M6600 Owners Thread

With my M6600, sometimes, it doesn't boot the mSATA SSD (I need to reboot it to work with it).

The solution I use for the moment:
Primary Drive: SSD Vertex 3 240GB (Run Windows 7 Pro & GRUB Loader)
Secondary Drive: mSATA SSD 120GB (Renice X3), Linux on it (Ubuntu 11.10 for the moment, maybe Debian 6, I will see that later)
Tertiary Drive: HDD WD CaviarBlack 750GB (making some "creepy" noises)

Booting from a loader (GRUB / LiLo / BCD) on the primary drive permit me to boot on the mSATA SSD.

 

Mmm, that's good to know @Athar... Maybe (assuming you are not the only one) this is why Dell has decided not to allow people to buy just an mSATA alone...

On the other hand it may be just an issue with Renice X3 mSATA SSDs...
Has anyone else had issues with mSATA SSD? (Specially as a booting drive). What about the Samsung you buy from Dell?

 

Mine (OCZ Nocti 60GB) wouldn't boot properly from mSATA until I removed the OS from the other two (mechanical) drives in the system, but since I only need one OS this is not a problem.

 

There must be something interrupting the Bus that the audio is sharing?

Have you tried disabling all the USB and firewire ports? (I know you were saying that this is the internal souncard right?, but still...it must be running off a connected bus somehow?)

Could also be due to the RAM? or FSB? These can cause issues if they are being hi-jacked? or aren't big or fast enough to handle the audio stream.

I guess the other question is, is anyone else seeing the same problem you're seeing, and do they have a similar config to you? ( ok that might be two other questions...)

 

I've been running mine for almost 5 months now without probs whatsoever.

 

Mine msata ssd (factory installed 128 gb) runs fine with no problems since mid august.

 

It is a known issue that it is easiest to install an operating system on the mSata drive with other hard drives removed. I have installed an OS without having the remove the drives, but it was a chore.

In my experience, any changes made to hard drive configurations will push the mSata drive down in the boot order in the Bios. You have to go into the Bios setup and move it back up to the top of the boot order.

If you can deal with these two quirks, you should be fine. Both of them go back to how the Intel chipset sees the mSata drive.

Also, make sure you are running the newest bios.

 

I run the A06 BIOS, but I confirm what I said earlier, sometimes, the mSATA is not boot at all (not detected in the BIOS), so I need to reboot the computer one time for this detection.

But when I install the loader on a another drive, it could boot on it, maybe a "wake up" time^^

 

My experiences are based on the Samsung drive that came with the M6600. It may be that the drive you are using. You might try reseating it.

 

Everything you are saying is pretty interesting...
The only mSATA drive configuration option you can select in Europe Dell's web is actually installing the mSATA as primary disk ... (primary disk is not specified in USA's web). Seeing what you guys have said until know I can't figure out a clear reason why Dell doesn't allow to buy just the mSATA SSD now ... Maybe it is just pure marketing... or they may be trying to avoid problems caused by people not knowing they should remove the other drives before installing the OS in mSATA... Or maybe they are relying less on the mSATA... It actually used to be the recommended option but they don't recommend it anymore and it even doesn't show up if selecting through the most advanced/expensive "starting point"...
Anyway, a larger sample could give some light on it, and a Dell representative clarification too (Nano?)