XPS One 2710, Windows 10 boot failing at Intel RST

SATA Operation in bios can be set in a number of ways

ATA

INTEL RST RAID

AHCI

INTEL RST DOES NOT SUPPORT Drives larger than 2TB

CNTRL I indicates a RAID controller

Sounds like you installed Win 10 with BIOS set to RAID, instead of AHCI...

OR its really old pc with NON UEFI bios.

That means you can NEVER have a drive larger than 2TB as a bootable drive.

https://www.seagate.com/support/downloads/beyond-2tb/

Really Old systems like XPS 420 for example only have 2 modes

AHCI and ATA

However that means it will not recognize a GPT partitioned drive as being formatted so it wont boot from it.

The trick to getting it booting in that mode is to use an OEM System DVD in the optical drive.

That way it boots because it doesnt see anything to boot from so it boots the dvd

The DVD has a menu that says press key to boot from dvd.

once you ignore that It sees the WIN10 partition and boots from that instead.

What version of Windows 10 are you running? I think you need to go back to bootable configuration with just the SSD and update the version of Intel Rapid Storage Technology. See this article: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4514156/updating-to-windows-10-version-1903-on-devices-with-certain-versions-o

My posting generated several questions. I will try to answer to these by describing how actually got to this point. Originally, I had mSATA SSD about 32GB and 2TB Seagate HDD, configured as RAID 0. First broke SSD. In attempt to salvage HDD, I used Intel RST application to reconfigure the set into non-RAID. That was successful. Unfortunately, shortly after, the Seagate stopped spinning. I managed to restore the data using specialized recovery software. I purchased and installed mSATA 512GB (no HDD yet at this point). I loaded Windows 10 Pro and everything worked great. Actually it is still working - I am using the computer right now writing this note. Next I connected fresh WD HDD 6TB. The system recognized the new drive. I was able to initialize it and create two equal partitions about 3TB each. I have intended for data storage. It worked great for several days - I was able to upload the data restored from the broken HDD. Two days ago, during the reboot, the computer stopped and became unresponsive at RST window, as I described in my prior post. I disconnected HDD and the Windows booted correctly and I was able to access BIOS. There are three options for Advanced → Onboard Device Configuration->SATA Mode:  ATA, AHCI, and RAID. The computer with SSD alone with boot and work smoothly only for SATA Mode: RAID. Additionally, I tried few combinations of BIOS settings with HDD connected (such as UEFI) - each to computer froze at RST window and there was no access to BIOS. Again, I am not attempting to put OS on HDD but rather configured it as a data storage. I know that it should work because it worked (!). The current configuration of BIOS is the same as for the working configuration.

There was also question about the OS. It is MS Windows 10 Pro, Version 10.0.19041 Build 19041. The BIOS version is A14.

I hope that clarifies a bit the problem and its origin.

Thank you.

It appears that you have the latest version of Windows 10, Version 2004. There are several known issues with that version of Windows 10 but I don't see any related to Intel RST. Your setup should work and like you said it did work for a while. I would make sure you are using the latest version of Intel RST.

You could try to uninstall Intel RST, but I am not sure if it is needed because SATA Mode is set to RAID in the BIOS. As you have discovered you cannot set SATA Mode to AHCI, the reason is that Windows was installed with SATA  Mode set to RAID. You could change SATA Mode to AHCI in the BIOS and then reinstall Windows or you could try running the following procedure to change Windows from RAID to AHCI: http://triplescomputers.com/blog/uncategorized/solution-switch-windows-10-from-raidide-to-ahci-operation/

Note that in the procedure, you don't change the BIOS setting until step 4.

With SATA Mode set to AHCI you should not need to install Intel RST.

You may want to read and follow this: Switch Windows 10 from RAID/IDE to AHCI operation

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@Vic384 wrote:

It appears that you have the latest version of Windows 10, Version 2004. There are several known issues with that version of Windows 10 but I don't see any related to Intel RST. Your setup should work and like you said it did work for a while. I would make sure you are using the latest version of Intel RST.

