HOW TO: Windows Installation Thread (includes SATA III, SSD Upgrade, RAID0 Discussion)

In addition to the useful information in this opening post, and especially if you are a Windows 8/8.1 (or newer) user, you will also want to check out Philip Yip's awesome tutorials. They are invaluable.

Here is a link to the Unofficial Guides by Philip Yip

There are numerous threads that have this information already in them. There's really nothing about the process that is unique to Alienware. There are subtle differences navigating the BIOS and RAID configuration screens on different systems, but the Windows installation process is the same on all systems. The intent of this post is to provide help setting up a clean Windows installation whether using one drive or multiple drives in RAID 0 mode. If you are installing Windows 8, be sure to disable Secure Boot (switch to Legacy Mode) in the BIOS before you start. (Secure Boot does not work for Windows 7.)

IMPORTANT: Always leave your Alienware BIOS set to RAID. Do not use AHCI. Using AHCI provides no benefit and introduces multiple functional limitations. Using RAID includes AHCI mode by default. Using RAID in the BIOS applies even if you only have one HDD or SSD installed.

Quick Tip for RAID 0 Setup:
Simply install Windows to one SSD or HDD with the BIOS set to RAID. After installing Windows to one drive, install RST and create the RAID0 array within Windows using RST. This is a super easy operation and eliminates the need to mess around with F6 drivers. That's the only way I do it any more, 'cause it's so much easier. Once the RAID0 conversion is done, simply go to the Disk Management utility, right click on C: and select "Extend volume" and use up any unallocated disk space. Please note that with HDD the RAID conversion within Windows may take one or more hours depending on the size of the volume. With SSD the conversion process is much faster. Be patient and let it finish. If you interrupt the process, your Windows installation may be unbootable.

How to Set Up RAID on Your PC | PCWorld Business Center - See Page 2

(The BIOS and RAID configuration screens shown in the videos below may look slightly
different than the BIOS in your Alienware, but conceptually the process is identical.)

[parsehtml]<iframe width='640' height='360' src="//www.youtube.com/embed/5L--ByVvXqw?rel=0" frameborder='0' allowfullscreen=""></iframe>[/parsehtml] Cut to the chase and start watching this at 3:00 mins)

[parsehtml]<iframe width='640' height='360' src="//www.youtube.com/embed/rgo0OPSw9_E?rel=0" frameborder='0' allowfullscreen=""></iframe>[/parsehtml][parsehtml]<iframe width='640' height='480' src="//www.youtube.com/embed/PsveMWRdNxo?rel=0" frameborder='0' allowfullscreen=""></iframe>[/parsehtml][parsehtml]<iframe width='640' height='480' src="//www.youtube.com/embed/mME9VLT7-xw?rel=0" frameborder='0' allowfullscreen=""></iframe>[/parsehtml] (Please be sure to "like" these videos on youtube for the credit of the authors.)

This will also walk you through setting up RAID in the BIOS, Intel Option ROM and F6 drivers: Intel® Rapid Storage Technology User Guide

Intel® Rapid Storage Technology F6 Driver Download - Windows 7 Installation Drivers
(select the x64 version unless you are running a 32-bit OS - extract the compressed files from the zip archive and place the extracted files on USB stick)

Intel® Rapid Storage Technology for Windows 7 x64/x86 - RST Drivers and Intel Control Center
(after installing Windows using the above F6 drivers, install this package along with the other Intel Chipset drivers that need to be installed)

Recommendation: Do not use device drivers, Alienware OSD or Alienware Command Center software provided on the Alienware Resource Disc. Download all proprietary Alienware drivers and apps using the latest files posted at support.dell.com. You will generally have good results using chipset, video and WiFi reference drivers provided by the device manufacturers. Alienware OSD and Alienware Command Center should be installed as the last two items on your fresh Windows install. It is recommended that you download and install Microsoft .NET 4.0 Framework and reboot before attempting to install Alienware Command Center.

