Solved my laptop hard drive appears as a removable device...

[Murd3rd]

after installing a fresh copy of W7, my Laptop hard drive shows up as a removable device (see attached photo, actual screen image of MY desktop area), however if you click to remove it, it says its in use, blah blah blah, can't eject or what have you, i just wanna know how to make this message go away, i searched a lil bit but could not find any clear way to solve the issue except for one thing on google that brought up just ignore it if it isn't hurting anything.......well i don't like that answer

any help will be much appreciated, thanks in advance

i will also add that my computer has been like this for well over six months now.....and its just driving me insane......and i finally found a descent forum to get on and the time to more thoroughly investigate the situation

 

[Murd3rd]

bump.....

 

[TVeblen]

This is a common problem when running on the generic AHCI driver supplied in W7.
The solution is to install the correct AHCI driver for your laptop.

First - find the AHCI driver. These usually come in the motherboard CD if this were a custom build. For a laptop you would need to see if there is one in the manufacturer's downloads section, contact the manufacturer, or find out the brand of motherboard, check the specs, and see if you can find a suitable driver. The generic Intel driver works for many boards based on Intel chipsets.

Once you have the correct AHCI driver you install it thus:

• Open Device Manager
• Navigate to IDE/ATA/ATAPI Controller > ***AHCI Serial ATA Controller
• Right click > Properties
• Choose: Update Driver
• Browse to the folder that contains the AHCI driver you downloaded > Select > OK
• “Successful” Message > Close
• “Must Restart > Restart
• Drivers Install > Another Restart necessary > Restart
• Drivers successfully Installed. Remove Hardware Icon no longer showing.

*** : the name of the AHCI device is different for different systems, but it should be the only one with AHCI in it's name.

See if that will help.

 

[TVeblen]

bump.....

Oh, and welcome to the forum murd3rd.
Read the forum rules when you get a chance (don't bump)

 

[Murd3rd]

thanks you for the quick detailed response, im gunna try that out asap

sorry for the violation, didnt know that rule, another forum im on (truck forum) there is no rule against bumping

any reason as to why you cant bump, it keeps your thread in sight of others

 

[pebbly]

thanks you for the quick detailed response, im gunna try that out asap

sorry for the violation, didnt know that rule, another forum im on (truck forum) there is no rule against bumping

any reason as to why you cant bump, it keeps your thread in sight of others

Hi Murd3rd, The main reason you are asked not to "bump" a post is because this forum is very busy and the person most qualified to answer your post may be working on another thread so a little patience is required, your post will get the attention it deserves

 

[Murd3rd]

ok so i did a lil searching for the driver and what i found is the driver that i already have installed? is it possible that this is the driver needed and something else is wrong? see attachment.

 

[Murd3rd]

thanks you for the quick detailed response, im gunna try that out asap

sorry for the violation, didnt know that rule, another forum im on (truck forum) there is no rule against bumping

any reason as to why you cant bump, it keeps your thread in sight of others

Hi Murd3rd, The main reason you are asked not to "bump" a post is because this forum is very busy and the person most qualified to answer your post may be working on another thread so a little patience is required, your post will get the attention it deserves

ok, thank you for the explanation, i appreciate and understand completely, i will remember for next time

 

[TVeblen]

Hey Murd3rd

That looks like the same generic windows driver you already have. So it will not help.

If you fill out your "My System Specs" (you can use the link in the lower left corner of any post window of yours) someone here can look up your laptop by make and model and give you some help in finding a good driver.

When you finished installing W7 did you install any other drivers? Either from download or from Windows Update?

You may get what you need by installing the "Chipset Driver" for your laptop, if you have not done that already.

EDIT: don't sweat the bump thing. I was a bump violator when I first came here too, and they haven't kicked me out yet!

 

[Murd3rd]

Hey Murd3rd

That looks like the same generic windows driver you already have. So it will not help.

If you fill out your "My System Specs" (you can use the link in the lower left corner of any post window of yours) someone here can look up your laptop by make and model and give you some help in finding a good driver.

When you finished installing W7 did you install any other drivers? Either from download or from Windows Update?

You may get what you need by installing the "Chipset Driver" for your laptop, if you have not done that already.

EDIT: don't sweat the bump thing. I was a bump violator when I first came here too, and they haven't kicked me out yet!

i will fill that out asap, thanks

when i installed windows 7 i just ran the windows update and got ALL updates available

where can i acquire the "chipset driver"?

