Location of mSATA slot on HP ENVY 17-j184na

[1_iota]

On page 3 of the HP ENVY 17 Notebook PC Maintenance and Service Guide (http://h10032.www1.hp.com/ctg/Manual/c04091762) it states there is “One full-size mini-card slot for Intel mSATA Cache”. However, the manual does not describe the location of this slot. Where can I find this?

[Huffer · Accepted solution]

I had a close cousin of that model a few years back and the mSATA port is not accessible except by removing the motherboard from the chassis. You can't see it by opening the access panel, and the Manual does not expressly show it. And before you spend a lot of time and money you should know that an mSATA mSSD in this machine can only be used as an Intel Rapid Storage acceleration cache disk working in tandem with a mechanical hard drive. That is why HP only offered 24 and 32 gig mSATA disks on some models in this series, for that purpose.  

You can see where the slot is on the motherboard in the diagram on p. 77. The mSATA plug is under the "3" and the two screw holes are to the right of that, with the right one just next to the corner chassis screw shown by item "5".  

This is the kind of mSATA disk it uses; now just about obsolete:

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[1_iota]

Thank you so much for this detailed response. No wonder I couldn't find the slot! I was just investigating my options for upgrading the hard drive. Sounds like my best bet is to avoid the mSATA and just replace my existing mechanical drive with an SSD.

[Huffer]

That is 100% the case. You have the ability to install a pair of 2.5 inch disks, one of which or both can be SSDs. The main boot drive should be an SSD. You can get a second drive caddy and cable from http://www.newmodeus.com.

https://www.newmodeus.com/shop/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=2_5&products_id=577&zenid=173e...

Both hard drive bays are accessible under the "T" shaped access panel.