Basically, you want to be sure that any drives in the system have only unallocated space before you begin the installation to the unallocated space. (Unallocated space means there are no partitions on the drive.) The series of screen shots below depict what you should see with one HDD. With two drives, one would be called Disk 0 Unallocated Space and the other would be called Disk 1 Unallocated Space. Follow the steps in this series of images during Windows setup to delete any partitions and start with unallocated disk space on the disk volume where you are going to install Windows.

[parsehtml] [/FONT][/SIZE]<iframe class='imgur-album' width='100%' height='550' frameborder='0' src="http://imgur.com/a/KrelN/embed"></iframe>[/parsehtml]
Additional Threads:

Windows 7 Installation Media Download:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/win...-7-download-links-just-like-vista-before.html

http://forum.notebookreview.com/win...-digitalriver-windows-7-sp1-13-languages.html

Additional Resources:

[HOW TO] Windows 7 Clean Install Driver Installation Order for Alienware Laptops

[HOW TO] Restore the Alienware Look and Feel After a Clean Windows Installation

NBR Alienware Userbars! | OFFICIAL AW Wallpaper Pack, User Avatars & AW Login Screen

Windows Performance Optimization Guide

How to enable TRIM Command in Windows 7 with a Solid State Drive

To enable or disable or check the status of the TRIM command, you will need to open an elevated (Administrator) command prompt.

To Enable TRIM Command In the Elevated command Prompt windows, type the following: fsutil behavior set disabledeletenotify 0

To Disable TRIM Command In the Elevated command Prompt windows, type the following: fsutil behavior set disabledeletenotify 1

How do I know if TRIM is enabled? In the Elevated command Prompt windows, type the following: fsutil behavior query disabledeletenotify Note: being enabled means Windows is sending a command but this not a guarantee your SSDs are using TRIM. Explanation: DisableDeleteNotify = 1 (TRIM command disabled) DisableDeleteNotify = 0 (TRIM command enabled)

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If you cannot find what you need in this thread, please don't start a new thread to ask new questions just yet. If it relates to this thread topic, please ask in this thread.

Have you searched our forum using Google? This is highly effective. Here is how...for example, using the prefix in red font, you can Google: site:forum.notebookreview.com M18x set up RAID0

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Update 5/4/2012:

For those interested in adding an extra drive to their Alienware, it is easily done. The entire conversion was about $40 grand total, and it works really great.

The internal bay I am using is this one: https://www.jacobsparts.com/items/HDDBAY-01/

Here is the external enclosure I am using for my BluRay burner: 5.25" USB 2.0 CD/DVD Slim Notebook External SATA Drive Enclosure (Black) N-URW-ESATA

Here is the bezel I found for my slot-load drive in the external enclosure: Silver Bezel for Panasonic 12.7mm Slot-Load Drive-PAN-BEZEL-SS-SI

And here is what it looks like:
http://i.imgur.com/KVfo1.jpg>http://i.imgur.com/KVfo1.jpg /> http://i.imgur.com/ayrhf.jpg>http://i.imgur.com/ayrhf.jpg />

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Update 06/05/2012:

A recent discovery has shown SATA 6GB/s SSD are sometimes dropping to 3GB/s on a new installation or image restore... Reset the BIOS to optimal defaults and reboot Windows. I have tested this 4 times and the last week and resetting the BIOS causes both Port0 and Port1 to operate at 6GB/s. One of the 4 times I had to pull the CMOS battery because resetting optimal defaults did not work. Once this is done, the SATA 3.0 speeds stick permanently on both ports for me.



Once the array is confirmed to be operating at 6GB/s you can return to the BIOS to set your preference for overclocking, USB power sharing, virtualization, etc. This may be a glitch with Insyde 2.0 BIOS that does not affect systems with a different type of BIOS.

If you continue having issues with your SATA 3.0 SSD running at 3GB/s instead of 6GB/s, try the "LPM Fix" by merging these registry files. [DOWNLOAD LINK]

Update 07/25/2012: New version of Intel RST. [Download Intel RST 11.5.0.1207] or previous version [Download Intel RST 11.2.0.1006]

Update 09/22/2012: Latest version of Intel RST [Download Intel RST 11.6.0.1030]

Update 01/26/2013: Latest version of Intel RST [Download Intel RST 11.7.0.1013]

Note: Updated links for downloading RST will no longer be provided in this post. You can always find the latest and greatest from the Intel Download Center. You may as well look for newer Intel chipset, WiFi and graphics drivers while you are there grabbing the latest version of RST.

