XPS15 L521x Windows 8 Boot Problem

I assume the original Dell DVD you have includes a Dell Reinstallation DVD i.e. Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit with Service Pack 1 and not DVDs made by Dell DataSafe? I don't trust anything made by DataSafe or DataSafe backups personally.

You should probably the setting to AHCI however what is the SATA operation at present and what options do you have available? I don't have this model so I don't know about the other modes and would need to have a quick read up on them. Personally I don't trust cache drives, from my experience they cause far more problems than they are worth. I had a 68 GB Crucial m4 with Dataplex and it was a nightmare. I installed Windows directly on it opposed to using it as a cache drive, it was a bit tight so I upgraded to a 128 GB one. If it was my laptop I would disable the cache drive (probably switch the BIOS setting to AHCI) and replace the 32 GB mSATA cache drive with a 128 GB or 256 GB one:

http://www.crucial.com/store/mpartspecs.aspx?mtbpoid=677AF433A5CA7304

http://www.crucial.com/store/mpartspecs.aspx?mtbpoid=241F7334A5CA7304

There would be enough room to comfortably install Windows 7 directly on a 128 GB/256 GB mSATA drive while using your 750 GB hard drive as an additional data drive.

To use AHCI you will need to load the SATA drivers here from a USB stick (extract the file with 7zip and copy the f6flpy-x64 folder to the USB stick) during the setup to recognize the hard drive. However as Windows 7 doesn't recognize USB 3.0 natively, the USB stick will probably confuse the Windows 7 setup. To prevent this you will have to change the following BIOS setting before starting the Windows 7 setup: Disable USB 3.0 functionality to install Windows 7 from a USB Flash Drive. Loading the SATA driver during the setup is explained in the guide above. Once Windows 7 is installed and all the drivers are copied to the desktop, you may re-enable it. You would be best to delete all old partitions on the 750 GB drive otherwise it may try to dual boot 7 and broken 8.

I don't know if you disliked Windows 8 entirely or just the fact that it completely crashed in 2 weeks (I would guess its a cache problem and not a Windows 8 problem however). Personally I prefer Windows 7 and I am currently sticking to Windows 7 or plan to downgrade my machines running Windows 8 back to Windows 7.

However once Windows 7 is reinstalled you should be able to redownload Windows 8 setup files and obtain your product key from your email (assuming you purchased the upgrade online).

Found this post, should be the same idea. I advise getting the larger drive and changing from IRST to AHCI.

Try one thing first, change the SATA operation to AHCI and just see if the cache is disabled to see if Windows 8 boots or not. Also if you have the Windows 8 USB or DVD you made to install Windows 8 you could try booting from it and see if it can perform a startup repair. If this works it should allow you into Windows 8 to run Belarc Advisor.

Thank you for your answer Philip. This helps a lot!

Well I do have a w7 reinstallation DVD. The current SATA operation is Intel Smart Response Technology an the other two available are AHCI and ATA.

My concern now is if I will be able to restore the backup image i made before upgrading to w8 (using windows tools).

I wonder if I will have to format my HDDs after changing to AHCI (what formatting mode?) And then reinstall windows, by now in the HDD until I get the bigger mSATA. The 750 GB HDD is currently 1 unit. It was not partitioned

After reinstalling windows I want to recover the image I made. This is important because I have programs and I just have the key of Ms Office and not from my Adobe suite :( and others. I wonder if that would be possible because the image was done having the dual drive ISRT working and I think RAID (which I don't completely understand).

it would be great if the laptop came with a factory image to recover but unfortunately it does not. Any insight into this will be helpful

You can download the setup files using another computer. You will need to enter your product key to begin the download bit, don't worry at this stage it doesn't do anything with regards to product activation at this point.

Note one thing though a 32 bit Windows XP, Vista, 7 computer will download the 32 bit setup files while the 64 bit Windows XP, Vista, 7 will download the 64 bit files so make sure the computer you are downloading the setup files on has the same bit of Windows you have installed otherwise Startup repair won't work.

Quickly try to run the Startup Repair while the SATA Operation is set to IRST.

Hi again. I changed  Intel SRT to AHCI then tried to start but after the "dell" screen only loaded a black screen with a white blinking cursor. After this try I booted the w8 DVD (although I must say that it was made out of an iso image i dowloaded of w8 pro from a forum. I didn't burn a DVD or made a USB when installing my own w8 pro). Well this time the repair program found the OS installed so I made an "automatic repair". It restarted while in AHCI but the same black screen loaded. Then changed the SATA operation to ISRT but loaded again the blue Recovery screen showing the same error code 0x0000001.

Now. What would be a possible next step? If the w8 DVD I dowloaded is not a problem at this point. 

I have the email Microsoft sent me with the activation code and a download link. Can I download it from another computer?. I ask because it suggest to be in the same machine that will use w8.

Thank you a lot for your help.

Hello.

It took me a while to find a computer with 64 bits windows to download w8 again but I got it now an tried what you suggested with no luck.

Tried first to perform a repair while in ISRT but couldn't do nothing because HDD was blocked According to the recovery program.

Then I tried to do a repair while SATA operation was set to AHCI. this time the repair started but after one minute it showed a message "repair unsuccessful" and offered to try other restore options. Well I tried to restore an automatic backup the laptop made before Christmas, but it didn't even start. BTW, secure boot is disabled in Setup.

For the way things have turned out, It seems that this w8 installation cannot be recovered. I wonder how could I recover the image of w7 I have. I don't wanna jump trying to reinstall w7 to then learn that the image cannot be recovered because of RAID disks or the ISRT thing.

Please any extra idea or instruction will be very welcome

Nice work. (Y)

Thanks for documenting your solution. I think it will be very useful for others facing the same issue.

There is a much easier solution to clean boot Win 8 - had the same issue.   The challenge is the base driver that comes with Win 8 - not compatible with the XPS 15 hybrid drive/controller.

I downloaded the latest AHCI driver from Intel that lists support for Win 8 and during install, select load driver when it cannot find the hard drive. 

The installation will work every time.

I believe the below link is the correct link:

http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=Y&DwnldID=21752&lang=eng&OSVersion=Windows%208*&DownloadType=Drivers

We had the same issue with a Dell XPS 15 L521 notebook, it would not boot in Win 8.1 and would freeze on the Dell logo screen.  This problem would re-occur about every two weeks after doing a complete reinstall of win 8.1, looks like the problem is the mSATA SSD card.  We are replacing it now, we will see if the problem is resolved in  a couple of weeks.

We have had problems with the laptop since January, it is coming with NO BOOT DEVICE error.

The SSD and the hard drive have been changed by a computer shop in Edmonton, AB.  It is still coming still coming up with same error, they said

that the motherboard is the problem.  Our company have purchased two of these computers and both of them have had the same problems. 

Both have failed just after the one year warranty was over.  These were both very expensive computers but very poor and unreliable.  We would never purchase

these again as they are very poorly made.