New M6500 Discussion Thread

First time here, and I did some searching but could not find anything yet regarding the following issue:

I just bought an M6500 that came with 1 500GB SATA drive. I installed an SSD mini PCI card and installed Windows 7 in it. I then formatted the original SATA drive and everything worked fine.

However, when I install a second 2.5" SATA drive on Port 2, the SSD mini PCI card can no longer boot. It doesn't show up in the BIOS as a bootable device, only the 2 2.5" drives appear.

If i take the 2nd drive and connect it via an eSATA dock then no problem at all.

What do I need to do to make that 2nd hard drive work fine on the 2nd port in the laptop?

 

Which BIOS version are you running?

 

The BIOS Version is A06, the drives are in a non-RAID setup.

SATA mode in the BIOS is "RAID".

 

Huh? What does "non-RAID" mean in that case?
However, there's your problem. The BIOS (at least A06 - don't know if others differ) doesn't detect the SSD in the FCM slot when both HDDs are set to be in RAID in the BIOS:
Dell Precision M6500 ? DebianforumWiki
(yep, wrong language, I know. )

 

By "non-RAID" I mean that the two 2.5" drives are just installed as standalone SATA drives in the machines.

Since A06 is the latest version, it seems like the only choices I have left is to setup the 2nd drive in a RAID 0 or RAID 1.

Is that how you have yours setup? Are you booting from the SSD mini card?

 

And a couple other considerations:

My first 2.5" drive has data, so I will back it up before trying this, but since the machine won't boot, is it safe to setup the RAID from the BIOS?

Otherwise, can I remove the 2nd drive, install it on an eSATA dock, setup the RAID from Windows 7 using the Intel Rapid Storage software, then install the drive internally? (will it recognize it?)

 

My controller is in AHCI mode, I have no RAID of any sort set up and yes, I boot from the mini card SSD.

I'm not sure what happens if you set up the RAID from within Windows or if that's possible at all. Backing up your data is a good idea anyways.

I have no idea since I've never used Win 7.

 

This might help in changing your Raid to ACHI

Changing from RAID to AHCI - Microsoft Answers

 

Just to be clear, are you saying that you have three drives.... the miniPCI that you're booting from and then two other 2.5" drives?

Very interested if that's the case since I've been under the impression that using the miniPCI slot required that the other two 2.5" drives be configured as a RAID volume together, else only one of the 2.5" bays would be useable.

 

could someone point me in the direction of where I might find a set of Dell driver discs for an M6500 ?

did a very quick search in this thread but nothing showed up

just purchased the following from eBy for the sum of £900

M6500
940XM
16 gig ram
2X500 HD in raid
ATI 7820
USB3
3.2 webcam
1920x1200
W7 Enterprise
Has a little bump on the corner and looks like the screen has been replaced but can't say I'm too unhappy with price.