Locked BIOS Preventing SSD Upgrade and several other issues

[Stonewall]

Greetings all. I recently customized a new Envy 17 3D with every detail maxed out, except one. The dual SSD/HD option. On the phone ordering this machine, I wasn't given much information regarding the SSD for the machine, and couldn't see spending 500 dollars for that upgrade, so I opted for the standard 500 gig HD. Afterwards, I tried calling and upgrading before the computer was built, but was basically told "sorry" but you can send the laptop back after you receive it in the mail if you're not pleased with it. Such a pathetic response and excuse, and one to which I just laughed. Long story short, I bought a 128 meg Crucial C300 6GB/s from Newegg, and have installed it in my Envy. Now here is where the problems start. To effectively run this SSD, the BIOS needs to be set to AHCI, along with a few other things in BIOS. Win 7 when set properly automatically sets things to optimize and better suit SSDs, like automatically turning on TRIM, disabling defragmenting, and so on. But because it was not installed from the factory the option they set on this computer is set for a HD, not set for an SS drive, and therefore my new installed SSD is running sub-par. I know HP locks their BIOS settings to keep idiots from ruining their systems for whatever reasons they have. However, I paid an extra 300 dollars for an extended warranty that covers ALL damage. Even if I was to throw it out a 3 story window because I had a bout of nerd rage, the laptop replacement is covered. That being said, I want full access to my BIOS settings. I am so far extremely disappointed in HP. From mediocre support and tech help to laptops that are very expensive yet locked and bared, which essentially is taking something we pay full price for and limiting what we get. And besides, warranties run out, and these settings you force onto us stay the same. For the money I paid for this Envy 17 3D, I could of easily had my own laptop built completely custom with full access granted to me, and with a few extra goodies that this laptop doesn't have. But hindsight is always 20/20. Basically, I want to know if there is any way I can gain full access to my BIOS to be able to change my settings to AHCI, and eventually in the future when this laptop starts to slip and become outdated and underpowered, the option to overclock so it will stay current as long as I can make it. I've searched Google and read countless pages with people asking the same question, with no real fix ever to be shown. It is to my understanding that updating or flashing the BIOS won't help, as it doesn't fix the problem. So is there some sort of firmware/software that we can use, or is there something on the board like a DIMM pin that needs moved? Or is there ANY suggestion at all? I mean this is like buying a exotic sports car for hundreds of thousands of dollars, only to find out that big 12 cylinder engine has 8 of its cylinders "locked" to prevent you from voiding the car's 3 year warranty. Give me a break. Again, with the extended warranty I paid out the rear for, even if I completely screw up my system and it's my fault, I'm covered. So.... how do I gain full access to my system?

[Huffer]

It is not really possible, unless you were to completely write a new BIOS, but that would take information HP guards jealously, not to mention supreme coding skills. I can't find a manual here which shows the contents of your BIOS screens but I find it hard to believe you cannot change the hard drive to ahci mode. With Windows 7 it would seem that even on a model with a standard SATA hard drive, the disk access would be set to ahci. What other BIOS settings do you need to change? I think TRIM is a software thing.

[Stonewall]

I know the BIOS isn't set right. When I did a clean reinstall of Win 7 on my new SSD and reloaded all the Envy related stuff back to the drive I checked out the details.  Windows hasn't activated TRIM, disabled disk defrag, or done anything that it's supposed to do when it detects an SSD drive.  And because HP's BIOs is basically useless, I can't change anything.  The only thing my BIOS does is let me change my boot order, and show me the system time and date, and allow me to run a hard drive test.  Thats it.   Might as well not even have a BIOS.

[erico]

Hi,

You might find this article interesting and perhaps informative. You are the King of paragraph world. 😉

regards,

erico

[Stonewall]

Article was interesting... but really had nothing to do with my question/problem.  He was more or less blogging about making an install of his preinstalled windows 7 to a blank SSD drive. More or less just the ways to go about doing it, not really anything to do with the BIOS settings or optimization of the drive.  In fact in the last paragraph he said boot speed was only 1-2 seconds faster.  With an SSD configured or 'tweaked' right, Win 7 can boot in under 5-7 seconds.

I've still yet to find someone, something, a guide, or anything of the sort, to help me with the problem of HP locking some of the computer settings (in this case BIOS) so that we as consumers are unable to do anything with our systems that we paid our hard earned money for.

[Huffer]

It is a problem for enthusiasts. HP does not make much in the BIOS open to the end user to configure, and I am unaware of any hack to get to the hidden settings. I am still not understanding if you think your computer is set to "legacy" drive access mode and not ahci. I am skeptical that HP presets the laptop with different hidden BIOS settings if you order the SSD option since there is only one BIOS available to install. I also, for my own curiosity, as I am considering an SSD, would like to know what other BIOS setting would optimize SSD performance. My own laptop is a Lenovo and it gives a few more BIOS settings options than HPs. I can't find much on optimizing BIOS settings for SSD.

[Stonewall]

Ok, well let me ask this.

Is anyone aware of the make and model of the 17 3D's MoBo?  I've tried like crazy to find the information, and nothing. Even 3rd party system scanners just show the board make/model as "Hewlett Packard 1590"  And a few of the tools will somply list the board as "Intel"  I was under the impression HP didn't make boards, and even after searching the product ID's and whatnot from the BIOS I came up empty handed

[erico]

What does CPUID CPU-z show as far as manufacturer and identification numbers for the system board?

[Huffer]

Laptops have custom one-off motherboards designed and built to the distributor's (HP) specs. They are not Asus, or MSI, etc. they are literally HP motherboards. This is not always true of HP desktops. Sometimes you can find an alternate BIOS for a desktop, but not a laptop.

[Stonewall]

Well I'm still curious about this sort of 'Catch 22'

If you pay for HP's extended warranty, any damage is covered.  Even damage we do, even if its on purpose.  So wouldn't that put those that had that extended warranty in a position of some sort of leverage?  I mean if you call the Envy support line and tell them you want your BIOS unlocked, they say they can't say anything to void a warranty, but you have any damage covered.  So... in a sense, couldn't they tell you?