advice needed on op install on alienware ssd

bagaante · 23 Jan 2013 at 20:24

hi there, i bought a new r4, and today (seperately) i ordered an m4 256gb ssd and some ram for it

the specs are :

210-40039 Alienware M17x : Standard Base 1 SR
338-16738 Processor : 3rd Generation Intel Core i7-3630QM (6MB Cache, up to 3.4GHz w/
Turbo Boost 2.0)
1 SR
230-12513 Display : 17.3" WideFHD (1920 x 1080) WLED LCD 1 SR
319-10774 Camera : Integrated Skype HD Certified FullHD Camera with dual digital microphones 1 SR
320-12437 LCD Back Cover : Soft Touch - Nebula Red 1 SR
340-29313 Ship Accessory : English Docs 1 SR
340-29317 Placemats : Placemats (Eng, Gre, Pol, Ara, Rus) 1 SR
340-29314 Resource DVD : Alienware M17x 1 SR
370-20086 Memory : 6144MB (1x2048 + 1x4096) 1600MHz DDR3 Dual Channel 1 SR
400-25920 Hard Drive : 500GB 7,200 RPM + 32GB mSATA Caching SSD 1 SR
429-16501 Optical Drive : BluRay Combo (Blu-ray read only, DVD, CD read & write) 1 SR
450-13572 Power Cord : UK 250V 1 SR
450-16348 Power Supply : Alienware 240W AC Adapter 1 SR
451-11606 Battery : Primary 9-cell 93W/HR LI-ION 1 SR
490-14105 Graphics : 2GB GDDR5 AMD Radeon HD 7970M

when it comes im wanting to put the ssd in it straight away, does the caching drive take up one of the two hd spaces (ie will i need to remove that?), and basically
i need to know what to do then. Ive never formated any pc before let alone an expensive laptop and frankly its a bit daunting, ive had a look on google, but
couldnt find anything specific to this so i wanted to ask people who knew about it.

Assuming i can even get the ssd in the right place, what order do i need to do things in? do i format the drive thats currently got the operating system on it (and is there a guide?)
or do i put the new operating system (again hoping the windows disc comes with it), and then format the 500gb hard drive after?

im going to use the 256gb ssd for my games, songs, op system and apps, and im going to use the bigger drive for my wifes stuff and photos etc, so not sure if it needs an
operating system

i really do appologise, im a complete noob, and im so out of my depth its not funny, can someone either advice me or point me in the right direction for some kind of guide or
tutorial

please have pitty on me and help me!

iv-tecman · 23 Jan 2013 at 20:46

Well you dont need to beg lol as for putting the OS onto the SSD its pretty simple.. The mSATA is in a small bay and you'll have one spare bay. Basically you have 1 x mSATA and 2 SATA bays 3 in total.

you can use what is known as Alien respawn, the laptop will have the option to make a USB drive with the factory image on this USB drive /Stick that you can then boot from.

now, how the SSD caching works, its enabled via RAID and intel rapid storage (intel RAID) in the BIOS so when you get your laptop, make the respawn USB first. Then install the SSD into the drive bay the existing drive is installed to. Keep the existing drive removed, boot the system and enable the SSD as a single volume RAID Drive, do not use the Cache SSD just yet.

Boot from the USB and install the O/S

Boot a few times, it'll do its thing whilst it re-images the drive and puts the OS on, when its done you'll have the O/S on the SSD and a SSD that isn't going to be doing much, this is the mSATA drive.

Once the O/S is back on, power off, install the other HD into the spare drive bay, boot and enable RAID for both the mSATA and 500GB drive.

Boot, when in windows format the drive, then go to the taskbar tray and open intel rapid storage manager, when open enable acceleration with the 32GB SSD and the 500GB and then the 500GB will be cached with the mSATA and the O/S will be on the SSD.

Its quite easy when you know how, but if you've never done this before, its quite erm well scary lol

the good thing with doing this by taking the existing drive out, and doing nothing with it, if it all goes wrong, put the drive back in again and you can try again, you won't lose the existing O/S so its safer this way... do not format the existing drive until the SSD is up and running.

Keep calm, take your time and make sure you make that USB re spawn before you do anything..

bagaante · 23 Jan 2013 at 21:56

Thanks mate, and yes I'm going to have to read this a few times as much of it I read in a state of panic! (I wish I was joking)
The alien respawn, is this a programme that comes with it? I've got a 32gb USB 3 drive if that will do?

iv-tecman · 23 Jan 2013 at 23:15

bagaante said:
Thanks mate, and yes I'm going to have to read this a few times as much of it I read in a state of panic! (I wish I was joking)
The alien respawn, is this a programme that comes with it? I've got a 32gb USB 3 drive if that will do?

Yes the 32GB stick will do just fine, the alien respawn is a app pre installed to your new laptop, you use it to make a bootable USB stick with the pre installed alienware image.

Its quite simple. nothing to panic about, like I say, take the old drive out, put it safe, install the SSD and it if all goes wrong, then put the drive back in again. the tricky part is setting the RAID to get the mSATA cache up and running...

bagaante · 23 Jan 2013 at 23:27

and the mSata drive cache drive, is that a seperate hard drive, and if so do i need to take that out with the 500gb hard drive? (im thinking is that not what they might have installed operating system on to speed the laptop up? dont really understand it to be honest)

bagaante · 25 Jan 2013 at 10:20

Also, aside from being more time consuming a friend told me with SSd drive would be better off with a fresh install (I don't know if he's telling the truth) , as he says there's less likely to be issues down the road

ninja2000 · 25 Jan 2013 at 10:45

OK, the SSD caching is a msata drive seperate ftom the HDD and is used to help speed the HDD up. I would remove it and sell it as it will not speed up your SSD.

I personally always do a fresh install as it is easy but have done respawns for friends too.

If doing a respawn then create your image onto the usb stick, then turn off the laptop and remove HDD and msata ssd and install your new ssd in place of the HDD.

Now just boot from USB stick and follow the instructions, you will be up and running in about 20mins

iv-tecman · 25 Jan 2013 at 11:40

He can use the mSATA to cache the 500GB drive instead though.

He can boot from the SSD, and use the mSATA and 500GB together and he'll get very good performance from that.

iv-tecman · 25 Jan 2013 at 11:41

bagaante said:
Also, aside from being more time consuming a friend told me with SSd drive would be better off with a fresh install (I don't know if he's telling the truth) , as he says there's less likely to be issues down the road

Maybe, but truth told the M17x base image is quite good and free of any bloatware.

I'd save time and just use the respawn usb, its what I did.

ninja2000 · 25 Jan 2013 at 11:53

iv-tecman said:
He can use the mSATA to cache the 500GB drive instead though.

He can boot from the SSD, and use the mSATA and 500GB together and he'll get very good performance from that.

Good point, I didn't think about that

bagaante · 25 Jan 2013 at 15:11

So If I keep the cache drive also (assuming it can definitely have three drives, been told it can only have two), how do I set up so that the cache drive speeds up the 500gb in bios? I'm assuming C: will be my crucial SSd with op system on, and am I right in think D: will be 500gb one and E: will be cache ? So I go in bios and....?

iv-tecman · 25 Jan 2013 at 15:30

You can have three drives in the M17x, two are standard size 2.5” bays, the other is a mSATA port, the mSATA drives are VERY small, they are not encased in a same size cover as a standard 2.5” drive.

mSATA are more like a PCB with a SATA connector, which makes them perfect for caching drives as they don’t take up much room. Think of them as more like a PCMCIA card if you remember them? But they are just small form PCB that act like a SSD.

Anyhow, you can 100% have one mSATA and two SATA drives in an M17x.

Take the 500GB out, put the SSD in, image up with respawn. Once this is completed, put the 500GB back in, go into the BIOS settings and chose RAID and RAID up the 500GB and mSATA.

Boot and then when booted using intel rapid storage chose to accelerate the 500GB with the mSATA and that will be it. The mSATA will have no letter assigned, you'll have two hidden partitions on the SSD (these are part of the Alienware image and will only show in disk manager) C: drive and D: drive.

C: SSD
D: 500GB + mSATA
Or E: if optical is using the D: letter.

You can change these if you want C: and D: for HD and then use E: or something else for optical. Use Disk Manager for this task.

