Windows Startup Repair query

Greg, my guess (almost sure, as BIOS doesn't list them) is he doesn't have any other available SATA ports for his 3TB HDD or future HDDs so he won't be able to disable it fully.

http://www.lsi.com/products/io-contr...-sas-3008.aspx this is the controller in your Tower, and it is raid capable. But I guess I do understand what he was trying to say, there isn't any raid configured. Yet this is a raid card as well.

RedLad, thanks for the screenshot by the way. You should go in to that screen again, highlight that adapter and press DEL to delete it. I believe that is the reason you are getting the warning about preferred boot device missing. You are already working from the SATA-1 port, and have no connection to the SAS card so no reason to be worried. Just do it!

Let us know how it goes.

Has the tower been checked thoroughly for more SATA ports? Does the Manual (linked earlier) say anything about this?

Did Dell add a RAID controller for the purpose of expanding the SATA ports only? Yet their Support denies it has one?

From the manual :

Storage (HDD/SSD):
SAS0 4-port mini-SASSAS3, 12 Gbps (SATA3, 6 Gbps)
SAS1 4-port mini-SASSAS3, 12 Gbps (SATA3, 6 Gbps)

Storage (ODD):
SATA2-ODD0 Intel AHCI SATA 3.0, 6Gbps
SATA2-ODD1 Intel AHCI SATA 3.0, 6 Gbps

As you can see there are only 2x SATA ports, and 1 of them is the DVD-ROM (SATA2-ODD0). SSD is at (SATA2-ODD1) at the moment.

The 8 other bays are all SAS ports unfortunately.

Then as long as they are not RAIDed I would use them as necessary. This is apparently what is intended for that PC.

I would say that as well. We did get the SSD to run on AHCI drivers. The rest can be as it is. Maybe he will want a RAID later on anyway, who knows.

There are 2 issues at the moment though.
1- The SSD still underperforms and unstable with respect to benchmark results.
2- There is a warning at boot about preferred boot adapter (in this case the SSD) missing

I believe (2) will be solved when RedLad deletes the adapter from SAS list.
(1) we will see after clean install.

This is the problem with having a controller intended for RAID second-guessing the Startup. They only really work as intended for RAID and RAID works terribly with Win7 from what I've seen here anyway.

Let's hope that a fresh install as configured now will resolve it without needing to try a bunch of other settings.

Hi lads,

Thanks for the posts, just wanted to give you this update. Earlier on I turned on the PC, went into BIOS and noticed that the Raid controller was set to on, I actually had thought I had it disabled. Anyway, when I disabled it the PC booted up without showing that 'preferred boot device is missing' message. I also want you to note that I didn't go into the Ctrl+C screen to delete the adapter like you say GokAy. Not yet anyway, but I can if I need to. So now, the PC shows the Dell logo, then bypasses that screen that was showing the LSI and other text before and then goes to the 'Starting Windows' logo.

Just about where you mention "the other 8 other bays are all SAS ports unfortunately." Is this going to affect me in a big way moving forward when I do the wipe? I will be plugging in the 4TB to one of them front bays. Or, is it an option to remove the CD drive from the other SATA port and used the HDD in there and just buy an external CD drive to use if needed?

My guess is because you disabled the controller, your 4tb won't work. You can just insert it and check. Shutdown pc just in case.
If it doesn't work, enable controller and try what I posted earlier - post #162 - (delete adapter without disabling SAS)

GokAy said:

My guess is because you disabled the controller, your 4tb won't work. You can just insert it and check. Shutdown pc just in case.
If it doesn't work, enable controller and try what I posted earlier - post #162 - (delete adapter without disabling SAS)

You're right, the PC started, but the HDD wasn't listed in disk management. So I re-enabled the Raid in the BIOS and now it shows. When you say delete the adapter, how exactly do I do that? Do you mean changing the 'Boot Support' line from 'Enabled BIOS & OS' to 'Disabled?'

Please see attached screens to see what I mean: