BIOS setting for new SATA HDD for new OS install

[cheapfrag]

I built my first PC in August 2007. The specs are as follows:
Intel C2D E6750 2.66GHz
Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3P Motherboard
Corsair CMPSU-620HX 620W Power Supply
4x 1 GB Patriot Extreme PC2-6400 RAM
EVGA 320-P2-N811-AR GeForce 8800 GTS 320MB Video Card
WD7500AAKS 750GB SATA Hard Drive
Sony/NEC Optiarc SATA DVD+/-RW
CoolerMaster Hyper TX2 cooler
Antec P180B Case
Microsoft Windows Vista Ultimate (32-bit)
Creative Labs Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Gamer

Now I will be installing a new Hard Drive (Samsung SpinPoint F3 500GB) for the Operating System and keeping the 750 GB HDD as storage.

I have also purchased a new graphic card: EVGA GeForce GTX460 768MB

And, I was thinking that I would install the 64-bit version of Windows Vista Ultimate.

So my question is mainly about the BIOS settings. I’m not sure that I set the BIOS setting for my WD SATA Hard Drive to the best settings.

SATA RAID/ACHI Mode: Disabled*/RAID/AHCI
SATA Port0-3 Native Mode: Disabled*/Enabled
Onboard SATA/IDE Device: Enabled*/Disabled
Onboard SATA/IDE Ctrl Mode: IDE*/ACHI/RAID-IDE
(asterisk indicates current selection for my WD7500AAKS)

What should these SATA BIOS settings be set to for my new Samsung F3? If I change settings, will I still be able to read the existing information off my WD7500AAKS HDD when it is the storage drive?

Init Display First: PCI*/PEG/PEG2
What should this BIOS setting be set to?

Sorry for the long post. Thanks in advance.

 

[Paperdoc]

Ideally you should set your SATA ports to Enabled and their modes to AHCI. Since your older HDD was used as an IDE Emulated device, it is possible you'd have difficulty reading it as a storage device in AHCI mode, but I think it should work OK. Do NOT set to RAID. I expect the Port0-3 Native Mode should be Enabled.

For your display, setting as it is to PCI looks right, because that's where your video card is and it is NOT a PEG device.

Hint: When you go to do a fresh install of Vista 64-bit on your new HDD, DISconnect your old HDD as you do it. Vista and Win 7 have an interesting procedure when they install. IF it finds a second HDD available, it will place on it a backup copy of essential system files. The idea is that, if it ever has trouble booting later, it can go to that second HDD and restore the corrupted files and fix itself. Good precaution. BUT it also means that with this in place, it CANNOT BOOT unless that second HDD is in place in addition to the real boot drive! So, may people defeat a part of that by having only ONE HDD in place during the installation. That forces the Install to place the backup files on the same drive as the OS is installed on. Not quite as secure for automatic restoration purposes, but frees you from the necessity of having that second drive working at all times.

AFTER the new install is all working, shut down and reconnect the older HDD. It should be recognized on boot-up and available to use in My Computer.

 

[guanyu210379]

If you found any trouble rearranging the partitions after the new installation of the Win 7.
You can always download a free partition wizard CD and rearrange your partition, including if you wanna destroy (wipe) your old VISTA partition permanently.
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/93322-partition-wizard-use-bootable-cd.html?ltr=P

BTW :
Goodluck with the Win7 installation

 

[geofelt]

When initially installing the OS, I suggest that you select AHCI(not IDE or RAID) as the sata mode in the bios. After OS installation, it is very difficult to change the mode without a reinstall. AHCI is necessary for a SSD which you might get in the future to use the trim command. The trim command muchly improves the efficiency of file deletes. Currently the delivered Windows-7 driver is the only one that can pass on the trim command. In time, the Intel raid drivers will get updated with that capability. Also AHCI enables hot plugging and some monitoring capabilities. AHCI is a subset of raid, but I do not recommend raid for normal usage.

The init display first is telling the bios where to look for the boot display adapter. That could be on a pci slot or a pci-e slot. Don't know what peg2 would mean. Eventually, the bios will find a device with any of the settings. It is a moot point with only one display. I am guessing that specifying peg or peg2 micht result in a slightly faster boot.

 

[cheapfrag]

When initially installing the OS, I suggest that you select AHCI(not IDE or RAID) as the sata mode in the bios. After OS installation, it is very difficult to change the mode without a reinstall. AHCI is necessary for a SSD which you might get in the future to use the trim command. The trim command muchly improves the efficiency of file deletes. Currently the delivered Windows-7 driver is the only one that can pass on the trim command. In time, the Intel raid drivers will get updated with that capability. Also AHCI enables hot plugging and some monitoring capabilities. AHCI is a subset of raid, but I do not recommend raid for normal usage.

The init display first is telling the bios where to look for the boot display adapter. That could be on a pci slot or a pci-e slot. Don't know what peg2 would mean. Eventually, the bios will find a device with any of the settings. It is a moot point with only one display. I am guessing that specifying peg or peg2 micht result in a slightly faster boot.

Thanks for the replies all!

geofelt - Will I see any improvement in Hard Drive performance if I use AHCI mode? If not. I might just leave it the way it is.

If I enable AHCI mode, will I be able to access the existing information off the old WD7500AAKS drive when I hook it up as a secondary drive?

To enable AHCI mode, I assume I would set SATA RAID/AHCI Mode to AHCI? What about SATA Port0-3 Native Mode (Disabled*/Enabled)?

Will AHCI effect the DVDRW drive on that SATA controller?

I think the other two settings (Onboard SATA) is for the other SATA controller (jMicron?)... I'm not sure I am using those SATA connectors (I will only have 2 SATA HDD and 1 SATA DVDRW drive)

 

[geofelt]

Thanks for the replies all!

geofelt - Will I see any improvement in Hard Drive performance if I use AHCI mode? If not. I might just leave it the way it is.

If I enable AHCI mode, will I be able to access the existing information off the old WD7500AAKS drive when I hook it up as a secondary drive?

To enable AHCI mode, I assume I would set SATA RAID/AHCI Mode to AHCI? What about SATA Port0-3 Native Mode (Disabled*/Enabled)?

Will AHCI effect the DVDRW drive on that SATA controller?

I think the other two settings (Onboard SATA) is for the other SATA controller (jMicron?)... I'm not sure I am using those SATA connectors (I will only have 2 SATA HDD and 1 SATA DVDRW drive)

You will not notice any performance improvement. The enabling of non sequential queueing is a performance plus, but a normal desktop does not usually have many queued requests.

You will be able to access your files on the old drive whatever you do. Sata is point to point, there is no such thing as primary/secondary.

I suspect you want native mode to be enables, but that is just a guess.

AHCI has no effect on dvd sata drives.

Without AHCI, you will not get the S.M.A.R.T drive statistics which might warn you of an impending drive problem. You will not be able to hot plug any sata drives.

I would not change it for an existing OS, but if you are doing a reinstall of the OS, AHCI seems like a no brainer to me.

 

[cheapfrag]

Best answer selected by cheapfrag.