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GuiltyCol

9 Posts

45322

July 12th, 2013 11:00

Intel Smart Response Technology option missing from BIOS after install of mSata SSD drive

Hi all,

I'm having problems getting hard disk caching working as the BIOS doesn't show "Intel Smart Response Technology" option for the SATA Operation setting, and would appreciate your help please as I think I've read every mSata post on this forum.

I have an Inspiron 17R SE 7720 with BIOS version A10 (Service Tag:  <ADMIN NOTE: Service tag removed per privacy policy> ). I've bought and installed a Crucial mSata 32GB SSD drive in the mSata slot. The drive is detected in the BIOS as: M4-CT032M4SSD and shows in My Computer in Windows and the Intel RST app.

However the Intel RST app has no option to enable acceleration. The whole Acceleration button / tab at the top is missing.  (Note I am NOT trying to boot windows from the mSata drive)

How can I change the BIOS from AHCI to Intel Smart Response Technology mode? 

I have installed the latest Intel Rapid Storage Technology drivers: v11.6.0.1030 as downloaded from the Dell drivers download site.

Screen shots below.

Many thanks for your help.

DELL-Amogh G

1.5K Posts

July 12th, 2013 14:00

Hi GuiltyCol,

You may reset the BIOS settings to defaults. Please follow the steps below:

  • Power on the system and tap at the ‘Dell’ logo
  • Press on the ‘System Setup Utility’ screen and then press ‘Enter’
  • Press to ‘Save Changes and Exit’ and press ‘Enter’ again

Please let me know if iSRT option comes after loading BIOS to defaults. Please share the operating system installed on the system.

Please remove the service tag from public view for security reasons.

Keep me posted with the information. I will be glad to assist further.

GuiltyCol

9 Posts

July 14th, 2013 06:00

Amogh thank you very much for your help and prompt reply (I'm using Windows 7 64-bit Pro by the way).  I have good, then bad, then good news, which I include here in the hope it will help others.  Note there are MANY reboots in the following story, which I have missed out for brevity.

Firstly resetting the BIOS to defaults did indeed resolve my question, and I was able to successfully select the Intel RST option in the BIOS.  Thanks!

Now the bad news: doing this caused Blue Screen of Death on boot up and I was unable to boot into Windows until I went back to the BIOS and reset the SATA Operation to AHCI.

To resolve this problem, I followed the instructions to edit my registry to re-enable the correct device driver, on the Microsoft support site here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/922976

Now I was able to select the Intel RST SATA option in the BIOS and boot into Windows 7.  But then I encountered a new problem: the Intel Rapid Storage Technology app v11.6.0.1030 (installed last week from the Dell website) in Windows failed to run, giving me an "Unknown software error".

I downloaded v12.5.0.1033 directly from the Intel website and that fixed the problem.  I've now been able to use the SSD drive by caching to accelerate my main hard disk, and can report already that boot times are at least halved.

One minor annoyance is several posts on this forum have said that a 32Gb SSD was the biggest size that could be used for caching, so that is the size I bought, however when I set it up, the Intel RST windows application said that it would support up to 64Gb.  If I'd have known that, I'd have bought the bigger size.

However all is now well, and it's working.  Thanks again Amogh.

Colin
DELL-Amogh G
1.5K Posts
July 15th, 2013 14:00
Hi GuiltyCol,
 

Thank you for the response. I am glad that the issue is resolved and I appreciate your technical expertise.
 

Please feel free to reply for any further questions. I will be glad to assist further.
Maridd
3 Posts
September 6th, 2013 15:00
I am having a similar issue, my XPS8300 had a drive failure, I replaced the drive with two new Seagate 1Gb drives (RAID 0) and installed a 64Gb SSD for the purpose of chaching the array. The drive that shipped with my XPS had Win 7 pre-installed and I did not have any media to re-install that, so I upgraded to Win 8 Pro. I have the whole thing working with the latest BIOS (A06) but I cannot see the acceleration tab either. I have downloaded and installed the latest IRST driver (12.8) from Intel but still no acceleration tab? Any thoughts or help appreciated.
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