Computer "freezes" random intervals after installing SSD in IDE mode.

Hi AddRAM. Well, the list of what I've tried is long, but here goes at attempting to describe most of it. I've reinstalled Win7x64 onto a clean drive, twice, using an ISO USB boot from MS Windows download site. The second installation was after having replaced the drive with a second SSD (via Amazon, who didn't quibble.) After both installations, I immediately updated Win7 (with a few hundred updates) before installing Office 2010 and other programs, but overall the machine is lean and clean, without bloatware. I thought it might be my graphics driver because of the way the machine just locks, arbitrarily, and then the mouse, keyboard, everything is frozen with the only recourse being a hard boot. But I've rolled back the graphics driver to the one provided on the SONY support site for my machine (a VAIO VGN-SR29-VN) and the problem has since reoccurred, so it's not the graphics driver.

I've read on another forum where someone else had the same issue and resolved it by switching from AHCI to IDE mode in their BIOS, but my BIOS is so lightweight that I don't even have that option. My Samsung Magician software informs me that AHCI is enabled, and that's it. I can't disable it in BIOS and try running IDE mode. I've checked that all the ATA connections are solid and secure.

I have just disabled 'RAPID' Real-Time Acceleration mode via the Samsung Magician software, but I don't yet know if that will help as it's not been long enough since doing it to test whether the issue will reoccur.

A bit more background: I installed the Samsung 850 EVO in my SATA II VAIO. It's around 7 years old, but it's in perfect nick and it's running an Intel Centrino Duo-Core 2.4Ghz so I thought it was worth the investment. Whenever the issue occurs the machine simply freezes and I have to perform a hard power off reboot. Immediately after doing that I see a DOS screen saying "WARNING. Hard disk failure imminent. Backup all important files and data and press F1 to continue." Which I do (press F1, that is) and then select 'Start Windows Normally' and just carry on. Another issue (although probably related) is every few hours or every day or two, you can never tell when it will happen, Windows Explorer simply stops working. When this happens I still have mouse and keyboard functionality, so I can 'restart Explorer' without having to do a hard reboot.

Can't say much about the shutdowns but wanted to comment on:

- You should really use AHCI with an SSD.
- RAPID mode uses your RAM as cache, and looks like it increases performance but in case of a power failure, you can lose data that was still on RAM, which wasn't written to the SSD yet.

Also, install chipset drivers first. And if you decide to reinstall once again, do it in stages perhaps?
- Install Windows, install chipset drivers - use for a while
- Install SP1 - use for a while
- Install some of the other updates - use for a while
- Install 1 driver at a time - use for a while
etc.
See if you can pinpoint the culprit.

Also if you ever decide to reinstall right before you do it, maybe you can just use sysprep to strip drivers all together, and see if you will get freezes after the mini setup. I really wonder how others will respond to this kind of idea.

Thanks, GoKay. I forgot to mention in my previous post that I did run the intel.inf utility and right after OS install and before Windows updates. Actually didn't find anything, so I guess I already had the correct chipset drivers (basic Win7, I guess.) Still using AHCI (I don't really have any other option). Since disabling RAPID mode I haven't had a freeze-up just yet ... been about 24 hours, but that doesn't necessarily mean the issues solved. I'll want to give it a few more days to see ...

Good going :)