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    mSATA, SATA-II Limitations?

    Discussion in 'Alienware 14 and M14x' started by Tapakidney, Jun 10, 2012.

  1. Tapakidney

    Tapakidney Notebook Evangelist

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    Forgive me if this has already been answered somewhere, but it's a bit of a needle-in-haystack kind of question to search for.

    Is the SATA2 speed of our mSATA slot software or hardware limited? IE, is it possible that a bios update will come out that will allow our drives to run full speed?

    For that matter, how large is that bottleneck when forcing SATA2 over 3?

    Thanks!
     
    Tapakidney, Jun 10, 2012
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  2. Slacker2002

    Slacker2002 Notebook Enthusiast

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    I also would like to know.
     
    Slacker2002, Jun 10, 2012
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  3. iPhantomhives

    iPhantomhives Click the image to change your avatar.

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    fyi , my msata runs at sata III , 6gb/s no problem at all.
     
    iPhantomhives, Jun 11, 2012
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  4. Tapakidney

    Tapakidney Notebook Evangelist

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    Oh yeah? Sweet! Is it maybe just the M17XR4 that's mSATA runs SATA2?
     
    Tapakidney, Jun 11, 2012
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  5. struselix

    struselix Notebook Consultant

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    I cannot confirm. My mSATA is not running at SATA3, only SATA2!
     
    struselix, Jun 11, 2012
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  6. saurey

    saurey Notebook Guru

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    I believe there is only one 6gb msata drive on the market now from runcore and it's pretty pricey.. I might get me one eventually after prices come down.

    AND THEY FIX THE BIOS FOR THE FAN NOISE
     
    saurey, Jun 11, 2012
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  7. Tsunade_Hime

    Tsunade_Hime such bacon. wow

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    Does SATA 3 even matter for an SSD? After a certain point, faster reads/writes are pointless as with pretty much all SSDs you get .1 ms latency, which gives your OS that snappy feeling. Most people can't tell the difference between 260 and lets say 400 read. Sure if you copy data 24/7 on your laptop you would see the difference.
     
    Tsunade_Hime, Jun 11, 2012
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  8. iPhantomhives

    iPhantomhives Click the image to change your avatar.

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    iPhantomhives, Jun 11, 2012
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  9. Enfore

    Enfore Notebook Enthusiast

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    Mine appears to be running at SATA3 too. And like iPhantomhives, mine came at 92% I believe, considering I got it 2 days ago lol.

    Link is below since the image is large if I insert it here!

    http://i46.tinypic.com/v6uq9s.jpg
     
    Enfore, Jun 11, 2012
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  10. iPhantomhives

    iPhantomhives Click the image to change your avatar.

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    Your's runs faster then mine! o well I only use it as storage , I think it suppose to came with 100%....
     
    iPhantomhives, Jun 11, 2012
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  11. Enfore

    Enfore Notebook Enthusiast

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    Haha, slightly! Might be due to the different capacities? I just use mine for booting windows and I run all my programs of a Samsung 830 256GB ssd.

    Yeah, it should have. I also noticed that my battery came with 7% wear...
     
    Enfore, Jun 11, 2012
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  12. Luke QC

    Luke QC Notebook Guru

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    I just installed a 120 GB mSATA SSD from Mushkin and it's fast as hell !

    I didn't check the speed but Windows give it a score of 7.9. As it's got 7.8 on a M17x, I think we've got SATA III enabled for our mSATA slot :).

    However, anybody knows if it's possible to disable the RAID configuration screen at startup ?
     
    Luke QC, Jun 12, 2012
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  13. Tapakidney

    Tapakidney Notebook Evangelist

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    I disabled that by installing Windows AHCI instead of raid. Yes, it bothered me enough to do a reinstall.
     
    Tapakidney, Jun 12, 2012
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  14. Luke QC

    Luke QC Notebook Guru

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    How did you do that ? I've just reinstalled yesterday ! :(

    But how can Windows be related to that screen ? It shows before the BIOS screen...
     
    Luke QC, Jun 12, 2012
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  15. Tapakidney

    Tapakidney Notebook Evangelist

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    It's not a windows thing, it's how your computer interacts with your hard drives. It's BIOS related, and you change the setting in your BIOS setup.

    There may be another way to make it skip the screen, but I did a quick search when I ran into the problem and ended up just sayin "F it" and reinstalled after changing the BIOS setting.
     
    Tapakidney, Jun 12, 2012
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  16. Luke QC

    Luke QC Notebook Guru

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    OK so you've got to reinstall Windows whenever you change the Hard Drive mode in the BIOS ?

    I will live with it.
     
    Luke QC, Jun 12, 2012
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  17. Tapakidney

    Tapakidney Notebook Evangelist

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    I know there are some hoops you can jump through to change to AHCI without a reinstall, but it involves registry changes, and I believe possible performance issues.

    I just ordered the Mushkin 120GB to replace my 60GB Adata. Does the Mushkin fit in over the plastic peg ok on the R2?
     
    Tapakidney, Jun 12, 2012
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  18. Luke QC

    Luke QC Notebook Guru

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    Thanks for the information.

    As for the Mushkin, yes it fits perfectly.
     
    Luke QC, Jun 12, 2012
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  19. saurey

    saurey Notebook Guru

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    I tried that method and it didn't work. I think the Intel drivers overwrite the windows disk drivers or something. Unlucky.. I'll probably have to reinstall as well.
     
    saurey, Jun 12, 2012
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