Hard Drive Replacement - Dell Inspirion 17R Special Edition

Hi ymoiseyev,

mSATA hard drive is used for caching purpose, so that frequently used programs or instructions are virtually stored on mSATA partition as SSD are faster than the normal hard drive. mSATA drive uses the SSD technology to make the system faster. If you replace the normal mechanical hard drive with SSD hard drive the IRST technology feature would be nullified. However, to use the SSD on the system you will have to change the SATA operation mode in the BIOS from IRST to AHCI. You will need an operating system reinstallation disc to install it on the system. Using the Dell recovery discs will not work as the SATA operation mode is different with previous hard drive.

thanks for your response. So I need to clone the drive first and afterwards replace the hard drive with SSD drive and change the BIOS settings from IRST to ACHI, correct? Or am I missing something?

many thanks,

Yuri

Are you 100 percent certain that after I replace my mechanical hard drive with an SSD drive, I need to change BIOS settings from from "RAID" to "AHCI"? Your tech. support guy on the phone said that  I shouldn't change anything after SSD installation.

many thanks and I will look forward to hearing back from you,

Yuri

Your best bet is to do a clean load of the OS once you've installed the SSD -- you do not need the Intel Rapid Storage mode with the OS loading from a solid state drive.

Can you please clarify if I can do the following on my Dell Inspiron 17R 1720 Special Edition with mSATA drive installed?

1. Can I clone my mechanical hard drive and replace it with an SSD Drive? 

2. If so, do I need to change the BIOS settings from IRST to AHCI or can I leave them the way they are?

3. If I do the switch from IRST to AHCI mode will my mSATA drive still be used for caching purposes?

Many thanks and I will look forward to hearing from you,

Yuri 

1.  Yes.

2.  You cannot change the setting without doing a clean reinstall.

3.  No.

Can anyone answer my question? I would really appreciate your help on this. I am wondering if I need to change BIOS settings after OS cloning and mechanical hard drive replacement for an SSD Drive from  "RAID" to "AHCI"? 

Yuri

thanks for your quick reply. I really appreciate. If I do a clean windows install then will I be able to download Dell drivers and some programs to check the computer? Do I have to change the BIOS after clean install to ANCHI mode or not? What is going to happen to mSATA drive? 

If I do cloning and replace the mechanical hard drive with an SSD drive and I don't change the BIOS settings? Will Intel Rapid Start and Smart Technology be working or not?

Yuri

It should, yes.  That said, as above - a clean install of the OS onto a new SSD is a better way to go.  The mSATA cache drive may actually slow the system down relative to running from a single, full speed SSD.

Hi ymoiseyev,

If the hard drive is replaced by SSD you will need to change the SATA operation to AHCI as keeping the hard drive to ISRT mode is waste since the mSATA uses SSD technology to make the system faster. You will need to change it to AHCI mode before performing clean install on the system.

Hi ymoiseyev,

Sorry for the delayed response. You will need to change the SATA operation to AHCI on the system so that you put the mSATA card has a boot drive. Please follow the steps mentioned below to change the SATA operation.

1.Turn on or restart the computer.

2.Immediately at the Dell logo screen, starting tapping the key once a second until the BIOS screen pops up.

3.Using the right arrow key move to ‘Advanced’ tab.

4.Using the down arrow key move down to ‘SATA Mode’ and press ‘Enter’ button.

5.Change the SATA operation in BIOS from Intel Smart Response to AHCI.

6.Save changes in BIOS.

7.Reboot the system.

Please follow the steps in the link below to perform fresh operating system installation.

http://dell.to/1l1ZrkY

The only step which would be different during the installation is you would find two hard drives so please install the operating system on the SSD to make it a boot drive.