AHCI mode: Installation of SSD, Optical drives and SATA drivers (advise needed)

[Spartan18]

Hello there

I've started buying the components for my new PC build, mobo wise I think I'm leaning towards the Asus P8Z77 V Deluxe. The PC will have one ssd as a boot drive, a secondary HDD and two optical SATA drives one DVD-RW and an BR-RW. I will be installing WIN7 Ultimate SP1 inclusive. I'd really appreciate some advice on the steps below as I'm currently quite confused with the whole process

Bear in mind the above mobo has two controlers for the various sata ports 1 intel and 1 marvel, both are set to AHCI in the bios by default.

1. I connect only the ssd and the optical drives as the HHD will have to be connected after the WIN7 installation (That I have established)

2. The SATA port(s) at least for the SSD have to be configured in AHCI, which is indeed the case by default for all sata ports on this mobo. I don' think I can individualy set the other SATA port to IDE mode. As such would the optical drives work properly in AHCI mode?

3. I proceed with WIN 7 installation and I load the AHCI mobo specific drivers..Now here comes the tough part, as this asus has 4 different sata drivers. See below

3.1 Intel(R) Rapid Storage Technology Driver Software V11.1.0.1006 Intel(R) AHCI/RAID Driver for Windows XP/7 32bit & 64bit.

3.2 Marvell SATA 6G Driver for Windows XP/Vista/7 32bit & 64bit.

3.3 Intel Rapid Start Technology Software

3.4 Asmedia SATA Controller Driver V1.3.4.0

I understand the driver i need to install for AHCI is the 1st one. What about the other three though? Do I need to install them? And if yes at which point, load them along with the AHCI drivers during WIN7 installation or afterwards from within the OS once the installation is complete.

Please forgive the length of my email, I just don't want to screw things up.

[jackvdbuk]

SSD do not need to be AHCI - its just benficial as it allows for NCQ and such.

i have mine in IDE as i just couldnt get it to boot in AHCI as the BIOS kept messing up on my IP35 pro - my SSD still is very fast and you wont look back

[Phage]

Relax. Windows will handle most of this.

1) Build PC. Just leave the HDD unplugged.Plug the SSD into the very first Sata port.
2) Turn it on.
3) Install W7 64 to SSD from DVD or download.
4) Install ALL the important system drivers (chipset, graphics, Intel RST).
5) Open RST in system tray and check that disk data cache is enabled
6) Disable file content indexing (optionally turn it off completely) for SSD and double-check that Windows has correctly disabled scheduled defrags for SSD
7) Run WEI
8) Plug HDD in and format it.

Ta da !

[Jasp]

1. Plug you drives in, HDD and SSD should have the 6gbs cables in the intel controller, CDs should be fine at 3gbs in the blue ports.

2. The bios will moan on boot about boot media and dump you into the setup, check one of ya cds is first boot then your SSD, insert windows cd restart.

3. Install onto the SSD and partition the HDD at the same time if ya like.

4. Install drivers etc from CD.

5. Enjoy...

Its worth noting their is going to be a premium board which is higher spec then the deluxe with a thunderbolt port and a cache ssd built in, ive personnaly got the pro board as didn't need the extra bells and whistles and its still got far to many whistles for my needs, some of the features like the fan expert are seriously cool.

[Agent]

6) Disable file content indexing (optionally turn it off completely) for SSD and double-check that Windows has correctly disabled scheduled defrags for SSD

Is anyone able to provide any reason for this, preferably with evidence backing it up?
I've pretty much resigned this to the 'myth' pile now. As far as I can tell, it came about during the 'omg stop all writing to the SSD that you can' phase that came out. It's the same madness that gripped people when they moved their browser cache off the ssd

The file indexing is negligible in terms of writing that it does to the drive, it's just not an issue. If people are thinking that a SSD is fast enough without this turned on: The index is still faster and allows other programs to hook into it.

Any thoughts?

[Spartan18]

Many thanks to all for your replies

Specifically to the drivers: Do I install the intel RST AHCI driver during windows installation from the load driver option? What about the Asmedia, Marvel sata drivers as well as the Intel RST software, do they also get installed by the load driver during the OS installation process or afterwards?

Relax. Windows will handle most of this.

1) Build PC. Just leave the HDD unplugged.Plug the SSD into the very first Sata port.
2) Turn it on.
3) Install W7 64 to SSD from DVD or download.
4) Install ALL the important system drivers (chipset, graphics, Intel RST).
5) Open RST in system tray and check that disk data cache is enabled
6) Disable file content indexing (optionally turn it off completely) for SSD and double-check that Windows has correctly disabled scheduled defrags for SSD
7) Run WEI
8) Plug HDD in and format it.

Ta da !

[Jasp]

All your drivers are installed via the ASUS CD after windows has installed. No need for the load during OS option.

[Agent]

When using Windows 7, you shouldn't need to install any drivers at that point. It should just pick the drive up fine, even on AHCI.

Everything else just install when Windows is up and running.

Thankfully we're no longer in the 9x and XP days of driver installation. You really can't go wrong with installing them.

[Phage]

Is anyone able to provide any reason for this, preferably with evidence backing it up?
I've pretty much resigned this to the 'myth' pile now. As far as I can tell, it came about during the 'omg stop all writing to the SSD that you can' phase that came out. It's the same madness that gripped people when they moved their browser cache off the ssd

The file indexing is negligible in terms of writing that it does to the drive, it's just not an issue. If people are thinking that a SSD is fast enough without this turned on: The index is still faster and allows other programs to hook into it.

Any thoughts?

You're most likely right. I've always advised it on the basis that it was the advice I received from OCZ back in the day. May well be out of date nowadays.

[Agent]

After a bit of searching it seems to have started back in the JMicron days where putting the controller under any load would cause stuttering issues. Turning this off seemed to help overcome their bad controller.

AFAIK then, it's not an issue with anything from the past couple of years.