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Windows 8 Information
​

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Everything about the process of installing Windows 7 that is noted above applies to Windows 8. You do not need special instructions for Windows 8. In addition to what is posted below, you will find more tips to make Windows 8 a good OS here: [ LINK ]

So, here is my "down and dirty" tutorial. Nothing out of the ordinary, extra fancy or materially different from a basic Windows 7 setup, except for some customization tips which made it work the way I want it to work.

• Clean install - avoid upgrading from Windows 7 to Windows 8 (You *might* need to upgrade to activate your Windows 8 Upgrade key for the first time, then do a clean install after the key has been successfully activated. Whether this is required is not clear and needs further testing to confirm if it is so.)
• Set the BIOS for RAID (not AHCI) even if you do not use RAID
• Install Windows only to UNALLOCATED DRIVE SPACE (meaning delete all old partitions, including system and recovery partitions on the OS drive or RAID array before installing Windows)
• Windows 8 has native driver support for almost everything (including Intel Chipset and Management Engine) in the M18x R1 except:
  
  • Intel RST - installed so I could have the RST Control Panel [Download RST 11.7.0.1013]
  • M18x R1 Windows 7 version of Alienware OSD and Alienware Control Center*
  • M18x R1 Windows 7 version of Freefall Sensor*
  • M18x R1 Windows 7 version of Card Reader*
  • NVIDIA GTX 680M Drivers (modded because of the M18x R1 hardware ID, same as Windows 7 - see this post)

  ​
• Install AlienAutopsy: Download AlienAutopsy
• Install AlienRespawn: Download AlienRespawn
• Install Windows 8 Media Center (free for a limited time): Add Features | Microsoft Windows
• Install Start Menu: Start8 for Windows® 8 - Bringing back the Windows Start menu
• Install Sidebar Gadget support: 8GadgetPack - Gadgets for Windows 8

Note: Security software is not needed with Windows 8. It has built-in antivirus/malware/firewall protection.

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HELP! I screwed up big time and installed Windows with the BIOS set to AHCI instead of RAID!!! How do I fix this without having to reinstall Windows?

 

Im thinking about buying twin Vertex 3 SSD's, but if the laptop cant support the 6gb/s i'd think it would entirely be a waste of 500$ to do what a 200$ pair of HDD's could do, with like 10x the storage...

I've read here and there that people are enabling SATA 3, but does that mean its RUNNING at SATA 3, or that its just using the drives?

Also, maybe for some perfomance advice, i'll take it from you guys, but i'm looking at this SSD right now:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227714

I plan to buy 2 of them, and configure them for RAID 0. Think its a good move or would should i examine another SSD?

 

yes it does.
but
you will only see those speeds using sata 3 ssd's in single or raid mode

 

Yeah but when you see those speeds you will drool!

I have two of these SSD's and I am getting 1.1gig/s!

 

yeah DEFINITELY ^^^^ what he said!

 

I'm gana be buying some SSD from this place, this is pretty much my selection:

Fry's Electronics |

I'll be considering to pick one up from here. We'll see but i'm also thinking of just going to newegg, and getting a pair of Vertex 3 Max IOPS. I obviously will want something thats fast, but reliable.


I'm looking to raid0 them, so about 125 gigs each drive will suit my needs. My mass media will be stored on an external. I'm not a huge pack rat for games, i'll keep something till i need more room, and then just bring on the holocaust.

For the external i'm looking something at 1TB+, preferably 2, but it has to run w/o a power cable so i know that cleaves my choices. Also, ideally it will be small and comfortable to carry. I'm thinking of this thing from newegg:

Newegg.com - iomega Prestige Portable 1.5TB USB 3.0 Black External Hard Drive 35213

Also, what will i need to know when i finally do get the SSD in my system? I'm obviously going to want to SATA 6 them, anything special i need to know?

Thanks in advance!