Also, disable the system managed swap file, as you’ll have 16GB, no point in having a 16GB swap file. Now many will argue against it, but I just have a swap file of 512MB just in case a legacy app requires a swap file.

bagaante · 25 Jan 2013 at 16:06

iv-tecman said:
You can have three drives in the M17x, two are standard size 2.5” bays, the other is a mSATA port, the mSATA drives are VERY small, they are not encased in a same size cover as a standard 2.5” drive.

mSATA are more like a PCB with a SATA connector, which makes them perfect for caching drives as they don’t take up much room. Think of them as more like a PCMCIA card if you remember them? But they are just small form PCB that act like a SSD.

Anyhow, you can 100% have one mSATA and two SATA drives in an M17x.

Take the 500GB out, put the SSD in, image up with respawn. Once this is completed, put the 500GB back in, go into the BIOS settings and chose RAID and RAID up the 500GB and mSATA.

Boot and then when booted using intel rapid storage chose to accelerate the 500GB with the mSATA and that will be it. The mSATA will have no letter assigned, you'll have two hidden partitions on the SSD (these are part of the Alienware image and will only show in disk manager) C: drive and D: drive.

C: SSD
D: 500GB + mSATA
Or E: if optical is using the D: letter.

You can change these if you want C: and D: for HD and then use E: or something else for optical. Use Disk Manager for this task.

Also, disable the system managed swap file, as you’ll have 16GB, no point in having a 16GB swap file. Now many will argue against it, but I just have a swap file of 512MB just in case a legacy app requires a swap file.

Thanks again

Don't know what a PCMCIA is, but I kind of understand that a cache just lets you access things quickly (hope that's right)

Is intel rapid storage a programme that comes with it? Also how do I change the bios to Uefi so it boots quicker ( I need to do this with my pc also as its also got an SSd but takes about 30-60 seconds to boot up)

The system managed swap file bit at the bottom I didn't understand, perhaps it will be clearer once I have the laptop, hopefully coming next week, m4 arrive earlier my 16 gb corsair ram on its way, and hd cooler was supposed to be delivered by overclockers yesterday but I'm thinking snow slowed things

bagaante · 30 Jan 2013 at 09:33

Laptops out for delivery today, I'm very excited :d

bagaante · 31 Jan 2013 at 23:22

iv-tecman said:
Well you dont need to beg lol as for putting the OS onto the SSD its pretty simple.. The mSATA is in a small bay and you'll have one spare bay. Basically you have 1 x mSATA and 2 SATA bays 3 in total.

you can use what is known as Alien respawn, the laptop will have the option to make a USB drive with the factory image on this USB drive /Stick that you can then boot from.

now, how the SSD caching works, its enabled via RAID and intel rapid storage (intel RAID) in the BIOS so when you get your laptop, make the respawn USB first. Then install the SSD into the drive bay the existing drive is installed to. Keep the existing drive removed, boot the system and enable the SSD as a single volume RAID Drive, do not use the Cache SSD just yet.

Boot from the USB and install the O/S

Boot a few times, it'll do its thing whilst it re-images the drive and puts the OS on, when its done you'll have the O/S on the SSD and a SSD that isn't going to be doing much, this is the mSATA drive.

Once the O/S is back on, power off, install the other HD into the spare drive bay, boot and enable RAID for both the mSATA and 500GB drive.

Boot, when in windows format the drive, then go to the taskbar tray and open intel rapid storage manager, when open enable acceleration with the 32GB SSD and the 500GB and then the 500GB will be cached with the mSATA and the O/S will be on the SSD.

Its quite easy when you know how, but if you've never done this before, its quite erm well scary lol

the good thing with doing this by taking the existing drive out, and doing nothing with it, if it all goes wrong, put the drive back in again and you can try again, you won't lose the existing O/S so its safer this way... do not format the existing drive until the SSD is up and running.

