First Enthusiast/Gaming Rig

So Tuesday I went to the local small bank and got a personal loan to get a new laptop. My first thought was to get a Y50 because it's the big thing in mid-ish tier rigs, but I read about the poor screen quality and I was really wanting an SSD for the performance boost when it comes to video editing and photo editing and such. So I found an open box MSI GS60 on Newegg for $1119 (I had a $1200 budget) and decided I was going to get it. By this time it was around midnight and I had cash on hand - no money in the bank so I assumed that it would be there in the morning. Woke up, got to the bank and put the money in, got to work where I was going to order it and it had sold out. So I was kind of pissed. I remembered reading about Sager/Clevos on reddit and I found Xotic PC.

I waited till they opened and called and talked to a sales rep and asked him about the intricacies of the various models that fell under budget for me. He told me about the NP7358 and a more expensive model. I needed an OS so I had to add that on for $80. The more expensive model with the OS came up to $1229. It had the 860m 4GB Kepler, was a 17", and I believe the processor was the i7-4810. I ended up talking to him about the differences in the heating/cooling and the Maxwell vs. Kepler structure. I decided that the Maxwell would be better for my uses and then we discussed build quality. Satisfied I decided that I would go with the NP7358, upgrade to 12GB of RAM, and get a 120GB SSD for my OS drive. It came to the $1229 of the other and had everything that I was looking for. So now I have the NP7358 with the i7-4710MQ, the 860m 2GB, 12gb DDR3 dual channel RAM, 15.6" matte screen, 1tb 7200rpm hard drive, 120gb SSD, windows 8.1 64-bit. I also got the upgraded wireless card, I can't remember the name because it was a free upgrade. Though I would have missed it unless Jeremy B (the rep on the phone) pointed it out to me. So needless to say I am pretty pumped.

TL;DR:
I didn't mean to make this thread sound like a blog post, just kind of happened. Sorry. So I have no experience with enthusiast/gaming rigs or their power/abilities. Before installing any games or even Steam what programs, hacks, tune-ups, or other things do I need to do to maximize the power, performance, and capabilities? I just want to start everything off right so I can get the best performance for my games.

Thanks guys.

 

1 - You might want to check out the Sager/Clevo forum for this kind of post XD.

2 - You may want to get very familiar with FN + 1 = max fans. It will help in anything that roasts the CPU.

3 - You will want to probably make sure you have some sort of start menu giving program like Stardock Start 8 or StartIsBack for Windows 8. You said your OS was $80 so I know you're getting Win 8. (Then I read up and realized you mentioned Win 8 too >_>)

4 - You will want to install various games and get to gaming =D.

5 - You will need to learn how to clean your fans periodically so your temps stay down.

6 - You will need to learn how to undervolt your CPU if you need to keep it a little cooler; I suggest Intel XTU or a modified BIOS from Prema that is unlocked.

7 - You will need to enjoy your system to the fullest =D.