Intel Rapid Storage Technology gone from BIOS

I have an Aspire S5, with a 128GB SSD. The SSD is seen in the laptop as two 64GB drives, and is configured in RAID0 as default. At one point the RAID failed, and I tried to factory reset but the laptop wouldn't get into the recovery-mode (pressing ALT+F10 and all variations of ALT/CTRL/F-buttons) so I reinstalled manually with a USB.

In BIOS, both drives are seen as 64GB, but in Windows only the one drive I installed on is seen as 64GB, the other one is still seen as the RAID-drive (128GB). It's not usable since I have to format it first but I don't dare to do that. I can see that the recoverypartition is still on this, but since RAID0 being RAID0, I'm assuming that all data on this ghost-partition is not usable in any way.

When starting the laptop I get the Intel Rapid Storage Technology prompt (press CTRL+I), and it's saying that the RAID has failed, listing both drives (partitions), one of them as a member and the other one (the one I reinstalled Windows on) not as a member. So I deleted that configuration and thought I'd recreate it and reinstall Windows again. But when I deleted the configuration I can no longer access Intel Rapid Storage Technology at all, the prompt never comes up! It just boots straight into Windows. Pressing CTRL+I at startup gives nothing, probably because IRST isn't loading at all...

I'll assume that the recoverypartition is gone forever since I already reinstalled on one of the partitions, but I'd like to at least get RAID working again.

TL;DR - Intel Rapid Storage Technology uninstalled itself from the board, how can I enable it again?

Accepted answers

IronFly

if you are not using windows 7, i strongly suggest you to re-install under UEFI.

i suggest you to update BIOS if any update for your S5 is available, maybe this can fix your IRST issue:

http://www.acer.com/ac/en/US/content/support

if you still had issue with CTRL-I

have a look here:

http://community.acer.com/t5/S-and-R-Series-Laptops/R13-R7-371T-Raid-0/td-p/366145/page/2

and check KEHinWA post

All comments

IronFly

check if your BIOS is in UEFI mode, if so, when you delete the array, CTRL-I is no more available.

so switch back to Legacy with RAID as SATA device, save and exit

at the next boot CTRL-I will be again available

set your ARRAY

exit

enter BIOS again and set UEFI back

check if SATA is still RAID

save and exit

re-install windows

XistenZ

It's in legacy mode, if I change to UEFI the Acer logo barely flashes for 0.000001 milliseconds and I get a message saying no boot device found.

It's also set to RAID, if I change this to AHCI then Windows will fail to boot.

In short, BIOS set to Legacy and RAID will not let me enter IRST.

IronFly

if you are not using windows 7, i strongly suggest you to re-install under UEFI.

i suggest you to update BIOS if any update for your S5 is available, maybe this can fix your IRST issue:

http://www.acer.com/ac/en/US/content/support

if you still had issue with CTRL-I

have a look here:

http://community.acer.com/t5/S-and-R-Series-Laptops/R13-R7-371T-Raid-0/td-p/366145/page/2

and check KEHinWA post

XistenZ

Thank you! This was exactly what I was experiencing.

For future readers, this link takes you straight to the post. I did have some trouble following the authors instructions, but I made it work.

- I don't know how to install the new RSTCLI drivers and make a bootable recovery USB of an already installed OS, so I used a Windows 8 USB I already had, made from an ISO-file

- when running the first command (RSTCLI64 -I --Controller), I had to adjust it somewhat to (RSTCLI64.exe -I --controller) for it to work, note the .exe-extension and controller with a SMALL 'c'.

- When executing this the prompt informed me that the installed driver was of version 12, so it could not run the one I just downloaded because it was newer (as I said earlier, no idea how to install it on the OS).

I downloaded the apropriate version and redid the procedure, this time it worked and the drives was listed.

- Take note of the #-#-#-# sequence, for the author of the post the drives was '0-3-0-0' and '0-1-0-0', for me they were '0-0-0-0' and '0-1-0-0'.

Adjust the last numbers in the next command accord to your drives numbersequence:

(RSTCLI64.exe -C -l 0 -n SOMENAMEYOUWANT 0-1-0-0 0-3-0-0).

The CTRL+I option is still gone from BIOS, but it's merely an inconvenience now Smiley Happy

IronFly

Good to hear it!

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