XPS410 2nd HDD

Is this something unique to a 410? I have not heard that before with any raid capabale system. I have added three extra drive to my system and do not see that at bootup.

What is your SATA setting in the bios set to?

I had a 9200 / XPS410 with two hard drives non-raid and it certainly did not pause for a minute on boot, I think a RAID controller message may have flashed up during boot though that was all.

The SATA settings are as follows:

SATA 0   320GB HDD with OS

SATA 1   CD-RW/DVD ROM drive

SATA 2    DVD+/- RW drive

SATA 3  Off

SATA 4  320 GB HDD  (new drive)

SATA 5 Off

I used the SATA plug on the board because it was easier to reach, No other reason

John

Air1855

there should be an overall SATA setting as per HERE See the setting under the Drives secton SATA Operation.  With a non raid setup it should be set to Raid autodetect/ATA

Just noticed the SATA settings posted above, the h/ds should be SATA 0 and 1, the RAID related delay could be because the controller is trying to read a CD-RW/DVD ROM drive so try changing to the following by moving the SATA cable connectors on the mobo and reflect the changes in the setup.

SATA 0   320GB HDD with OS

SATA 1   320 GB HDD  (new drive)

SATA 2    CD-RW/DVD ROM drive

SATA 3    DVD+/- RW drive

SATA 4    Off

SATA 5    Off

Okay, here is what I have done or tried based on the various suggestions.

I changed the SATA Setup as shown here

SATA 0   320GB HDD with OS

SATA 1   320 GB HDD  (new drive)

SATA 2    CD-RW/DVD ROM drive

SATA 3    DVD+/- RW drive

SATA 4    Off

SATA 5    Off

No change in pause

I changed the the Raid Operation to a non raid setup and set it Raid autodetect/ATA.   Does Not work.  System would not boot, ran through a lengthy problem diagnostic and finally shut down.  Had to change back to Raid On.

Tried the Dell Tech support chat and that was a total waste of time.  They end up sending me all the setup options.  I could tell the person was stumped..

Appreciate everyones help. This phenominan seems to be the nature of the beast.

Well since it won't boot with the raid autodetect that is why it is showing up. it is trying to set up a raid array. unfortunatly the only way for you to correct this would be to do a complete reinstall.

whtabt

POST Behavior

POST Hotkeys

None

It is hard to beleive that a reinstall is required because the machine was running OK with one h/d so could not have been configured as RAID at the first install.

Click Start > Run then type in compmgmt.msc and click OK, you are in Computer Management (that is for XP, I think Vista is the same) then look under Storage > Disk Managment, does that tell you anything about the disc set up?

Using Disk Management does not show anything relating to RAID/NON-RAID  setup.  It gives you stauts of drives:

Layout - Simple

Type - Basic

File System - NTFS

Status - Healthy ( Primary or System)

Disk Capacity and any partitions.

The system was not setup as Raid but the SATA option in the bios was set to Raid not Raid autodetect/ATA.

So with one drive it did not try to setup a raid array, with the addition of the second drive the controller has sensed the second drive and now wants to try to create the array.

Why the bios was set this way is unknown. And as the OP has experienced he cannot change the SATA setting as the system will not boot.

So therefore the only recourse is to do a reinstall with the bios set to Raid autodetec/ATA.

No I am not sure if when one presses the CTRL-I what options will pop up. There may be a possibility that one can disable the message from inside the options screen.

Not being a user nor fan of a Raid this is only conjuncture on my part. Perhaps someone who is familur with the settings when pressing the CTRL-I will chime in and list the settings.

Well we know what the first and second option would do.  :emotion-1:

IF you feel a bit gammey, you could make an image of your current drive and try the third option. I would strongly recommend that if you feel like trying the 3rd option.

The way I read the option it will just create a regular volume.

The system was set to RAID ON by Dell when shipped.

When you press CTRL-I you have 3 optiions:

Create RAID Volume

Delete RAID Volume

Create Non-RAID Volume

or  Exit

No way to hide message

I Ordered a 9200/410 about 18 months ago, I specified 2 x 250GB h/d's non RAID and it came as such, why they set the BIOS to RAID when building a single h/d machine I really dont know.

Now I would have thought that with a single h/d the system would have tried to build a RAID array though would not have been able to do so because of the absence of the second drive so the Windows install should be as per non RAID and that it should boot with the BIOS switched to RAID off - though I cant answer how. 

I reckon I would give Dell a hard time for building the machine with RAID on and single h/d thus making the perfectly normal installation of a 2nd h/d (probably) impossible without an OS reinstall.