Keep calm, take your time and make sure you make that USB re spawn before you do anything..

ok did the alien respawn thing, installed 16 gb ram (my first time - took me ages to get it to slide into place the first time, i was being so so careful lol), couple of questions

now that the ssd is in and its doing windows updates and stuff , i am wanting to put the original drive back in, i noticed the other hard drive caddy was missing two of the screws to hold the hard drive, im worried about putting the original hard drive back in with 2 screws (im also hoping the 2 screws wernt dropped into my components by dell given i havnt touched that bay yet

when i get it that far is a case of doing what you said with the raid, loading up windows from my ssd then right clicking the d drive (or whichever the original 500gb hard drive is) and clicking format?

for some weird reason also when i inspected my computer it says ive got 22 gb of ram (correct - had 6 with it, just put in the 16gb i bought), but its saying only 16gb usable) is that something i have done wrong?

the other thing how do i check what driver my graphics card has (its a 7970m) and which version should it have?

thanks again guys
cant believe i actually did it tbh(well got this far) - thanks so much

iv-tecman · 1 Feb 2013 at 12:38

The second HD cage has a transposer and addtional screws, look carefully, you'll see it, if not then don't worry about it, two screws won't matter too much TBH.

If you don't intend to use your laptop using the battery or not using the battery much, then i'd be tempted to press Fn F7 and turn off the HD4000 as its mostly for power saving.

Device Manager will show you two GPU, the IGPU and the AMD 7970m, after you press Fn F7 and reboot, you'll have one listed in device manager, the 7970m. Update the drivers to the latest CAT 13.2 Beta 4, VERY good driver.

As for the second HD and mSATA, well I take it the mSATA is still installed and you just need to install the second 500GB. Install this, configure the BIOS RAID options, reboot and then using intel rapid storage manager setup the mSATA as a cache to the 500GB job done, format and away you go..

As for 22GB, hmmm not sure, it should only report 16GB if you've installed 4 x 4GB modules, is that what you did?

bagaante · 1 Feb 2013 at 13:25

it already had 6 gb in (4gb and a 2gb from dell) , and i installed 2x 8 gb

iv-tecman · 1 Feb 2013 at 13:31

bagaante said:
it already had 6 gb in (4gb and a 2gb from dell) , and i installed 2x 8 gb

Oh erm..

Ok well that'll be due to windows 7 home having an upper limit of 16GB

you need windows 7 pro to make use of 22GB.

windows 7 starter 2GB limit
windows 7 home basic 32bit 4GB limit
windows 7 64bit home 16GB limit
windows 7 64bit pro onwards 192GB limit

Sadly you need an OS update to use the full 22GB. My advice is to take the 6GB out, not needed and just use the 16GB and sell the 6GB.

16GB is more then enough... Unless you intend to do heavy movie editing etc..

bagaante · 1 Feb 2013 at 13:36

iv-tecman said:
Oh erm..

Ok well that'll be due to windows 7 home having an upper limit of 16GB

you need windows 7 pro to make use of 22GB.

windows 7 starter 2GB limit
windows 7 home basic 32bit 4GB limit
windows 7 64bit home 16GB limit
windows 7 64bit pro onwards 192GB limit

Sadly you need an OS update to use the full 22GB. My advice is to take the 6GB out, not needed and just use the 16GB and sell the 6GB.

16GB is more then enough... Unless you intend to do heavy movie editing etc..

i dont want to be going under the keyboard, (taking the harddrive out and putting ram/ssd back in was enough for me right now) i think i will leave it in for now

bagaante · 1 Feb 2013 at 17:30

iv-tecman said:
The second HD cage has a transposer and addtional screws, look carefully, you'll see it, if not then don't worry about it, two screws won't matter too much TBH.

If you don't intend to use your laptop using the battery or not using the battery much, then i'd be tempted to press Fn F7 and turn off the HD4000 as its mostly for power saving.

Device Manager will show you two GPU, the IGPU and the AMD 7970m, after you press Fn F7 and reboot, you'll have one listed in device manager, the 7970m. Update the drivers to the latest CAT 13.2 Beta 4, VERY good driver.

As for the second HD and mSATA, well I take it the mSATA is still installed and you just need to install the second 500GB. Install this, configure the BIOS RAID options, reboot and then using intel rapid storage manager setup the mSATA as a cache to the 500GB job done, format and away you go..

As for 22GB, hmmm not sure, it should only report 16GB if you've installed 4 x 4GB modules, is that what you did?

is there only one lot of 13.2 beta drivers?

dont want to download desktop ones by mistake

actually i can only find the 13.1 ones , and thats the same one it keeps recommending me to download