 

[Murd3rd]

i filled out the specs of my laptop however i could not find the motherboard type or sound card type(not that the sound card really matters for this situation)

attached is a PDF of my entire system specs straight from Toshiba, with the exception of the vista which mine no longer has, i have 7 Ultimate 64-bit

 

[pebbly]

Hi Murd3rd, here is a link to the drivers Laptop Driver Downloads:
the sound card drivers are there, as for the chipset drivers download this little information tool Piriform - Download speccy will tell you the mobo manf , then you can go to the website and download the latest chipset driver

 

[TVeblen]

Continue to try and find either a AHCI driver for the motherboard or an updated chipset driver for the laptop, that is the easiest way, but there is a second option.

How comfortable are you with poking around in the guts of the operating system (editing the registry)?

 

[Murd3rd]

Hi Murd3rd, here is a link to the drivers Laptop Driver Downloads:
the sound card drivers are there, as for the chipset drivers download this little information tool Piriform - Download speccy will tell you the mobo manf , then you can go to the website and download the latest chipset driver

thanks pebbly, ill check it out

 

[Murd3rd]

Continue to try and find either a AHCI driver for the motherboard or an updated chipset driver for the laptop, that is the easiest way, but there is a second option.

How comfortable are you with poking around in the guts of the operating system (editing the registry)?

i have done it before but only with step by step instructions, is there a write up somewhere of what you are wanting me to do?

 

[TVeblen]

Let me find that.
In the meantime: did you check this out? - http://www.csd.toshiba.com/cgi-bin/...6921&selCategory=2756709&selFamily=1073768663
"How To Manually Upgrade from Vista to Windows 7 - Satellite A355D"

 

[TVeblen]

I have this info in my notes. The solution is based on this MS document: Internal and External SATA Port Configuration

To summarize:
"To work around this problem, you can disable external SATA support on a per channel basis by setting the value of the TreatAsInternalPort registry key to 1 and then rebooting the system"

So, if you can check and see which channel your drive is connected to you can change a registry value accordingly.
Do this by going to Device Manager > Disk Drives > Right click the drive and select Properties > General Tab > Location.
Most likely Channel 0.

Now open the registry editor and navigate to:
HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\msahci\Controller0\Channel0
(Using the channel # you found in Device Manager above)
If these keys (Controller0, or Channel0) do not exist you must create them.

In the Channel0 key, create a new DWORD value with the following properties:
Value Name: TreatAsInternalPort
Value Data: 1
Base: Hexidecimal

Then reboot.

Be sure to back up the registry, create a restore point, before making any changes.

 

[Murd3rd]

I have this info in my notes. The solution is based on this MS document: Internal and External SATA Port Configuration

To summarize:
"To work around this problem, you can disable external SATA support on a per channel basis by setting the value of the TreatAsInternalPort registry key to 1 and then rebooting the system"

So, if you can check and see which channel your drive is connected to you can change a registry value accordingly.
Do this by going to Device Manager > Disk Drives > Right click the drive and select Properties > General Tab > Location.
Most likely Channel 0.

Now open the registry editor and navigate to:
HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\msahci\Controller0\Channel0
(Using the channel # you found in Device Manager above)
If these keys (Controller0, or Channel0) do not exist you must create them.

In the Channel0 key, create a new DWORD value with the following properties:
Value Name: TreatAsInternalPort
Value Data: 1
Base: Hexidecimal

Then reboot.

Be sure to back up the registry, create a restore point, before making any changes.

thanks for the info i will most likely be trying this

 

[Murd3rd]

Now open the registry editor and navigate to:
HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\msahci\Controller0\Channel0
(Using the channel # you found in Device Manager above)
If these keys (Controller0, or Channel0) do not exist you must create them.

ok they do not exist so how do i create them? sorry if this is pesky stuff i probably should know

 

[Murd3rd]

Let me find that.
In the meantime: did you check this out? - Model Content Page
"How To Manually Upgrade from Vista to Windows 7 - Satellite A355D"

i appreciate all the help, and no i am checking it out as i type this, i saw that the other day but didnt even think that it could be a tool for troubleshooting, but im about to read through it


as i was reading through it just now, it is talking about doing an upgrade, but i didnt just upgrade, i totally formatted my hard drive and installed a fresh copy of windows 7, i have zero toshiba software on my laptop anymore except the necessary software to run the hardware that is installed in on this computer, which may not even be toshiba specific