You could try to uninstall Intel RST, but I am not sure if it is needed because SATA Mode is set to RAID in the BIOS. As you have discovered you cannot set SATA Mode to AHCI, the reason is that Windows was installed with SATA  Mode set to RAID. You could change SATA Mode to AHCI in the BIOS and then reinstall Windows or you could try running the following procedure to change Windows from RAID to AHCI: http://triplescomputers.com/blog/uncategorized/solution-switch-windows-10-from-raidide-to-ahci-operation/

Note that in the procedure, you don't change the BIOS setting until step 4.

With SATA Mode set to AHCI you should not need to install Intel RST.

 

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Yea! I typed faster than you did, this time...!

You can uninstall Intel RST by going to All settings / Apps / [scroll down the list of Apps until you get to Intel RST then click on it} / then click on Uninstall. Like I said before, I do not know if it is required if SATA Mode is set to RAID.

A non UEFI system will not boot a drive larger than 2TB.

https://www.seagate.com/support/kb/intel-rapid-storage-technology-rst-drivers-and-support-for-disk-drives-beyond-22-terabytes-tb-218615en/

For disk drives beyond 2.2TB, the proper level of Intel RST driver should be v10.1 or higher.

That is to say, UEFI boot is needed to boot from a disk that is greater than 2TB and GPT is required for partitions larger than 2TB. You don’t need UEFI to have a non-bootable drive that greater than 2TB, only GPT.

https://www.seagate.com/support/downloads/beyond-2tb/

https://www.seagate.com/support/kb/interactive-flash-guide-for-disk-drives-beyond-22-terabytes-tb-218611en/

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/2581408/windows-support-for-hard-disks-that-are-larger-than-2-tb

The management of modern storage devices is addressed by using a scheme called Logical Block Addressing (LBA). This is the arrangement of the logical sectors that constitute the media. "LBA0" represents the first logical sector of the device, and the last LBA designation represents the last logical sector of the device, one label per sector. To determine the capacity of the storage device, you multiply the number of logical sectors within the device by the size of each logical sector. The current size standard is 512 bytes. For example, to achieve a device that has a capacity of 2 TB, you must have 3,906,250,000 512-byte sectors. However, a computer system requires 32 bits (1s and 0s) of information to represent this large number. Therefore, any storage capacity that is greater than what can be represented by using 32 bits would require an additional bit. That is, 33 bits.

The problem in this computation is that the partitioning scheme that is used by most modern Windows-based computers is MBR (master boot record). This scheme sets a limit of 32 for the number of bits that are available to represent the number of logical sectors.

The 2-TB barrier is the result of this 32-bit limitation. Because the maximum number that can be represented by using 32-bits is 4,294,967,295, this translates to 2.199 TB of capacity by using 512-byte sectors (approximately 2.2 TB). Therefore, a capacity beyond 2.2 TB is not addressable by using the MBR partitioning scheme.

You can change RAID to AHCI in the BIOS but that does not change the fact that Windows was installed in RAID mode and that is why the SSD would not boot. To change the Windows installation, you either have to reinstall Windows in AHCI mode or run the procedure I previously linked to.

Partitions are part of the problem.  Raid is the second issue.

Raid is not the same as AHCI.  RAID is IRRT and requires the IRST F6 driver.

NON RAID AHCI does not require the INTEL RST Driver.

The drive that is larger than 2TB requires GPT partition only if you intend to boot from it AND the IRST Driver of a specific version.   The newest IRST Driver that comes with windows 10 is not compatible with older chipsets.

 Sounds like you used cloning and a previous version of windows aka 7.  A clean install deleting the partitions then partitioning the 5TB drive as EXFAT will fix the issue where you can store data on the drive and not have it think that its a boot drive or has the MSR or Recovery partition on it.