z420 - RAID + AHCI Problem

[ONCBON]

Hi Guys, 

Thank you for the information, had the same problem with HP Z420 workstation and slow disk performance.

I am now using the Intel drivers and getting better performance on all drives (ssd and standard) on the SATA bus.

Some 'strange' issues remain... 2 identical WD BLACK HDD's, one on the 6Gb/s connector and one on the 3Gb/s connector.  The drive on the 3Gb/s connector performs better.

When I try to switch the controller setting in the BIOS to AHCI from AHCI/RAID. My system could not boot anymore and it was impossible to get it to work, even by manually loading the AHCI driver.  I read in another article that I should ignore the fact that the Samsung software claims the SSD drive is not running in AHCI mode so I'm not going to bother with that for a while.

I hope new HP drivers will appear soon to correct these issues by default.

BON

[wvillers]

Yes, the Samsung SSD Magician is apparently incapable of dealing with the RAID+AHCI, but theSD is definitely not in IDE mode...

BTW, the 840 Pro seems to be quite good performance-wise compared to the 830:

[MikeAZ]

Try downloading the latest C600 drivers from the Intel site and replacing them throught Device Manager.  This fixed my Raid SSD issue, enabled TRIM and doubled the performance on the raid set.

[Skylarking]

Well it seems Intel actually works to fix issues with iRST drivers which are now at version 13.2.4.1000 while HP just keeps their old and errornous drivers around with what seems contempt towards driver update support for their customers ! 

Come on HP, it's almost October 2014 and your lates iRST drivers for the Z210 are at version 10.6.0.1002 dated end Jun 2012. Surely you can't expect we simply buy a new machine every time you can't be bothered updating your drivers !!!

Where's the support i thought i paid for (support is not just NBD hardware swapsies you know) ?

[Edited to add following]

Well it seems Intel may also be playing funny buggers. Their latest driver doesn't seem to list C206 cougarpoint PCH chipset (as used on Z210) within their supported chipset list. Intel did support this chipset with version 12.8.1016 (Aug 2013) though i haven't looked if any later versions also support C206... But i'll stick with my view that HP is being lazy at our expense...

[Editied again to further clarify the absurdity that is documentation]

Well it seems Intel iRST does indeed support the C200 series chipsets according to the readme you are presented with during install itself. Why the readme available on the intel web page is different to the install readme is beyond understanding... Maybe i'll find out other absurdities once i continue with the iRST driver install. HP should still pull its finger out and support its user base (and while they are at it get Intel to improve on its documentation quality as they are Intels customer...)...

[Pinkerton808]

If you have a mixed environment a SSD and RAID HDD devices-->the ahci setting in the BIOS is typically set to mixed- .

Things to consider;

Upadting BIOS helps to open up AHCI capabilities when older versions of BIOS didnt support it ...

For the Z620 series, you must STEP UP the BIOS upgrades to 1.23   from 1.23 you can jump as high as 3.xx

[gabornico]

many HP workstations have this RAID+AHCI mode.

Harddrives are managed by RAID BIOS (this is the main reason HP branded SSDs have a custom firmware).

The AHCI option rom handles only compatible optical drives in these workstations.

OP you have to decide what is more important.

Using the onboard SATA controller in AHCI mode gives better performance but cannot handle the existing RAID.

RAID+AHCI provides advanced SATA functions only to your DVD drive and manages your RAID set, but the SSD is also in RAID mode although it is not part of the harddisk array.