 

Just plug em in, update firmware, reinstall windows, etc, and you're good to go. I personally use the Seagate FreeAgent GoFlex 1.5TB USB 3.0. It's faster, cheaper, and I like the warranty.

 

Alright cool, i'll be sure to check the Seagate out.

As for the SSD, i plan to Raid0 them, but i know that some SSD are just terrible for it while others are a far more ideal choice. If none of the above ones i linked will suffice, i wouldnt mind just going to newegg. It doesnt appear that Fry's has the Vertex 3 Max IOPS i was planning on initially. I'm at least looking for a decent 120 gig SATA 6.0. Would the Crucial's be worth while? Or maybe the kingston Hyper X, its got pretty good reviews on newegg.

 

Bump --

Its gana be a couple weeks before i actually buy these, but i'd like some actual experience. The guys at fry's are pretty hit and miss, as far as how tech savvy they really are.

 

Crucial's SSD's hit the sweet spot between price and performance/storage for me. Though the 120-128GB range is certainly more courteous in terms of prices. Kingston is fine as is OCZ.

 

Not sure if you care that much about the external HD brand or not. I bought a couple of these and have had zero issues with them. Fast and quiet, always work right away. These ae less than half the price of the ones you were looking at.

Newegg.com - Seagate FreeAgent GoFlex 1TB USB 3.0 Black Ultra-portable Drive STAA1000101

 

I actually went ahead and bought the 1.5tb version refurbish, so it was only like 10$ more then that one. Cool deal i think. Thanks for the suggestion, both of you.

I'm probably going to with this corsair right here:

Newegg.com - Corsair Force Series GT CSSD-F120GBGT-BK 2.5" 120GB SATA III Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

More constantly good reviews (the OCZ reviews are kinda smeared between good and bad), is a hell of alot cheaper, and by the stats, it actually performs just as well, if not a tad better.

Also its red. Every one knows red is the fastest color.

Tell me what you think, i'll go ahead with the purchase this coming Monday.

 

It's fine enough. OCZ's actually cheaper now if you want to deal with rebates.

 

I installed my HyperX 120gb SSD in slot one. It installed windows, but once I was going to install drivers (for wifi) it froze. I reinstalled and tried again.. 3-4 times. Some times on boot I got "Disk read error".

Then I put back my normal disk in slot one and my ssd in slot two. The ssd was found and I had no problems with it. The HDD also worked (With windows installed).

Then I installed windows on the SSD again and kept it in slot two, changing the boot priority. Now it works perfectly.

Any ideas?

 

No one has any idea of what this might be?

HD slot 1 does not work with the SSD, HD slot two works with the SSD. Both slots works with the "stock" WD Black HDD.

 

Could be a dodgy SSD or HDD bay if it's doing that. I also had the same prob with windows install. Turned out to be a combo of the Bay and drive.

 

Which computer do you have it installed in? I know it's the M18x forums, but your sig says M11x and a Dell Mini. Some of those cheaper notebooks have crappy onboard sata controllers. You may also have a faulty hard drive. If it's working now, I'd just let it be. One of your slots may have been SATA 1.5Gbps and the other could be SATA 3.0Gbps. The SSD might not have liked that slower slot.

 

Finally installed my SSD.

Drove down to Overclockers UK (20mins) away, had it back home, installed and all updated with installs within 3hrs. Love SSD!

Must say I'm not noticing any real world difference compare to my desktop which has an old Vertex SATA3 in it. Sounds strange calling an SSD old.

So this leads to my question. I stupidly left the machine in RAID in the bios....I meant to get it to ACHI before I started.

So what is the impact of this on my SSD performance?

Note: After posting the bios, the machine boots logins and has all system try stuff running (norton, osd, intel controller, steam) within 18seconds.

 

Just change it to ACHI and see if that improves performance (it should) also download ATTO or CrystalDIskMark and check to see what your pefroemance is. , also check to see that it's running SATA3.

 

RAID and AHCI are exactly the same as for as real-world performance goes. The only reason to switch to AHCI is so you don't have to look at the RAID config screen every time you boot up. Make sure you do the proper tweaks for your SSD:
Disable superfetching.
Go to device manager > right click your SSD > Policy tab > click enable write cache buffer flushing.
Click My computer and right click on your C:\ drive. Disable indexing.
Disable Disk Defrag.

