Problem with SSD and Dell Precision M6500 - RAID Only - Cannot get AHCI to work etc..........

[Zoomclub]

Ok, I have a M6500 with the 2 std Seagate HD's in. Ideally = Want to keep both drives in but add a Samsung 840 Evo Pro SSD.
Here's my problem(s)! - If I do take either of the 2 Seagates out of slot 1 or 2 and put the 840 in - I get "Drive not seated properly" - I can see that physically the 840 is slightly - a few mm - smaller, depth wise than the Seagates, but have felt the SATA connectors slot in - In slot 1 for eg. - but still get "not seated" error.

So bought a DVD "replacement SATA adaptor" to put the 840 in, and indeed the BIOS then recognises it correctly, and I can get it to boot from the 840 but only if:-
1) - BIOS SATA settings set to RAID I get informed that neither the SSD or the Seagate are RAID drives, and the s/ware with the 840 tells me it should be operated in AHCI mode. Problem is that with BIOS Setup to AHCI it then just does not recognise the SSD - at all.
2) - There is no drive at all in Slot 1 - if there is then the BIOS does not recognise the SSD As even being present = nevermind giving the option of booting from it!

The BIOS revision I'm running is Version A010, and this is the latest version for the M6500 according to Dell updates. The SSD is loaded with Win 7 Ult 64bit, as is 1 of the 2 Seagates - the other is with Win 7 Enterprise 64 bit.

The SSD is correctly recognised in Device Mgr - Even if AHCI mode = If I've booted from either of the 2 Seagates - HELP PLEASE I'M GOING NUTZ!
Hope this all makes some kinda sense - please advise any ideas anyone, 'cos I'm fresh out!

Thanks
Jon

 

[cin19]

1) You can use the SSD under either raid mode or ahci mode, because when you enable the raid that will enable AHCI too.
2) When you install the new OS into the SSD, you are better only connect the SSD but not other storage drive because during the installation if you have other HDD then some of files/folds will be installed into those HDD. Later on you will get problem.
3) The Samsung Magician Software may not work under the raid mode, I have the ocz SSD in raid mode and the toolbox does not work under the raid mode.
4) If you want to dual boot the SSD with win7 ult and the HDD with win7 enterprise, then you may need use the " easyBCD' to build the boot loader. http://neosmart.net/EasyBCD/
5) So you connect the SSD, install the win7 ult, shutdown the laptop, connect the hdd, reboot the laptop, build the boot loader, then you may can dual boot.