.  I have never used this bay so 
far.

It seems like I could either purchase an external SATA ssd and plug it 
into the bay.  I don't know if I would have troubles booting from that 
drive.

OTOH, I could remove one of the HDDs and put the SSD into either 
/dev/sda or /dev/sdb.  Presumably, I could put the HDD that was removed 
into an enclosure allowing it to be placed into the swappable bay on the 
rare occasions that it was needed.

1)  Does it seem better to remove an HDD and put the ssd into that space 
vs. putting the ssd into the swappable bay?  Does it make a difference 
if the ssd is put into the drive where /dev/sda is or /dev/sdb?

2)  Any suggestions on how large the ssd should be?

3)  Are there brands to avoid or brands that you would recommend?

--Bob