Run HWinfo or a similar program and ensure that the drive is operating in 6Gbps mode and not 3Gbps. A Crucial M4 should dominate a Vertex 2 drive.

If all else fails, reformat that bad boy and reinstall windows. Shouldn't take you longer than 10 mins if you're using a USB windows boot disk.

 

Ok.

HWInfo froze my machine up while initialising the data file :-( Uninstalled it quick smart! All looks ok.

So here are my Crystal disk marks:

read write
seq 500 200
512k 375 200
4k 22 51
4k qd 320 170


I assume they are sata 6 speeds?!?!


1000MB setting

 

I've recently installed a pair of Corsair GT SSD drives, running SATA 3 and configured them for raid0.

My read/write times seem to be pretty up there, according to Crystal disk mark 3.



Looks about right for twin SSD, perhaps a little slow but i'm not gana cry over +/- 10% of what i expected.

However, my boot times have consistantly been over 30 seconds. Sometimes it even hangs up, to where it'll take 2+ minutes to even get to login. The SSD are running the latest firmware, 1.3.2, i checked before i used them.

Any ideas? I was expecting ~10 second boots, like every one else is getting. This is a very fresh and clean install of windows, so i'm kinda out of ideas.

 

Switched to ACHI and windows blue screened. I expected it.

I can live with the raid screen.

 

You can put your system back how it was. Everything is fine and you are running at 6GB/s speed. No need to switch anything in the BIOS or reinstall Windows.

See thumbnail attached. We are running the same M4 128GB SSD and your performance is as good as it gets. You will see some minor variations from one day to the next with read/write benchmarks speeds, but as you can see from the benchmark I just ran you have no issues to worry about.

 

Cheers Dr Fox

 

^^^ What Mr Fox said, the speeds reported are just over the advertised speeds so you're looking good.

Hard to notice a difference between fast and super fast....

My M18x is insanely fast yet I cannot notice any difference in booting/every day work between this setup and my M14x with a Gen1 SSD (5 times slower)....

 

I agree something's up, 1st questions is... any network drives mapped? That would do that.

 

Thanks... cheers to you also.

Specific to the Crucial M4 SSD product line, I would recommend visiting and further participation in this thread:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/sol...crucial-m4-micron-c400-ssd-series-thread.html


In an effort to keep the forum tidy, I have merged multiple random threads covering the subject of SSD drives on the M18x.

If you are looking for discussions specific to your SSD manufacturer, we have some threads for that as well.

While the forum search function does not work well, Google works great. Please see BatBoy's instructions on how to find specific information on NBR using Google.

 

Uhm, i havnt gone out of my way to do anything like that. I've seen it go fast, in fact i've actually missed the boot screen because i wasnt paying attention. But i just got everything installed, all my drivers, and basic programs (comodo, skype, steam, the usefull things i'd always want to keep) and just now made a backup image of my disk, anticipating an inevitable drive crash.

How would i check/disable that? I obviously have no need for any of the on board internet stuff, since i tether through my phone.

 

If you don't know you probably don't have one... click on My Computer and see if you have any Network Drives. It happend to me, I was getting 26-35 sec boot times, once I removed the ND I started hitting 10-12secs.

Try going into msconfig (just run it from the run) and dessable all items on the startup to see if there's perhaps some software lagging yout startup time, you can later enable the startup programs you need 1 by 1 and checking the bootime improvement.

 

Please use the appropriate thread for discussions rather than creating a new thread on the same general topic.

For the M18x: http://forum.notebookreview.com/ali...sd-questions-troubleshooting-discussions.html

You will also find forums for general hardware discussions. For all brands of SSD, we have this forum:

Solid State Drives (SSDs) and Flash Storage and this discussion thread: SSD Thread (Benchmarks, Brands, News, and Advice)

You will also finds some threads specific to a brand of SSD. Here is one such example: Crucial M4 / Micron C400 SSD Series Thread

 

well, my thread got jacked, so i'm movin over here i guess...

