HOW TO: SATA III-SSD-RAID0-Windows Installation: Questions, Troubleshooting Thread

[[Nikos]]

Hi guys!
I'm planing to buy an SSD for OS and programs. I think one of the best SSDs right now is kingston's hyperX. I was wondering which steps I would have to do if I plan to make RAID 0. I'm waiting for my rig to arrive home. My rig is coming with default HD (320Gb), and here is my question:

What problems I'm going to find if I try to clone the disk to a RAID 0 of those kingston's SSD?
Which steps I shall have to do?
I mean, Shall I do a clean install to make disks work properly?

Thank you very much!

PS: I'll do the RAID with 2 SSD of course :P

Could anyone help me?

Thank you very much!

[eoinmfoley]

The general consensus here is that it's better to do a fresh install of windows after you have created the Raid array and reinstall all the drivers in this order:

1. Chipset Driver
2. USB 3.0 Driver (11xR3, 14x, 17xR3, 18x only)
3. Intel RST Driver / Intel Management Engine
4. Freefall Sensor Driver
5. Alienware On-Screen Display Driver
6. INTEL & AMD Graphics drivers (must be switched to integrated graphics to install the Intel HD driver)
7. LAN Driver
8. Wireless Network Driver
9. Audio Driver
10. Bluetooth Driver
11. Touchpad Driver
12. Media Card Reader Driver
13. Alienware Command Center
NOTE: Command Center should always be installed last.

I put a SSD in mine and did a fresh install, everything fine now.

[johnksss]

well...what do you do after it falls out of sata 3 mode later down the line?

[eoinmfoley]

well...what do you do after it falls out of sata 3 mode later down the line?

Not sure who the question was directed at... I had an Intel SSD that dropped out of SATA III after reboots and booted slowly due to a conflict between it and my WD HDD, however I have since sold the Intel 510 and replaced it with a 128GB Crucial M4 SSD and everything is working perfectly.

[johnksss]

Not sure who the question was directed at... I had an Intel SSD that dropped out of SATA III after reboots and booted slowly due to a conflict between it and my WD HDD, however I have since sold the Intel 510 and replaced it with a 128GB Crucial M4 SSD and everything is working perfectly.

your questions up above...


it seems to be a board/bios thing...i have to physically unplug it from the MB and power on, then power off and reconnect. then it kicks back into sata 3 mode. and it doesnt matter what drive i have in there first. heck...they are both the same drives... i remember that was discussed as well...

this is very annoying!

side note:
it did it to my m4 as well...and i would put it on stat port 1 and it would work fine...this is no help to raid though...

[eoinmfoley]

your questions up above...


it seems to be a board/bios thing...i have to physically unplug it from the MB and power on, then power off and reconnect. then it kicks back into sata 3 mode. and it doesnt matter what drive i have in there first. heck...they are both the same drives... i remember that was discussed as well...

this is very annoying!

side note:
it did it to my m4 as well...and i would put it on stat port 1 and it would work fine...this is no help to raid though...

I didn't try too many fixes, bar swapping the drives in their bays etc. but nothing worked. The Intel SSD was perfect in there by itself but once the HDD was there, it made a strange clicking sound during boot up and boot times were over 30 secs. After a while I just tried a different brand of SSD and haven't looked back.

[johnksss]

I didn't try too many fixes, bar swapping the drives in their bays etc. but nothing worked. The Intel SSD was perfect in there by itself but once the HDD was there, it made a strange clucking sound during boot up and boot times were over 30 secs. After a while I tried a different brand of SSD and haven't looked back.

ok. thanks for the input!!

mine is back to working again. ill have to keep an eye on that...i didnt realize it wasn't working till i tried to run pcmark05. hdd scores were far to low.

i didn't get the clicking sound..just the dropped speeds when using an ssd/hdd combo, but it was fine if i set port1 as ssd.

[[Nikos]]

If I mount a RAID Do I lose the TRIM function right? As I discuss in previous post I'm going to set up a RAID 0 with Kingston HyperX drives. I read that the current SSDs incorporates a function called garabage collection, which makes more or less the same function as TRIM.

With no active TRIM, the performance degrades as time passes.

My question is:

What procedure do you recomend me when this happens?

Format? Load a previously created image with everything installed?

It seems a little pain in the having to do this from time to time.
Do you know any other method to maintain or restore performance without having to reformat?

Thank you very much!

[[Nikos]]

If I mount a RAID Do I lose the TRIM function right? As I discuss in previous post I'm going to set up a RAID 0 with Kingston HyperX drives. I read that the current SSDs incorporates a function called garabage collection, which makes more or less the same function as TRIM.

With no active TRIM, the performance degrades as time passes.

My question is:

What procedure do you recomend me when this happens?

Format? Load a previously created image with everything installed?

It seems a little pain in the having to do this from time to time.
Do you know any other method to maintain or restore performance without having to reformat?

Thank you very much!

Help please :P last questions I guess hehe :S

[johnksss]

If I mount a RAID Do I lose the TRIM function right? As I discuss in previous post I'm going to set up a RAID 0 with Kingston HyperX drives. I read that the current SSDs incorporates a function called garabage collection, which makes more or less the same function as TRIM.

With no active TRIM, the performance degrades as time passes.

My question is:

What procedure do you recomend me when this happens?

Format? Load a previously created image with everything installed?

It seems a little pain in the having to do this from time to time.
Do you know any other method to maintain or restore performance without having to reformat?

Thank you very much!

what i did was...
pulled the drives out as a whole.
connected it to my desktop system.
then did a ocz wiper command on both. then put them back in the laptop.
if that didn't work...i would image the drive, then secure erase then re install image back on raid 0 setup.