Clearing my system services and startup only caused more problems then it solved, unfortunately, so i reverted it back to stock. It also didnt help the boot times either.

Could it be all the things i got plugged in? My USB drives are loaded. I got an external, mouse, joystick, headphones and controller in.

 

Have you tried unplugging everything? With that many devices plugged it, it could be affecting your OS load time.

As far as "my thread got jacked" is concerned, we are trying to maintain some order on the forum and we do not need to start a new thread for every unique question about SSD or have concurrently running individual threads for SSD-related subject matter. We also have threads for general discussions about SSD and threads brand-specific SSD discussion that are not M18x specific.

 

i am trying to install the OS on a new vertrex 3 120gb sata III ssd drive and the installation froze where it was 39% expanding files.



are there any known issues with vertex 3 or m18x and SSD?

 

OCZ Vertex 3? I've seen people recommend them, so i dont think so. Try removing and re-seating the hard drives, they might have not gone in quite right. Before that, if you still can i'd check/update the firmware, since the OCZ are notorious for being unstable. At least thats what i gathered while i was hunting for SSD.

also, i'm going to assume your using the OS that came with your system, but otherwise if i had say a flash drive with my OS on it, i would try remaking the bootable flash drive, since something might have not quite gone in right.

 

i tried installing windows again. this time it installed blazingly fast....but now it appears it is stuck on the "set up is checking video performance"...

so wth....guess i should exchange the drive

 

There are known issues with the vertex 3, it uses sandfail controllers. Get something that doesn't use them, intel/crucial.

 

Is it outright crashing? or just... not being fast. If its still up, just wait. Mine took abnormally long to get installed, like over 20 minutes.

 

I just exchanged it and the new is stuck at 22% expanding files OS install.....i am just sitting here staring at the screen....

 

i can move the mouse and press capslock so its not crashing. Its just sitting there at 22% OS Install.....the dvd drive spindled down waiting for the ssd...

 

AHCI mode and boot from sec. drive first in the BIOS and install the SSD in slot 1. If it hangs give it a couple of min.

 

or...
install as secondary drive
set to raid in bios
boot from win 7 dvd
and see if it will install like that.

 

I'm looking to put an SSD in my M18X and am trying to gauge what kind of performance I can expect. I'm not 100% certian which SATA modes this thing supports.

Anyone with that info able to chime in?

 

I had to format my new OCZ Agility 3 prior to installing Win7, otherwise it would also fail/freeze prior to expanding the files. Or you could try adding the Intel RST drivers during the initial install with the following files:

http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Det...216&keyword=rapid+storage+technology&lang=eng

You might also need to disable LPM (Link Power Management) on Port0 and Port1 the OCZ SSD, after the install completes:

www.hardwarezone.com.sg - View Single Post - [Official] OCZ SSD discussion thread

 

Sata III

 

Hell no i did not plan on spending $200 to bend over backwards. I exchanged it for the kingston ssdNow sata II version and its working perfectly. I will nevet buy an ocz product again.

I do wonder if the sata III speeds are truely twice as fast. This kingston ssd loads windows faster than i can blink

 

Using twin SATA 3 SSD in raid0. Thats what you can expect. =)

Yes, and its pretty cool, loading times are next to nothing.

 

thats my crystaldiskmark bench. Check yours against it, just keep in mind thats a raid0 setup with SATA3.

 

yeah, i gotta agree...im not about to buy a sata 2 drive for a sata 3 system... i just can't see it....maybe...go back and grab a crucial if your not happy with ocz....just a thought...

with that being said...
i have about about 16 drives and had to have them all replaced...twice and some more. vertex 1 models.

the 4 i have now..agility 3 and vertex 3 maxiops...seem to be still running fine with no issues.......but............we shall see...

 

with the same test i got 245 read and 214 write.

how exactly did you get your vertex 3 installed? are you experiencing any freezing issue? so far the kingston has not given any hiccup and it loads windows within one or two seconds with about 70 processes. i have not installed avira antivirus yet and i know that slows down the boot so i am curious to see how it fairs once all my 100 processes are installed.